food, fall and feelings

hi babes,

i don’t know about you, but lately i’ve been extra, extra hungry. like, afternoon munchy munch town, baking treats for the kids and then eating them basically by myself, solo late night nibbles after hubs goes to bed, protein shakes on top of actual meals, can’t seem to get enough HUNGRY.

and i’ve been feeling all the feels about it. as a fitness professional and sort-of wellness writer, it’s super-embarrassing to admit - almost painful, actually - that i’m overeating (gasp!) but i’m writing about it today anyway because:

1) i figure i’m probably not the only one.

2) i’m actively engaged in dismantling diet culture and guilt & shame around food.

3) i have tips! satiety-increasing, shame-free, not-too-restrictive tips to help deal with emotional overeating without driving yourself crazy.

why do we eat too much?

people overeat for a reason, and it’s not “simply a lack of willpower.” i’ll say it again: we overeat for a reason, and understanding our reason is the first step to changing the behavior itself. some common reasons for overeating are:

1) needing actual real nourishment,

2) stress & big feelings,

3) processing cultural indoctrination about food (being told to clean your plate, not wanting to waste food, social pressure to eat, other kinds of learned food culture paradigms); or

4) all of the above.

contrary to the bitchy little voice in our heads trying to food shame us over a few extra cookies, there’s always a reason for an unwanted behavior, and it’s much more effective to address the reason before condemning the outcome/behavior itself. as one of my favorite bloggers writes, addressing an outcome before its cause is like “putting vitamins in poop” - meaning, not effective at all in changing either behaviors or outcomes. this is actually good news because it means that instead of trying to will ourselves out of a craving (or beating ourselves up for caving), we’ll have more success with less struggle from accepting our behavior as natural, looking at what reasons we might have to be extra hungry, and then addressing those reasons.

today, i’ll write about the first two reasons, needing food and having feelings.

nourishment

i realize that even though i don’t “diet” per se, my default setting is to try to get away with eating as little possible throughout the day, both in terms of quantity and frequency of meals. part of this is due to being a fitness professional (ab series + food babies = no bueno) and being busy, but it’s also from being taught somewhere along the line that surviving on as little as possible is a positive. you know, so the little voice in my head can say, “good girl, you’ve subsisted on 8 almonds and a green juice for 10 hours.” eye roll, big time.

thing is, this restrictive plan backfires daily when i get home and my body screams for calories to make up for all the barre classes, speed-walking, breastfeeding and general shenanigans of a typical day. cue the toddler snacks until dinner, the nibbling while cooking, the desperate post-dinner protein shake in an effort to avoid eating cookies, and then how good cookies are when dipped in chocolate protein shakes.

it’s taking me a moment to adjust, but i have definitely noticed that when i eat full, real meals throughout the day, i feel better and snack less. real meals make it drastically easier to skip the 4pm goldfish and animal crackers and, since i avoid the blood sugar spike from such treats, i have less cravings for the rest of the evening. by full meal, i mean all the macros - protein, carbs & fat - and no, smoothies and protein bars don’t count as meals, even if they contain the calories. for many of us, they just don’t register with the brain as a meal.

resist the urge to restrict, and you’ll resist the urge to binge. you simply won’t need to.

eating feelings

now for the second reason - stress! anxiety! heartache! fear! there are many feelings that seem to demand a comforting blanket of fat. when you think about it, turning to food for comfort is a natural, normal process that makes sense. from the time we’re babies, our caregivers offer sustenance when we are upset. from both breast and bottle, we’re given warm, sweet, fatty substances with a side of snuggle and hug. so it makes sense that in times of stress we might turn to warm gooey desserts, satisfying piles of carbs, or the confoundingly beautiful combo of cold sweet fat that is ice cream.

in the world of internet law of attraction blogs, having excess weight is understood to be a protective reaction to fear. and this also makes sense - instinctively, humans fear scarcity (not enough food = death), loneliness (loss of tribe = less food, more death), and failure (unsuccessful quest for food = hunger/eventually death). thus, our bodies ensure survival by holding onto extra energy stores (aka muffin top) to prepare for the lean times and prevent death. and while our circumstances are different these days, the threat of scarcity, loneliness or failure are all still very much present - only now, we have easy access to abundant comforting calories.

it’s important to note that having excess weight does not mean possessing a bigger, rounder or softer body than we see on the magazine covers. by excess weight, i mean mass that doesn’t feel right on our particular frame, a feeling of awkward heaviness, of discomfort, of not fitting right. i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again - big doesn’t mean bad, fat doesn’t mean unfit, and skinny doesn’t mean healthy!

for me, it turns out that starting a business based on my great passion and entire career is scary af. and all the learning curves can feel stressful, especially when mixed with a fair amount of uncertainty and scarcity of resources/money. i realized that all my late night wide-eyed nibbling wasn’t so much because i’m a weak-willed hedonist but because this is a time of growth for me. quantum leaps are uncomfortable, and sometimes that shit is overwhelming and scary, while rainbow cookies and chocolate covered peanuts are happy and familiar. sometimes it feels literally comforting just to be full.

takeaways

you know what? once i acknowledged all this out loud, the cravings and snack attacks have all but gone away. thus, here’s my tips for dealing with an out-of-control appetite that’s bumming you out:

1) look at what “normal eating” is for you and check yourself - is it actually enough? is it balanced? are you restricting too much? if you’re trying to subsist on energy bars with a side of intermittent fasting, it’s time to adjust.

2) eat towards steady blood sugar. steady blood sugar prevents cravings and naturally promotes balance, the way i do this is to avoid sweet things for breakfast and to eat protein, fat and vegetables whenever i eat starchy or carby things.

3) ask yourself what’s up. are there reasons your might be fearful or stressed? like, i dunno, a global pandemic and the upheaval of all things normal? write about it. talk about it with a friend. acknowledge it somehow and feel more free after. for me, the more i talk about my fears and challenges, the more insight and assistance i get, and the more calm i feel/less chips i eat.

4) finally, look at the calendar. fall is the season of preparation for the scarcity of winter, and many of us feel an uptick in appetite for that very natural, logical reason. and not for nothing, fall food is delicious and comforting by nature (i’ve been super into smooth warm vegetable soups, stick to your ribs beans & rice, and roasted squash by the plateful).

anyway the point is that once i silenced the tired internal monologue of “you eat too much and suck and oughta be ashamed of yourself,” i was able to actually see what was going on with me, and since then i’ve felt immensely more capable of eating the way i want to, and even letting the cookies get stale.

anyway, happy eating, babes! and let me know - do the holidays have you eating your feelings? i love to hear from you!

with love & butter,

annie

Change is Good

today i have for you some big news and a little playlist, as well as a little bit of real talk because, well, i'm honest like that. lately i've been in the midst of a big fun shift away from what isn't serving me/my business anymore and moving towards something wonderful that will position me to be a better teacher, mover and babe, so without further ado.

for real, though

my dedicated readers may have noticed that i've been quiet these past few weeks. i mean, it's august, so there's that, but honestly, not only has it taken this long for the stars to align so that both kids are napping at the same time, i just haven't been able to get into the headspace of writing well/beyond the frazzled whining of a mother of young children in a pandemic.

