Not Just Health & Fitness
Covering all things health and fitness, but not just health and fitness.
Expanding from the basics to encompass everything under the umbrella of living your best life, while sharing insights into my personal journey along the way.
Not Just Health & Fitness
#4 From Arthritis to Active Living How Helena's Mum Reclaimed Her Vitality
Join Helena as she welcomes a special guest onto the show—her very own mother—to share an awe-inspiring transformation that redefines what it means to age with vigor and vitality. Witness the evolution of a woman who took the reins on her health, transitioning from a desire for swift weight loss to embracing a lifestyle of fitness and strength. This intimate conversation pulls back the curtain on the struggles and successes of adopting a consistent routine, overcoming arthritis, and the sheer determination that led to mastering exercises once considered unattainable.
But this journey is about more than just exercise; it's a testament to the power of protein and the role it plays in aging gracefully. Discover the profound influence of nutrition and strength training on daily life, from the satisfaction of rising from the floor with ease to the deep-seated motivations driving a proactive approach to health and independence. Helena and her mum delve into the emotional catalysts that spur such transformations, underlining the importance of maintaining an active lifestyle to engage with family and cherish moments with grandchildren.
Wrapping up, Helena shares her own experiences, addressing the myths that often discourage older women from weight training. This episode shatters misconceptions, highlighting the remarkable benefits of building muscle, from enhanced body composition to easing arthritis symptoms. Plus, get a sneak peek into the exhilaration of a team photo shoot and the significance of accountability in achieving fitness goals. We'll leave you with actionable nutrition hacks and an invitation to join Helena in further discussions. If this conversation has touched you or could inspire someone you know, Helena encourages you to share the episode and connect with her on Instagram at helena underscore underscore sly for any podcast requests, comments, or coaching insights.
See my website for information on my coaching services https://helenaslyfitness.com/coaching-packages/
Connect with me on instagram https://www.instagram.com/helena__sly/
Welcome to the Not Just Health and Fitness podcast with Helena. I'll be talking all things health and fitness, but not just health and fitness. I'm expanding from the basics to encompass everything under the umbrella of living your best life, while sharing insights into my personal journey along the way. Let's get into today's topic. Hi friends, welcome to episode number four. This is a really exciting episode my first guest episode with a very special guest. I'm actually interviewing my mum today about her fitness journey and I'm so excited to be able to share that with you. Hi mum, hi, how are you going today? I'm very good, very, very good. I want to go straight into your fitness journey. Let's start from the beginning, when you very first started working with me, I guess. What were your intentions or thoughts then, and what sort of mindsets did you have around training and fitness at that time?
Speaker 2:So at that time I wasn't training regularly in my martial arts and I'd put on a considerable amount of weight. I wanted a quick weight loss opportunity and you happened to be looking for a crash test dummy and I thought you beauty, I'll do this for a few weeks and then I'll go back to my normal lifestyle.
Speaker 1:So that was while I was training well, doing my coursework for my training certificates, and I did need somebody to practice on, and mum had been talking about feeling uncomfortable with her weight and things and I was really hoping that I could encourage her with this fitness lifestyle. And that wasn't just training, that was also starting and learning from the very beginning, with tracking your food and my fitness power. How was that at the very beginning?
Speaker 2:I didn't think I was ever going to get the hang of it. I thought this is all just too hard and you were very good because you encouraged me to just keep doing it and the more I recorded things, the easier it would get, and that was exactly right. I didn't understand all of it at first, but I thought I'm going to trust your knowledge and hopefully learn from you and work it out as I went along, and I think it's like 1900 days I've tracked now Consistently.
Speaker 1:Mum is actually my most consistent client and with a lot of people in the industry. You'd know, usually when you train family or your coach family, they're often the least compliant or the least committed, especially if they're getting the service for free. And it can be really hard to get somebody who's compliant, who's not just paying for it or influenced by you in a different way. So, yeah, super cool to have my mum as an example of what happens when you're just compliant to the process and especially when we talk about your training journey and the fact that you've got arthritis hips, knees, feet and how training was at the beginning. Talk about how you felt training initially, like physically, and what's different now.
Speaker 2:So initially I thought this is almost all of it was just too hard. I couldn't get full range of motion. When I'm looking at the videos of how any particular exercise needed to be done, I thought how I'm doing it doesn't look like that. I'm never going to get it frustrated. I wouldn't even let you video me doing anything because it just looked so awful. But I wish I had now, because now those ranges of motions have improved and I'd love to be able to see the difference.