i subscribe to the old saying: "when you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all." not that i have mean things to say to anyone, but there's a fine line between a narrative-style newsletter and an online journal kvetch-fest, and it just seems there's enough anxiety swirling around these days that i don't need to add to the pile. like many, i'm equal parts worried and scared of my kids getting covid, and also grateful and happy for our health and safety and numerous luxuries. (also, i love new york SO MUCH.) and, like many others - especially us hyper-sensitive, feel-y folks - i'm devastated, exhausted and terrified by the news of the world pretty much on a daily basis, and i don't have anything useful to say about any of it.

except this: apparently i've developed a new defense mechanism against nervous breakdowns called housecleaning, so if you need me, i'm probably vacuum-mopping the floor for the 500th time or psychotically scrubbing a sink! maybe it's the pandemic talking, but there are few things more peaceful to me lately than a clean living room. not the worst pandemic habit, i suppose.

anyway, all i know is that being able to work out with my beautiful crew of barrebabe people is my true saving grace, and i am damn lucky to have you. class is a daily mental reset, physical rejuvenator, and soul re-energizer, and the physical benefits of feeling connected, strong, toned and pain-free are small miracles in themselves. while barre class might not solve climate change or save babies or cool the oceans, it most definitely helps us to feel better, and i believe feeling better is the first and most necessary step to actually being better and working towards a better world.

thank you for showing up, creating some good vibes and excellent glutes and sharing a little piece of the internet with me. let's keep pulsing!

and now, here's a little playlist to say thank you :)

that's it for now, babes. stay cool & stay tuned!
with love & planks,

annie

waist not, want not

where abs and mindset intersect

disclaimer: if you are super mega comfy with your abs, dgaf about abs or maybe think it’s silly or a bit obsessive to think in great and serious detail about what lies beneath your shirt, stop reading. you'll just get bored, and you have other things to do with your day. i'm in support of that - just giving fair warning that this post is not for you.

but if you, like me, are fascinated by the somewhat mysterious real estate between your ribs and pelvis and all the wonders therein, keep reading. if you feel like you’ve tried everything in the book to bring yourself towards that ultimate yet ephemeral goal of a “flat” stomach and still fall short, this one’s for you. and if you, like me, have what one of my dance teachers called “smart pretty girl syndrome” and what i call the “pernicious p's” - perfectionism, people-pleasing, and/or brainwashing by the patriarchy - definitely stick around.

why? because chances are good that if you’ve taken a fitness or dance class of pretty much any kind in the past 40 years or so - including my own - you have been told a great big lie about how to work your abs. the lie in question is not only not very useful for strengthening or toning abdominals, it actually works against us, contributing to low belly pooching and even pelvic floor issues. because of it, i missed the point of many an ab series for years.

the culprit? the all-pervasive “draw your navel to your spine,” “pull belly button in” mantra.

i'm not down.

“navel to spine” is a shortcut cue and doesn’t tell the whole story, yet so many teachers repeat it every day. i know i have. i'd heard it so often in my training i'd never thought to question it. it’s certainly a hell of a lot easier to say than “pull your belly button and surrounding areas in and up” or “engage your transverse abs by pulling their horizontal muscle fibers in towards center and bring the entire abdominal wall in and upwards to support your internal organs and spine and lift your pubic bone towards the navel and use your muscles to stabilize your pelvis…”

it's not that the cue itself as a sentence in a vacuum is particularly damaging but words have power. cues matter, and when repeated over and over by instructors and then performed intensely and constantly by a roomful of overachieving women who are thorough af in everything they do, a shoddy cue can become a problem.

shortcuts don't work for the long run.

getting great core engagement is one of those simple but not so simple ideas. it’s a learned technique, and like anything, there's more than just one way to do it. the point is that when we, as participants or instructors, cling to a cue and overdo it, we are not listening to our bodies or the bodies in front of us and create patterns that do not serve us. i've written about this before, but i mention it today because i’ve noticed lately a common correlation between low belly pooching and very strong and defined middle and upper abs (which was totally me, until not too long ago) and i realize why - it's because we have all been told to pull in at the waist, and we did. go figure.

the problem is that too much pulling in of navel to spine can result in imbalanced abdominal activation, aka upper ab gripping. when we cinch around the waist without first lifting the low ab & pelvic floor muscles, we not only leave them out (literally), we actually put pressure down and out on this area which can eventually lead to issues like stress incontinence or even prolapse (over time or after pregnancy, y’all - calm down, you’re not going to actually break your vagina by pulling your belly button in. at least, not right away).

what to do instead? well, pilates and barre with me, duh. but also - consider this: your waist is not your abs. you have multiple muscles that make up the abdominal wall, front back and sides, and these muscles work together towards various goals - holding you up against gravity, for instance, or stabilizing and moving your trunk, pressure management in breathing, and containing vital organs, maybe even protecting growing humans. it’s so much more than the waistline alone, and sometimes in order to get things firing correctly, the go-to muscles have to chill out to let the ones in the back row have a chance.

here's a replacement shortcut cue i use. the next time you hear “belly button to spine,” instead think, “lift pubic bone up.” this helps the lower abs to fire and to distribute the work (and pressure) more evenly throughout the abdominals. try it for a few workouts and let me know how it goes.

what does this have to do with the pernicious p's of perfectionism, people-pleasing and the patriarchy? well for one, the cultural expectation of female physical perfection as expressed through abdominal flatness is definitely learned, not innate. there’s some patriarchy for you. as is learning to feel that your value as a human has anything to do with the topography of your midsection. (spoiler alert - it doesn't.)

the perfectionist part is baked into the tendency to overachieve so that a casual catchphrase can become an absolute law because it is done so constantly and intently. and people-pleasing? i think we all have a little of this. as a kid i wanted my dance teacher's praise, so i tried to do as she said. later, as a fitness professional, i honestly thought no one would believe a word i said about dance or exercise if my stomach wasn’t flat - a mindset that was misguided to say the least. now i know y’all don’t care about my abs. you care about yours.

(which brings me to my PSA for the day: don’t choose instructors based on how they look. choose based on how they make you feel.)

i will say that personally it was a big deal for me to let go of this cue. it had all the weight of a paradigm shift. i was even angry, in a way. but it wasn’t my teachers’ fault. ultimately it was my own inability to be brave enough to listen to my own body and try something outside of what i was told was the the truth. but that, my friends, is no longer the case. and if you are exercising a lot and feel your abs aren’t firing/appearing as you’d like, i can help troubleshoot. take class, book a 30 minute private, ask your questions and get some answers and exercises to try. i'm here for it.

pilates, sex & strength

i've been thinking a lot lately about the differences between men and women.

this might sound beyond obvious, but until recently, i really hadn't fully processed how much i internally ignore these differences. namely, that men naturally possess about 20x more testosterone than women do, which matters because testosterone is responsible for all things strength, speed and muscle-related when it comes to physicality. it's why men are generally bigger and stronger than we are, even if we outweigh them (or out-train them).

without realizing it, i've always held myself to physical standards set by and for men, such as tits-to-floor pushups, long fasting windows, abdominal flatness, or the hegemony of leanness. and i've always, always come up short.

thus, i've felt just a little bit like a failure, all the time.

it's like my numerous successes and triumphs didn't count as much because they were still less than. i could do a headstand, but because it wasn't one-handed handstand pushups it somehow didn't count. for all i've tried & trained, mostly what i have to show for it is tight pecs and a bitchy internal monologue.

is this just me?

i doubt it. when i was growing up, we were taught that equality means that girls can do anything boys can do, which i took to mean that girls should do everything that boys could do. and that because as women we must demand our equality, we need to be able to do all the things boys can do. to prove ourselves deserving of recognition of our personhood. to show that we are capable of the independence from patriarchal bullshit that our feminist foremothers demanded for us.

and while this is good - definitely a step up, at least - it's inherently flawed. now that i have a son and daughter i see how ridiculous it is to expect either of them to have the same capabilities as the other. boy bodies can't do what girl bodies can (i.e. pregnancy and childbirth, the miracle of life and whatnot) - why should i expect my body to do what a man's can? 

but i do. after nearly 20 years of trying, i still can't really do a pull-up.

i still feel inadequate when i can't lift my suitcase over my head. i'm pissed and jealous when my non-exercising husband can outrun me, outlift me, and out-pushup me. intermittent fasting and low carb eating are unsustainable for me, yet i still feel guilty about having toast with my eggs or caving to cravings. i've felt like a wimp when i've needed help over a chain link fence (yes, this has come up more than once and no, don't ask) or when i couldn't scale the side of an empty water tower while trespassing as a teen. i still beat myself up for the slightest softness of my lower abs, even though i have an entire set of organs in there that men don't. 

here's the point: 

when standards are unrealistic and inappropriate, practices are not aligned and cannot yield the desired results. 

now look - gender, like sexuality, exists on a spectrum and there are plenty of strong-ass women who can do all the push & pull-ups and plenty of normal healthy men who cannot be bothered. there's a range of “normal” hormone and fitness levels in each of the sexes and honestly, any kind of thorough discussion of that is way beyond my scope. 

i also realize dividing the sexes into two contrasting categories is reductive af. i'm not trying to tell anyone they are wrong in any way. if you're a chick and you love fasting and ironman competitions, i'm all for it - you do you, boo. but if you're like me and have tried your absolute damndest to do the fit man things well and never quite got there, i'm here to say: you're not doing it wrong, you do have willpower, and you don't suck.

so what happens when we flip the script and adjust our standards to fit our actual selves? what becomes possible when we stop acting like apples need to be more like oranges?

from what i've gathered so far, here are 3 key strategies and their results:

strategy 1: understand that “modification” doesn't necessarily mean “easy"

result: better strength gains & faster progress

the more we poo-poo “modifications,” such as keeping knees on the floor during pushups, the less we actually advance in our training. for instance, my pushups never got better until i practiced “girl pushups” and actually strengthened myself to the point that i could do a “real” pushup with excellent form. my advice? work where you are today.

form first, friends. always. 

strategy 2: focus on capabilities, rather than limitations

result: full body benefits & a more positive attitude

in this pushup example, for instance, i also learned that when i did chest-opening and back-strengthening exercises that i could do well, my pushups got a lot better. and when i learned to lean into my natural strengths, like flexibility and connection to my body, i could unlock the restrictions and stiffnesses that prevented me from finding my best alignment and doing great pushups. the pushups got better, too, when i strengthened other parts of my body that weren't so hard for me to deal with, like abs. and it's worth remembering that male structure tends to be bigger in the shoulders than the pelvis which is the exact opposite of my body. it's harder to lift heavy things when they are farther away from you.

strategy 3: redefine measures of success - both the journey and the destination

result: success in aligned goals, sense of satisfaction, energy for new challenges

having babies most definitely helped me appreciate the wonders of my female physicality so that i could - had to - redefine my measures of success and reframe my thinking about what i needed to do to be successful. it also taught me how to ask for help, that i am deserving of help, and that others need my help, too (and that doesn't make them any weaker or less than or whatever stories i used to tell myself about myself.)

luckily you don't need to actually procreate to do this. try unfollowing accounts that make you compare & despair and instead follow people who look and behave a little more like you do. (better yet? put your phone down.) be brave enough to send more of your energies towards getting good at things that bring you satisfaction and joy, even if they don't seem to be appreciated by the world (yet). and remember that underneath every goal is a desire for a feeling, so find things that give you the good feelings and don't worry too much about the rest. 

finally, remember that just because it's possible, doesn't mean it's desirable.

you know what pretty much always is desirable for everyone, though?

health.

confidence.

feeling good.

and thankfully for that, we have pilates.

invented by a man, but genius enough for a woman ;)

mindset & body confidence

one truth about me is that while i preach body positivity all day long, my own internal monologue is not always so cheery. i am certainly nowhere near body neutrality. while i appreciate those that have found freedom from self-judgment, oppressive beauty standards and all the tragedies of aspirational modern womanhood, that just isn't where i live.

i have always been motivated to seek beauty and to make my body into something beautiful. i'm a deeply physical person, and all my greatest pleasures are physical - listening to music and dancing, cooking and eating, feeling sand between my toes and swimming in the ocean, snuggling soft babies and being kissed by my husband with his strong stubbly jaw. experiencing the world through the body gets me out of my head for a little while and is a welcome break from the swirl of thoughts and feelings that constantly jumble my mind.

moreover, i honestly think a little vanity can be a great motivator towards health & fitness, provided it's not the end-all be-all of why we work out, and as long as our sense of self-worth isn't measured solely against cultural norm beauty standards. my workouts have never been about making our bodies fit into some cookie cutter ideal of fitness or beauty. rather, my approach is to use modalities that reveal and highlight the individual specialness of each body, so that her muscles, whatever their size or shape, look (and function at) their own unique best.

all that said, as positive as i am, i still grew up steeped in diet culture and fat phobia, around women on perma-diets who were taught to hate their bodies, and the body dysmorphia is real (as is transitioning to motherhood and feeling the feels about what the hell i'm supposed to wear on any given occasion that doesn't require leggings).

so when i went to try on my jean shorts and summer clothes as i packed for austin and nearly nothing fit right, i felt frustrated, ashamed and a bit hopeless. for all i do to take care of myself, it still wasn't enough.

immediately i began plotting my weight loss strategy and analyzing everything i was doing wrong. cut gluten, for real this time. stop eating cookies with the children and finishing their mac and cheese, you pathetic, weak emotional eater. all the legumes aren't doing you any favors, better skip those. and, my favorite - your body just isn't the same after having babies and you'll never feel the way you used to. the feeling in my chest was a mix of sadness, frustration and shame. all because a pair of cutoff levi's i bought second hand in flagstaff, az tore a little at the pocket when i buttoned them.

but then i paused and looked at almost-two-year-old Ramona, who is beyond beautiful with her little round belly and long legs and sweet, sensitive skin and i realized the time is now to help fortify her against the trials and supreme waste of mind energy that await her in our objectifying, youth-worshipping and fat-phobic world. already, her brother calls her fat because she is round where he is straight. (which, p.s., is a mystifying bummer to me because we never use the word fat in our house to describe a person. ever. but that is how prevalent and toxic it is that my highly observant and normally very sweet son would pick this up so early in life.)