Speaker 1:With your lunges. I remember you used to be like I hate lunges being in my program and it was because your range of motion was so limited and I remember just telling you just get to the edge of where your current comfortable range of motion is. And with your programming I intentionally put lots of pauses in. Obviously the program is tailored to you being at a beginner at the beginning, but it put pauses in at that end of range motion which let your body learn that that's safe. And now, and along the way, I remember when you very first sent me the video when you had actually gotten a full range lunge for the very first time in your back knee, hit the floor and you actually cried with pride for yourself. But what other exercises do you remember being super hard at the very beginning that now come a whole lot easier to you?
Speaker 2:So deadlift was so difficult because, well, first of all, just even picking up the 20 kilo bar I struggled to do, and then when I was gradually building up weight, I didn't have the group strength to hold the bar for anything more than about 40 kilos. And we trained together yesterday or the day before and I was doing 70 kilo deadlifts with adenis straps. So that's a huge difference to me and I find it difficult to believe myself that there's been that much improvement in my grip strength, in my leg strength, just from doing the thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was just a matter of doing the thing, showing up and applying progressive overload and that's something that you've always been very good at is just looking at adding that little tiny bit more to the bow or that one or two extra reps whenever you could, as often as possible, and that progressive overload, little by little, a little, makes a lot. And it's been incredible to see and I don't think you actually understand how impressive it is that you can deadlift 70 kilos and, I'll point out, with very, very good technique, by the way, like the course, course stability and the actual lift itself. The technique is essentially perfect and I posted that on my Instagram yesterday.
Speaker 1:It's just so not normal and I know that you sort of get in your head sometimes about how slow the progress is or like I don't feel like I'm making progress in this area, but I'm like hold up and zoom out for a little bit, because what you could do before versus what you could do now, and what you can do now compared to the average woman in her 60s, is very, very different, and I know that I often use like this sort of expression or statement like go walk around a Westfields and find one other 60 on your old woman who can do what you do, and it's just totally different. I want you to go into a little bit like what's your routine, like being able to fit this in? Obviously, you still work full time. You're not just somebody who's staying at home and has all this extra leisurely time. Talk about like your morning routine and how you fit this into your life.
Speaker 2:So obviously my my aim is to fit in four workouts a week and I leave home just after seven o'clock in the morning to get my train for work. So to be able to do that, I wake up at four o'clock. I have something light to eat, because I don't. I don't like to personally train without some fuel. Have something light to eat, let that settle. Sometimes I take a pre-workout, sometimes I don't, and I aim to get into my little home gym by five o'clock so that I can work out for an hour to an hour and 20 minutes before I have my shower and get ready for work. So that's how I managed to fit it in. If I've had, if I've got to get into work early, I might skip a morning workout and have an extra rest day midweek and then do my workout on Saturday, and then that would be a little bit later in the morning. So yeah, I try and wake up at four o'clock Monday to Friday.
Speaker 1:To get it in. Yeah, and that's, I think, the important thing for people to recognise is like it is possible if you make it the priority, and it wasn't probably always easy for you to be getting up at four. Was it was that, when you were training, when we very first started as well.
Speaker 2:When we very first started I think I was it took me a while to work out how to to fit it all in and I was only doing three to start off with, because that was all I committed to initially, because I wanted, if I was going to commit to it, I wanted to be able to do it. So I think I did one or two mornings and and a weekend. So I only woke up early one or two days a week and slept in a bit later the rest of the week.
Speaker 1:The other thing I wanted to ask, sort of outside the training itself, but as a result of the training and a beating well and I guess the high protein is is another part of it that I'm just so glad that you are consistent with, because at your age it's more important and that's another thing I think a lot of people don't realise or don't associate with is that as you get older, your protein requirements actually go up, but the trend for most people is to eat less and less protein as they get older. But eating proper meals, tracking your calories to make sure that you've got, you know, enough fuel and you're probably eating more than most women your age and being able to maintain your weight and obviously getting that protein and things in, and doing this training, how does all of that affect you in your life, beyond how you look?
Speaker 2:I feel I feel like I've got more energy than I had, you know, five or six years ago and I just find that I can. I can focus more as well, just being more well fuelled. Just let me do a lot more things than I did before, because I think when I first started with you, I was trying to eat less, eat less, and then I would binge eat on something that wasn't as good for me health wise, so you'd a whole bar of chocolate or two bags of chips or something like that. But you're always steady on your diet. Because I'm having more filling meals on a regular basis, I'm less likely to do it. I'm not saying I don't ever do that, because chocolate yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think I think it's just made me more consistent in in everything that I do and the other part of that, like physically I guess I know that you've mentioned before like how easy it is to get up off the floor now, which is something that is real security, as as your child, as your, as your kid to know that my mom has a lesser risk of Falls and if you do have a fall, you are in a position where your Skeleton is stronger because of the weight training that you've done and also that you have the strength to get yourself up off the floor, whereas the common trend, once again, is that above 60, the falls risk increases rapidly and for a lot of people, that's got the risk of, say, like, breaking a hip or something, and Even if there's not a major injury, a lot of people really struggle to get off the floor.