so, right then and there, i shifted my mindset towards what i'd want Ramona to think about herself, should she ever be faced with a similar jean shorts dilemma. instead of beating myself up for being a normal human woman and starting some major self-improvement project, i realized that i had an awesome opportunity to flip the script of my ongoing self-criticism and show my body unconditional love. perhaps last week's indulgences are just now showing up and we'll de-puff in a few days (this is, in fact, what happened). perhaps the jeans don't fit because all the heavy weights posterior chain work actually works and my booty is finally growing - hooray! let me celebrate these curves because my hips are indeed 4 inches wider than before, and that just means more to love, and more to scoop, in pilates.

now i can think: look at this body, the obvious care that is being taken with it, the magic within it that makes it grow and change and shrink and expand and do its own thing. and i have to say, while i don't think i received a single compliment over the weekend, it didn't matter, because i just felt awesome in my own skin. this is key. i finally felt the body positivity, the love from within, that i talk about all the time, and truly didn't need it validated from the outside world.

the mindset shift, again, was this: instead of getting frustrated and feeling like i needed to diet my way to some aspirational body ideal, i instead saw an opportunity to practice unconditional self-love. i would not force my hips into too-tight things or quietly shame myself about a second breakfast taco. rather, i would let myself be curious about my extra curves, about how an exercise actually felt in my body as opposed to what i thought the results would be.

and while i still don't really know what to wear as a 40 year old mother of 2 as opposed to a 25 year old bartender (the extremes of my wardrobe at the moment), it doesn't matter. with extra size comes extra bearing, a bigger presence, and i am not at all mad at that.

You Gotta Like It To Do It

hi babes!

today's newsletter is a little bit practical/STUDIO-related news and a bit about the power of like (read: actual enjoyment) when it comes to healthful habits & fitness. enjoy!

located at 87 richardson st (just a couple blocks from mccarren park), my beautiful new studio is a place devoted to helping curious movers and creative babes feel better now. i'm open for private pilates sessions NOW (get in while you can, babes, before my schedule fills!) with VERY small in-person pilates & barre classes coming soon.

healthful habits don't have to suck

i've always said that the best exercise is the one you'll actually do. and because we need to move roughly every day of the rest our lives, we may as well ENJOY it, no? well, the same applies to food.

my parents raised my sister and i on extremely healthy food and for this, in many ways, i am forever grateful. i know that childhood nutrition sets us up for a lifetime of health, and i know i'm lucky to have had such forward-thinking parents who belonged to a food co-op, pretty much never had soda or junk food of any kind in the house and bought organic everything as much as they could afford.

but there's another side to being raised on "hippie" food. for one, the way we ate was so different from my friends that as a child i would go literally insane at my friends' houses and consume entire sleeves of oreos and peanut m&m's by the bowlful. my very plain lunches never seemed appetizing to me, so i frequently would skip them and instead scrounge for change to buy ice cream (because what, really, is better than a fudgsicle) or nibble on people's extra cheetos. when i was finally on my own at college, i remember having nothing in my apartment except ramen noodles and frozen cool whip for a several months, and my preferred lunch in between dance classes was skittles and a diet coke.

pure & natural rebellion, obviously, but luckily i figured out early on that these previously forbidden foods didn't make me feel particularly good, and i got a restaurant job and was able to eat better food (aka actual food).

the other problem with the hippie foodways in my house is that we also lived by the 80s & 90s-era diet culture advice to eat low fat and, because of my dad's chronic high blood pressure, low salt. the low salt-ness meant that otherwise healthy and delicious foods came out bland and hard to eat (what the hell, dad - boiled potatoes, cabbage and broccoli with no salt or butter????) and eating low fat meant that this growing teenage girl was never satisfied because i was never satiated. the intuitive desire for fat energy in food had to be satisfied somehow, and thus quantities of grains and sugars were consumed instead (such as absolutely insane amounts of pasta followed by those weird snackwell's lowfat cookies).

it also means that to this day, there's a bunch of "health food" that i actively, vehemently dislike; including, but not limited to: whole wheat bread, brown rice, tofu, tempeh, lowfat yogurt, quinoa, bean sprouts, flax seeds and raisins, thank you very much. i don't eat any of those things, and yet i am, by all standards, healthy af (and probably a teensy bit of a hippie still). i eat plenty of fat, and while i steer clear of many packaged foods with their crazy amounts of sodium, i am not shy with salt in my own cooking. i eat protein in abundance and carbs for dinner, and always fruits & vegetables. i eat things i love prepared the way i like and it works - both body and mind are happy and healthy in equal measure, most of the time.

now, if you love these foods, by all means eat them, and save me a bite to help change my mind. the point is - it's better to eat what YOU like and makes YOU feel good, not because it's a trend, not even because the american heart association tells you to, and definitely not because every other gorgeous fitness babe on your instagram feed is a gluten-free vegan or subsists entirely on chicken breasts, kale and protein powder. now that i have kids of my own, i try to be careful not to stigmatize or fetishize foods. i offer choices, i'm not stingy with treats, i make vegetables taste delicious (broccoli and cheese, y'all, holy goodness) and i let them eat brioche as sandwich bread because fed is good and balance is great.

in closing, babes, i hope you are loving how you're eating, moving and choosing to spend your precious time. if you need ideas, i'm here, and i hope you choose to move with me :)

with love & planks,

annie

Hey Hey Barre Babes,

Rough Guide to Prenatal Exercise

One of the best parts of my job is that I get to work with people, mainly women of childbearing age, to empower them in their bodies, fitness and wellness goals. While every woman and every pregnancy is unique, I've noticed some common misconceptions about prenatal exercise safety and confusion as to what to expect while you're exercising pregnant.

Moving mindfully throughout my first and now second pregnancy has saved my sanity, kept me grounded and connected to my body, helped me deal with common pre/postpartum discomforts, and made my recovery to full strength and a better-than-ever body relatively easy. However, it's important to remember that pregnancy is not the time to strive for a personal best record, train for your first marathon, or really to pursue any other physical goal aside from feeling good, strong, connected and confident. 

To that end, here's my rough guide to caring for your prenatal body through movement.

Tip #1: YOU'RE STILL YOU
The main thing is to understand that the physical changes of pregnancy are both gradual and constant. You don't suddenly become a different person with a totally different body and strength level the second you get pregnant, or enter your second or third trimester. The body changes a little bit each day, and it's important to be able to check in with and listen to your body, to adapt to the changes while maintaining a sense of self and center.

Tip #2: YOU ARE THE BOSS
Pregnancy is an amazing opportunity to develop pathways of communication with your body and to learn to decode and trust its signals, and it's good to remember that YOU know best what's right for YOU. Unfortunately in our culture, it's also a time of heavy policing by the outside world. Coworkers, relatives, friends, blogs, Pilates instructors, even doctors can all make suggestions, provide guidance and counsel, direct you towards research-backed beneficial practices, but ultimately, you are the goddess of your own garden and will know what's right for you.

Tip #3: DO it while it feels right, STOP when it doesn't
Many commonly repeated prescriptions for what to/what not to do when exercising pregnant are too reductive, too general, and need to be understood in the context of our litigious society and cultural tendency towards extremes. Most pregnancy advice veers towards the conservative because no one wants to be responsible for a negative outcome for a pregnant woman or her baby (duh) but also for CYA purposes so as not to get sued. Moreover, it's impossible to account for each individual woman and her unique conditions, and pretty much the only thing that's safe for everyone to do an extreme amount of while pregnant is sleep. But when it comes to movement that you care about and are proficient in, there are really no hard and fast rules about exactly when to stop (see Tip #1). 

Take planks, for instance. Planks are not recommended exercise for pregnancy because they can place too much pressure on already stretched core muscles and contribute to diastasis rectii, or the thinning of the linea alba ligament that joins the sides of the abs together. But unless and until the core is stretched to the point that the center cannot hold, planks are great isometric strengthening exercises for the core muscles which actually helps prevent diastasis.

Precisely when the pregnant core should stop planking is different for every body. For me, planks are pretty much an every day occurrence in both my profession and my movement practices, and, being injury-free, it would stand to reason that my body might be able to plank a little longer into my pregnancy than someone brand new to working out. But even I am careful to stop when it feels like my form is suffering, because it's better to abstain than to do something with poor form. 

Tip #4: Mindfully Modify
following this order:
1) Decrease duration/reps. Even in the first few weeks of pregnancy, the body is building blood (blood volume increases by 50% during pregnancy!), growing a baby and a placenta, and going haywire prepping for the weeks to come. This can lead to feeling winded or lightheaded during activity much, much faster than normal, and it's imperative to listen to those signals and take rest breaks as needed.

2) Modify form. As the body changes, familiar exercises are going to start to feel different as well. Pay close attention to maintaining perfect form, and if it doesn't feel right, change position to make it work. This might mean bringing one or both knees to the mat instead of holding a full plank, or making movements smaller, or sticking to single leg lift variations rather than double. (This is really where a session with a qualified movement professional can come in handy.)

3) Omit what your body doesn't need so you can focus on what it does need. Meaning, feel empowered to skip exercises that place undue stress on your core muscles and focus instead on deep breathing while engaging pelvic floor and transverse abs. Avoid exercises that require laying on the belly or that move directly from laying down to sitting up or vice versa and focus instead on strengthening your side body muscles and lateral hip muscles. Eventually, you'll omit abdominal flexion exercises (because really, they won't even make sense after awhile) and focus instead on strengthening the back and hips in extension. Focus on what your body wants and needs, not what it (temporarily) would rather avoid. 

Other things to keep in mind:

1) Stay connected to your body. For me, the best way to do this is to keep moving, and everything from gentle stretching to hip circles to even a body scan-type meditation counts. When you mindfully move your body you keep the pathways open for you to listen to its messages and are better able to determine and provide what it needs.

For me, I've found the following signals and remedies to be useful:

feeling lightheaded in class ---> rest
feeling sluggish ---> do some gentle cardio
low back pain or heavy-feeling legs feel heavy ---> work lateral hip muscles, booty & hip extension
shortness of breath when sitting or relaxing ---> activate posture and breathing muscles, side body work, upper body tension release
pelvic floor pressure ---> time to chill

2) Roll with the changes and understand that they are gradual. A 12 week pregnant body is different from a 24 week pregnant body which is different from a 38 week pregnant body. Blanket prescriptions like "pregnant women shouldn't run/lift weights/planks/twist/do abs" are simply too general to matter to your unique, trained pregnant core.

I think the main reason they are so oft-repeated are because 1) at the extreme of pregnancy, these movements are neither possible nor desirable; 2) there are better exercises for pregnant bodies that need attention while pre-pregnancy goals can take a backseat for a little while 3) in a class or group exercise setting, it's best to teach in the most conservative way possible to protect both their participants from injury and themselves from liability. Again, listen to your body, modify for duration, then form, then omit!

3) Prioritize movements that:
1) connect you to your core (like TVA breathing and pelvic tucks)
2) stabilize the pelvis (like leg lift variations in quadruped)
3) mobilize the spine and major joints (like cat-cow, hip circles, shoulder rolls)
4) train the back of the body (booty-strengthening exercises, working with hips in extension, upper back and chest opening exercises
5) focus on your sides (like strengthening in side planks and mermaid stretches)
6) prioritize posture both throughout movement in general and specifically with Pilates exercises like chest expansion or serratus pushups.

Whew, that's a lot to do!

With love,

Annie

I almost can’t believe that this time two years ago I was screaming in pain, crying on the floor of the hospital room, and desperate to help my baby son out of my body. I have never felt so grateful, nor have I felt so humbled, as I do from having given birth. I write this to honor him, my brave baby, and to honor my body for all it has accomplished. They say each birth is different, unique to the woman in labor, and that no matter her "plan," she will be presented with the perfect individual challenge for her to overcome. Diego’s birth was both the very best it could be and also not what I wanted or planned for. At all. Not in the slightest. It brought me to my knees, literally. But it also opened up a beautiful, intense world of experiences for me. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

It started with a routine checkup.

It was a Sunday afternoon. Father’s Day. Sunny, sticky, and hot. Damian’s practicality and some superstition on my part caused us to pack the labor bag and, with much groaning and waddling from me, we made our way to the train. The cool subway car never felt so good. Even in my flowy pink boho dress, I looked so uncomfortably pregnant, people instinctively moved away. The Friday prior, I had been told my amniotic fluids were low, but since the baby and I had been so healthy and strong throughout my pregnancy, I didn’t honestly believe anything was really wrong. We went to meet the doctor, still planning for Damian to play his band’s show that evening, and I was calm as the nurse squirted blue gel on my belly and began to wave the ultrasound wand around.

“No fluids,” she said.

We needed to get the baby out right away! As I was already in triage, the preparations began for admittance and induction. They wrapped my belly with a pink and blue band to hold the heart rate monitor and stuck an IV port in my wrist. My blood pressure and temperature were taken half a dozen times and I answered the same battery of questions at least that much. How many weeks am I? Have I been pregnant before? Does my husband beat me? Fearing my fate, I called my doctor as a last-ditch effort to find an alternative to induction and was transferred instead to the midwife: blonde and serene, straightforward, and absolutely maddening as she described what was to transpire that evening.

“Better eat now,” she said. “And try to sleep if you can.” So Damian went out and returned with a Mexican Coke and the best steak I’ve ever had. And while I would not sleep for quite some time, as I hadn’t already for a few days, we settled in for the adventure to come. A couple hours later, the midwife returned. She informed us that we would begin with a pill, a cervical ripener called Cytotech that dissolves in the cervix to help it open, but, she admitted, rarely works on the first dose. If it worked, they’d insert a balloon that would inflate against my cervix, simulating the baby’s head, to help it open further. After that, I’d be given Pitocin through my IV.

Ready to pop.