Speaker 1:You've mentioned, like you used to have to sort of turn turtle to get off the floor absolutely and have sent me videos a few times where you're like I've just sat down on the floor to do my Cable face pool and I was able to get up the floor just by using, you know, one hand, rather than having to turn all the way over, and little things like that are important. Do you mind if we talk a little bit on the falls I guess, and how that Hits you sort of emotionally or that gives you that bit of security when we think about Auntie Helen's falls.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely so.
Speaker 2:It was really heartbreaking for us Watching my sister's health decline and she did have a couple of falls, especially in that last year where she was unable to get up off the floor, and that was a real motivator for me, because I Don't think she would have had some of the health issues that she had if she'd been able to get up off the floor by herself, whether that was turning turtle and being able to pull herself up or just use a hand to to push up off the floor.
Speaker 2:She simply didn't have that strength. So that was a real it did. It hit me hard and it was something that that has become part of my why I want to have the strength to get up off the floor by myself Should I have a fall. I want to be able to Run around and lift up my grandchildren, not have them have to come to me and climb on me. I want to be able to be active in my older age and and that's part of my why that gets me up at four o'clock in the morning- it's so impressive and it's so real.
Speaker 1:What would you say to other women around your age who Maybe think that weight training is is for younger people only and they're maybe too old for it, and it and it doesn't matter or it's not gonna have any impact? Oh I.
Speaker 2:I think I would have Said something similar myself, that that's for the younger people, that's for people who bodybuild, don't want to get too bulky, all those things. It's like I've been training hard for five years and we're just starting to see muscles now it's it's. You can't possibly get too bulky, training a few times a week. I think weight training has also helped my body composition change. So at the same weight I am now, I looked very different the last time I was this weight. So it's definitely got a whole bunch of benefits as well as the strength aspect. And I think, just start, commit to something small to start with, and then you can tick that box off and if you feel good about it, you can add some more in. But just start, don't wait. There's never going to be a perfect time. The time I started was actually quite a upheaval time in our family life and it would have been easy to say I'll wait until it's less hectic to do it. It's just like people say I'll wait until the new year or I'll wait until Monday.
Speaker 1:Start now, just do it now and I think, yeah, back to that sort of little by little. A little makes a lot and the progress that can be made over a year is incredible. But people sort of look at what they have achieved in a month and go, oh, this is not working past enough. But you got to think about how many years of decline is there already and how many years does it take to undo that. But even with your arthritis, there'd be other people, once again your age, who think that the fact that they've got arthritis or they've got bad knees or something like that is a reason to not start. What would you say to them?
Speaker 2:I think that doing strength training has really helped my arthritis especially. We did sort of some prehab type things beforehand, building up muscles around my knees to help those ranges of motion. So I am in less pain now than I was five or six years ago. I don't take anti-inflammatories unless I've had a flare up and I manage it really well. So if you've got those kinds of issues, you know. If you'd prefer to see somebody who specializes in that, great. But movement is everything, because if you don't move it you lose it. Can I just talk about my stride?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so before I was working with Helena, I had noticed myself walking past a window and I saw that I was kind of shuffling, almost like my sister who was 20 odd years older than me. I wasn't taking a full length stride, so I was already kind of making a conscious effort to take along the stride, but it hurt my hips, it hurt my knees and it hurt my feet and now I would say that my stride is a similar length now to what it was 20 or 30 years ago.
Speaker 2:So, that has been from building up strength little by little. It wasn't straight away and it was oh, I didn't notice it. I didn't notice it happening, but I can see it now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and once again that more confidence. Stride left-shoulders, lifting your feet when you walk rather than chuffling. Once again, less risk of tripping over, and you are actually quite active with finding ways to get more movement in your steps around work. Tell them what you do with that.
Speaker 2:So I work about 20 minutes away from the railway station so I have a 15 or 20 minute walk in the morning and in the afternoon, but I also make an effort of a lunchtime to walk around the park. There's a lovely park near where I work so I do at least one lap of the park, sometimes an extra block, and I aim to get my 10,000 steps in at least five days a week. Often it's more like 12 or 14,000 Monday to Friday. So average over the week is well and truly 10,000 a day on the days that I'm working.