I bristled immediately at this “cascade” of interventions, having spent the majority of my pregnancy reading Ina May Gaskin’s Guide to Childbirth and preparing for a natural labor in the birthing center. I cross-examined the midwife ruthlessly, trying to find alternatives or figure a way out. But eventually, I understood that despite her polite, open tone, I really had no say about what was to happen. I made demands for impossible things, trying to keep control of the situation (apparently a theme for me). Damian told me to relax. That the details I was harping about weren’t a big deal. And although I snapped at him, I suppose my outright bitchiness was really just a defense mechanism to hide my absolute terror of what was coming. I wasn’t afraid of the pain — not yet, at any rate — but of the 80% C-section rate associated with inductions on account of low fluids. Moreover, I would have to stay in bed for hours to be monitored, which at that point seemed like the greatest torture because it also meant being connected to the IV, shifted around like a ragdoll by the nurse, and using a bed pan (insult of all insults).

I was smack dab in the middle of what I felt was the classic hospital birth nightmare.

I was miles away from my peaceful birthing center plan of water, rhythmic breathing, relaxation, and hip circles. In all my preparations for birth, I had never heard of oligohydramnios, the technical term for my low fluids, and had never even seriously considered the possibility of induction. I was mad as hell I couldn’t get up and move around like I planned, couldn’t bounce and sway on my birth ball, or relax in my bikini in the bathtub. Nevertheless, my doula Michelle, my cousin Sarah, and Damian made a little party of it, and we passed the time waiting for the contractions to start by listening to music, sneaking me bites of watermelon, and spritzing my face luxuriously with rose water.

For hours I felt nothing, or nothing that I knew to identify as a contraction.

Due to my massive attitude about being confined to the bed and an intense desire to use the bathroom by myself (like a person!), I was allowed off the monitor for an hour while they prepared another dose of Cytotech. Michelle later said that hour, upon which I had so vehemently insisted, saved me. After some blessed alone time in the bathroom and stretching my legs, I returned to my birth ball and we started timing what I finally felt as contractions. They weren’t more than menstrual cramps, and frankly hurt less than regular pregnancy pains, but they were already two minutes apart. Within 45 minutes, we were in business and I was elated to be in labor. I was excited it was finally happening. I was excited to meet my baby and tried not to focus on my fear. As the surges intensified, we counted, breathed, imagined flowers opening up, and tried to relax. It was truly lovely.

Then, my water broke.

It was as if a switch had been flipped. All at once, my contractions came on full force. A stabbing, overwhelming pain from the deepest part of my belly, spreading throughout my pelvis, coupled with an intense downward pressure that was bizarrely uncomfortable.

As the barest trickle of amniotic fluid made its way down my leg all at once it hit me how dire my baby’s situation was and what a shithead I’d been to resist the hospital’s efforts to get him out safely. Suddenly, I was crouched over the bedpan and sobbing hysterically with guilt and fear and emotions I still cannot name. I was a screaming wild animal on the floor.

I would not stop screaming for hours.

I screamed as the kind blonde midwife and nurse pried my legs apart to insert the balloon — clearly another dose of Cytoech wasn’t necessary — and it was misery. I screamed as my hip flexors cramped. I screamed as Michelle and Damian tried to cool my face, help me relax and not hyperventilate, and tell me I was doing great. Many moms I spoke with said their labor pain was indescribable, but I knew exactly how to describe it: seppuku, traditional Samurai suicide by self-evisceration. I have never known pain like that before and am confident that nothing by comparison will ever really hurt again. I writhed and swore, counted down from eight, squatted on the bed holding on to the side rails, beat the pillows with my hands, swore and yelled some more.

Soon all that rage turned to genuine fear.

Fear of the next contraction, which was always less than a minute away. Fear of my ability to eventually help my baby out of me. Fear of my baby's well-being. Fear of more pain. Not long after the fear turned to desperation and my screams were cries for help. I’m not at all ashamed of this. I really, really needed help and knew it in my twisting, burning gut. All I wanted was an hour. A break. A nap to reset.

When the midwife offered an epidural, I thanked heaven. Thing was, we were only a couple hours into labor. My contractions had intensified so fast I didn’t have time to become accustomed to the pain before it increased tenfold. It was like barely beating the first level of Super Mario Bros. and suddenly fighting Bowser. My husband left the room when the anesthesiologist arrived. His heart was breaking watching me writhe in pain and begging for mercy. He needed a break.

Tell you the truth, I was a little relieved.

Some part of me was still trying to look out for him during the drama and I knew it must be hard to witness and not really be able to help. The epidural took forever because I kept having contractions. The midwife, to whom I’d been so mean to, was literally forehead to forehead with me. Her arms wrapped around me to both comfort and keep me still. I sat slumped at the edge of the bed, literally crying as my insides contorted, but I was calmer knowing that relief was on the way.

It came just in time. As soon as I laid back to catch my breath, the beeping from the heart monitor either stopped or went insane – I honestly can’t remember which – and suddenly there were ten people in the room, including my doctor, whom I was very glad to see. Within minutes it seemed like there were three pairs of hands inside me, numerous tubes and clamps and bags and who-knows-whats, and I didn’t even care. I just laid there in complete surrender, in complete gratitude to be in the hospital and in the hands of experts, thinking of women in huts all over the world. Thinking of worlds where there are no ultrasounds or air-conditioned hospital rooms or sweet-faced midwives or heart rate monitors or epidurals or doulas or wonderful husbands. I still feel intense waves of gratitude for the experts who helped me. For all the wonderful things the hospital has to offer. For all my friends and family and all they do for us. I believe natural childbirth is great for normal birth, but in me and Diego's case, things weren't normal. And I feel incredibly lucky to have had all the brilliant people and life-saving interventions on our side.

He’s here!

Anyway, it turned out to be a good thing I was numb, not only because of the numerous hands and tubes and procedures, but because apparently the contractions were too intense, coming right on top of one another, and too much for my baby. They gave me a drug that slowed the contractions down, an internal heart rate monitor for my little man, and a catheter pouring fluids back into my desert womb so he could float and not crush his umbilical cord. After a few moments, everything worked. The baby was doing better and we were left alone. I laid back blissfully knowing my baby was safe, relieved that the terrifying pain had subsided, and that he (and I) would both be OK. Michelle and Damian shivered and snoozed in their respective chairs, but I didn’t sleep.

I closed my eyes and went into the deepest meditation of my life.

While I'll keep the details of what I saw and felt between us to ourselves, the short version is that I was able to truly connect with him, feel his efforts and fears, and understand what a choice it was to be born. What a brave and active agent he was in his own birth. I encouraged him in every way I could and promised to help. I had always feared epidurals because I thought it would be terrible to feel stuck, paralyzed, and unable to assist my baby, but I found instead that, undistracted by my own pain, I was able to focus entirely on opening up and helping my baby out. Eyes closed or open, it was impossibly beautiful and I am forever grateful for being able to see and feel what I did that morning.

Soon the doctor found I was nine centimeters dilated and almost ready to go. It took me a second to figure out the choreography (turns out, pushing out a baby is NOT like Pilates at all) but once I got going I found I liked pushing. Everyone coached me and helped me hold my breath and curl my legs up to push outwards during contractions. We listened to James Brown, Rick James, and Zapp, switching over to some heavier Iron Maiden as the baby crowned and I could feel everything.