Speaker 1:And I know that we were sort of talking before about how aesthetics is not the main thing, but there's definitely been a change in your body composition over this time and a comment that I've heard you make before is that you look a lot more feminine now with the extra shapes that we've built and it's not the main thing. But you are the shape of you now compared to the shape of you before training, because I know a lot of people would look at you now, look at your shape and look how fit you look, and look at me and go, okay, they've got good genetics. But if you compare your shape to other members of your family and how the shape that you were before, it's totally different, right? Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. My waist is smaller, but the fact that we've worked on upper body length, I've got broader at the top, so it gives the illusion of that hourglass type shape. And yeah, who doesn't like to feel more feminine?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, and so the muscle has given you a more feminine shape than what you had previously. We were more of a, we were starting to lean towards more of an apple body type, and now we've got those waist to hip ratios, which is not just nice because it looks more feminine, it's also an indicator of health to have that greater hip to weight waist ratio. And, yeah, if you look at all of your sisters, it's not necessarily the same shape and you can attribute that to your weight. Training is not made you look bulky. We've built muscle, but we've built it strategically in areas that we're going to help improve your function and also in areas that we're going to build that sort of hourglass athletic physique on physique and where you're sitting out with your confidence. I've got a team photo shoot coming up soon and you have decided to jump on board in that. You've never done anything like that before, right.
Speaker 2:Absolutely not it's. It's kind of exciting and kind of scary. It also gives me some accountability to make sure that I stay on track. I'm pretty excited because I'm I'm fairly sure I'm the oldest member of the team. We might have one other mum who's closer, kind of close in age to me, but pretty much it's all ladies in their late 20s, 30s, and I want to feel part of that. I want to, I want to feel beautiful, just exactly how I am, and I'd like to be able to record that. The only other time I've maybe had, you know, nice photos taken has been my wedding day or the wedding days of my children that are already married, but I've never done anything like that. So so something new and scary. Let's step out of our comfort zone.
Speaker 1:I love that. Have you got any other messages to sort of put out to anybody who's on the fence about starting a training program, whether that be working with a PT in person or starting with online coaching? What would your advice be?
Speaker 2:I think it's really been helpful for me to have accountability, because it's easy to talk yourself out of things If you feel like you're going to let somebody else down. That's a bit of a motivator and we know that motivation doesn't last for a long time. But the fact that you're going to check in with your coach once or twice a week and know that you not only let yourself down, but you've let your coach down if you haven't been compliant, that's just one more little thing to help you stay consistent. Now, none of us are perfect. We aim for the 80-20 rule. You'd be compliant most of the time and you're going to see big changes.
Speaker 2:It's so important, and the aim of most coaches is not that you work with them long term, but for you to learn enough so that you can continue this journey on your own with little to no guidance. So there's education involved in it as well, and you can go out on your own and work out. Oh, maybe I need to reduce my calorie intake just now because I'm being less active. Maybe I need to increase my calories because I'm wanting to build more muscle. These are things that you learn along the way, so having a coach will A help you be more accountable and B educate you to be able to move forward on your own.
Speaker 1:Absolutely On that education piece around nutrition. What are some of the hacks that you've learned over the years as far as wanting to manipulate things to be able to contribute to, like a weight loss phase? What are some things that you could maybe say I know, for example, we often talk about, you know, swapping out sweet potato for pumpkin. Suddenly you can have double the amount of volume on your plate. What are some other things that you've picked up along the way that make it an easy tool to be able to manipulate things for the result that we're targeting at the time.
Speaker 2:So initially, increasing protein helps with improving how full you feel. I wasn't eating anywhere near enough protein and didn't realize it, so increasing protein has helped and learning other food swaps like things that we were scared of, or things that I was scared of was, oh potatoes. They can't possibly be good for you. They help you feel so full. I love having potatoes. I've probably eaten more potatoes when I'm trying to be in a small deficit than I do in a building type phase. I like to include things like egg whites that help with increasing protein and helping you feel full. Having at least one big salad a day in a weight loss phase I can have a huge meal, huge meal with all different salads. That's going to make me feel full on very little calories and I wasn't aware of just how much of that I could do.
Speaker 1:Or even like the dip that you made the other night, which would normally be made with sour cream. You swapped it out for Greek yogurt, knowing that it tastes similar but has quite a different macronutrient profile Things like that. I'm always impressed with seeing you come up with little macro hacks, and it's it's really, really cool. I think I'll probably wrap us up there. Thank you so so much for for sharing with me. I know that a lot of people are going to benefit For anyone who has tuned in. If you got any benefit out of this episode or if you think someone else will, please share with somebody else. If you've got any feedback for me or questions, helena underscore underscore sly on instagram is where to find me to make any further podcast requests, give me feedback or, of course, if you want to inquire for coaching. Until next time, much love.