I was so psyched to be able to help my baby out, shouting with effort in between gulps of oxygen.

Finally, my doctor said, “Annie, look…” As I peered down and pushed one final thrust, out he came! Diego was here! Perfect, purple, and yelling. I was also yelling and laugh-crying with elation. I’ll never forget the look on Damian’s face at that moment — awed, relieved, happy, a tear or two of joy. We brought the baby right up on my chest and I felt him. His delicious smell, the tiny perfection of him… it was wonderful, absolutely wonderful.

So, on June 19th, 2017 at 11:37 a.m., after 12 hours of labor, Diego Zuma Rodriguez made his way into the world, and a giant double rainbow stretched across New York City :)

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Simply go to the Contact section here on my site to sign up. Keep pulsing, babes!

Annie

Walking down Bedford Avenue, it seems that every second storefront is hawking CBD this and CBD that. The checkout counter at the bodega invites us to purchase CBD everything from brownies to energy shots, not to mention Sephora, which is basically half pot-based skincare all of a sudden.  The New York Times has covered the recent craze in several great articles, and I encourage the curious among us to read them as it’s pretty much the Wild West out there for this nascent industry.

As you probably know, I make CBD Muscle Melt to accompany the stretches and self-myofascial release practices of CBD Stretch, my very chill stretch workshop. While there are a lot of people out there who know a lot more than I do about this apparently magical substance, given its recent prevalence and meteoric popularity, I thought it might be useful to at least talk a little about what it is and why I use it.

What is CBD?

CBD stands for cannabidiol, a compound found in cannabis plants that is responsible for the relaxing, chill-out benefits of weed without the psychotropic effects (aka getting stoned) from THC, another type of cannabinoid in marijuana. Interestingly, these compounds work on humans because we have something called an endocannabinoid system that, in addition to ruling all kinds of functions in the body, has certain receptors to which CBD (and THC) bind. In a way, CBD meets you where you are to help your nervous system relax, which helps you calm down, focus, find peace, and otherwise chill.

Muscle rub + foam roller = heaven!

The most popular form of CBD is CBD isolate (extracted from hemp with no THC present) and full-spectrum CBD oil, which includes all 113 cannibinoids and a super teensy amount of THC, less than .3%. My favorite way to use it is topically, in conjunction with relaxing stretches and simple release techniques. I started using a CBD rub a few months after Diego was born to help with new mama shoulder tension and back pain from breastfeeding, and I would put it on before yoga and stretch sessions. It helped me literally relax, taking the grip right out of my tired traps, focus on myself (which can be challenging at first when tasked with keeping a squirmy, screaming human alive 24/7), and seemed to help me listen to my body. I also noticed it deepened the effects of my stretches and helped them last.

Salve-ation

I began to piece together the series of foam roller releases, simple stretches, and massage ball work that comprise CBD Stretch from all my therapeutic movement studies and went looking for a CBD rub to feature in class. I wasn’t all that stoked on most of the ones I could buy because they either didn’t work dependably or contained what I felt were semi-whack ingredients like lanolin and gelatin. So, having dabbled in making my own lotions and potions, I decided to try my hand at making it myself.

A behind-the-scenes look at how the magic’s made.

Using homemade CBD-infused coconut butter, skin-healing African shea butter, almond oil (which soothed my skin through pregnancy and kept it supple and stretch mark-free), and essential oils I knew to be effective in pain relief, I managed to make the little magical pots of pot I now use for sore muscles, achy joints, headaches, and even period cramps. The CBD works best with the essential oils and even better when combined with stretching, self-myofascial release, or meditation. I believe CBD increases interoception, which is our ability to feel and understand what is going on inside our bodies, thereby connecting us more deeply with our physical selves and helping us to listen. And since nothing makes me feel better than helping others feel better, I consider it to be a success already :)

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Simply go to the Contact section here on my site to sign up. Keep pulsing, babes!

i'm ba-ack! 

my pilates weekend in austin + a powerful mindset shift for body confidence.

ALIGN SUMMIT

Stretching it out in Austin, Tx with my dearest dance buddy, friend, teacher, Danica Kalemdaroglu

i want to say big thank you to all my clients for your support for my blissful weekend away at the first annual ALIGN summit pilates conference in austin.

this weekend gave me so much life! it felt incredibly good for this distracted mother of two littles to just worry about my own damn self for awhile, and while i got about 12 hours of sleep the entire 4 days and have needed many naps since, i've come back to the studio refreshed and energized in my teaching and passion for pilates. i woke up at 6 every day for class, stayed up late drinking, discussing & dreaming with dear friends, enjoyed some new york normal but relatively long walks in beautiful 90 degree austin, and ate approximately 75 tacos. i would do it again next weekend if i could!

It’s all in your mind

real talk : body confidence

fair warning, this section of the newsletter is about to be even more personal (and possibly self-indulgent) than usual, but it seems to me an important share in the fitness space.

one truth about me is that while i preach body positivity all day long, my own internal monologue is not always so cheery. i am certainly nowhere near body neutrality. while i appreciate those that have found freedom from self-judgment, oppressive beauty standards and all the tragedies of aspirational modern womanhood, that just isn't where i live.

i have always been motivated to seek beauty and to make my body into something beautiful. i'm a deeply physical person, and all my greatest pleasures are physical - listening to music and dancing, cooking and eating, feeling sand between my toes and swimming in the ocean, snuggling soft babies and being kissed by my husband with his strong stubbly jaw. experiencing the world through the body gets me out of my head for a little while and is a welcome break from the swirl of thoughts and feelings that constantly jumble my mind. 

moreover, i honestly think a little vanity can be a great motivator towards health & fitness, provided it's not the end-all be-all of why we work out, and as long as our sense of self-worth isn't measured solely against cultural norm beauty standards. my workouts have never been about making our bodies fit into some cookie cutter ideal of fitness or beauty. rather, my approach is to use modalities that reveal and highlight the individual specialness of each body, so that her muscles, whatever their size or shape, look (and function at) their own unique best. 

all that said, as positive as i am, i still grew up steeped in diet culture and fat phobia, around women on perma-diets who were taught to hate their bodies, and the body dysmorphia is real (as is transitioning to motherhood and feeling the feels about what the hell i'm supposed to wear on any given occasion that doesn't require leggings).

so when i went to try on my jean shorts and summer clothes as i packed for austin and nearly nothing fitright, i felt frustrated, ashamed and a bit hopeless. for all i do to take care of myself, it still wasn't enough.

immediately i began plotting my weight loss strategy and analyzing everything i was doing wrong. cut gluten, for real this time. stop eating cookies with the children and finishing their mac and cheese, you pathetic, weak emotional eater. all the legumes aren't doing you any favors, better skip those. and, my favorite - your body just isn't the same after having babies and you'll never feel the way you used to. the feeling in my chest was a mix of sadness, frustration and shame. all because a pair of cutoff levi's i bought second hand in flagstaff, az tore a little at the pocket when i buttoned them.

but then i paused and looked at almost-two-year-old Ramona, who is beyond beautiful with her little round belly and long legs and sweet, sensitive skin and i realized the time is now to help fortify her against the trials and supreme waste of mind energy that await her in our objectifying, youth-worshipping and fat-phobic world. already, her brother calls her fat because she is round where he is straight. (which, p.s., is a mystifying bummer to me because we never use the word fat in our house to describe a person. ever. but that is how prevalent and toxic it is that my highly observant and normally very sweet son would pick this up so early in life.)

so, right then and there, i shifted my mindset towards what i'd want Ramona to think about herself, should she ever be faced with a similar jean shorts dilemma. instead of beating myself up for being a normal human woman and starting some major self-improvement project, i realized that i had an awesome opportunity to flip the script of my ongoing self-criticism and show my body unconditional love. perhaps last week's indulgences are just now showing up and we'll de-puff in a few days (this is, in fact, what happened). perhaps the jeans don't fit because all the heavy weights posterior chain work actually works and my booty is finally growing - hooray! let me celebrate these curves because my hips are indeed 4 inches wider than before, and that just means more to love, and more to scoop, in pilates.

now i can think: look at this body, the obvious care that is being taken with it, the magic within it that makes it grow and change and shrink and expand and do its own thing. and i have to say, while i don't think i received a single compliment over the weekend, it didn't matter, because i just felt awesome in my own skin. this is key. i finally felt the body positivity, the love from within, that i talk about all the time, and truly didn't need it validated from the outside world.

the mindset shift, again, was this: instead of getting frustrated and feeling like i needed to diet my way to some aspirational body ideal, i instead saw an opportunity to practice unconditional self-love. i would not force my hips into too-tight things or quietly shame myself about a second breakfast taco. rather, i would let myself be curious about my extra curves, about how an exercise actually felt in my body as opposed to what i thought the results would be.

and while i still don't really know what to wear as a 40 year old mother of 2 as opposed to a 25 year old bartender (the extremes of my wardrobe at the moment), it doesn't matter. with extra size comes extra bearing, a bigger presence, and i am not at all mad at that.

anyway, babes - be well, be curious, and come move with me soon. with love & planks,

-Annie

I’m back from a weekend in Austin feeling equal parts exhausted and completely alive.

After four days of early mornings, long walks in the Texas heat, deep conversations, and more tacos than I can reasonably justify, I came home with something better than rest — I came back with a shift.

Not a dramatic, life-altering transformation.
But something quieter. More lasting.

A shift in how I see my body.

Real Talk: Body Confidence Isn’t Linear

Here’s the truth:
Even though I talk about body positivity all day long, my inner dialogue doesn’t always match.

I’m not living in some perfect state of body neutrality. I still have moments of judgment. I still catch myself measuring against old standards, old habits, old narratives.

I grew up around diet culture. Around women who were always trying to shrink themselves. And that stuff sticks — even when you know better.

So when I tried to pack for this trip and realized that most of my summer clothes didn’t fit the way I wanted them to… yeah, it hit.

Frustration. Shame. That familiar spiral of:

“What am I doing wrong?”
“I need to fix this.”
“Maybe I should start over.”

The Moment That Changed Everything

Then I looked at my daughter.

Her soft belly. Her strong little legs. Her completely unfiltered way of existing in her body — without judgment, without hesitation.

And it clicked.

If she ever stands in front of a mirror one day feeling the way I just felt… what would I want her to think?

Not “fix it.”
Not “shrink.”
Not “you’re not enough.”

I’d want her to feel at home in herself.

So I paused.

And instead of spiraling, I made a different choice.

The Shift: From Control to Curiosity

Instead of trying to control my body, I got curious about it.

Maybe the jeans didn’t fit because bodies fluctuate — like they’re supposed to.
Maybe the workouts are working, and my body is changing shape in new ways.
Maybe there’s nothing to fix.

So instead of forcing myself into smaller spaces — physically or mentally — I let myself take up the space I’m actually in.

And something surprising happened:

I felt good.

Not because anyone complimented me.
Not because anything physically changed overnight.
But because the pressure lifted.

What Pilates (Really) Teaches

This is the work.

Not chasing some perfect version of your body.
But learning how to live inside it.

Pilates, at its core, isn’t about aesthetics. It’s about awareness. Strength. Connection.

It’s about understanding how your body moves, supports you, adapts — and yes, changes.

Your body isn’t something to constantly fix.
It’s something to work with.

On Strength, Stress & Small Shifts

Life doesn’t exactly make this easy.

We carry stress — external and internal. The world feels heavy sometimes. And even when life is good, there’s that strange mix of gratitude and anxiety humming underneath.

I feel it too.

And while we can’t always control the big things, we can shift how we respond.

Not through restriction or punishment — but through addition.

Adding nourishment.
Adding movement.
Adding small, supportive habits.

Because restriction almost always leads to backlash.
But support builds something sustainable.

A Note on the Body We Ignore

One of the most overlooked parts of all this?

The pelvic floor.

It’s not a niche topic. It’s not just for postpartum bodies. It’s foundational.

It’s your core. Your breath. Your stability.

And like the rest of your body, it deserves attention before something goes wrong — not just after.

Where I Landed

I still don’t always know what to wear.
I still have moments of doubt.
I’m still practicing.

But something has changed.

There’s more space now.
More ease.
More respect for the body I’m in — not the one I think I should have.

Because with change comes presence.
With presence comes confidence.

And that kind of confidence?

It doesn’t need permission.

on fat & fatness

i’ve been thinking a lot lately about fat.

if you’ve been reading for awhile, you know i’m anti-diet, absitively posilutely body positive, and all for balance and moderation in most things, including moderation. and i’ve written before about fatness and fitness. today though, while i don’t quite have a cohesive manifesto, it feels somewhat urgent to share some thoughts about fat.

let's consider the following points:

• fat is a thick, soft, melty substance that is loved for flavor, satiety, snuggling and to keep animals warm. sumo wrestlers, babies, steaks and breasts are all prized for their fatness, but when virtually anything else is fat, somebody has some kinda problem with it.

• fat is for eating, but there's been a lot of debate over how much and what type is “ok.” possessing fat on a human male body means he will starve to death more slowly if there's no food around. possessing fat on a female body means she is prepared to feed a baby and also starve to death more slowly, but also somehow that there must be something wrong with her. 

• while fat itself is a real thing, fatness, or the quality of “being fat” isnot an absolute. it isn’t the pull of gravity, the magnetic field of the poles, or the turn of the seasons. it’s culturally, temporally and actually relative.

how to measure fatness:

• weigh it, but this only works for food. weight in a human body is water and bones and muscles and inflammation and organs and trillions of cells. which means that weight is not an accurate measure of fat in a human body. and it's all different on the moon.

• the bmi. the body mass index uses math and a made-up chart to determine whether we are overweight (and thus at risk of poor health and general misery) or not. the bmi is bullshit. there are plenty of fit & healthy people out there that top the bmi charts on account of being densely muscled and not very tall. case in point: a close dancer friend who stands at about 5’6” and weighs in around 160 lbs (all booty and good jumping legs) was once told by a doctor she was overweight. this was preposterous. look at her and you’d see she was an entrancing, sculptural ball of energy, an artist in an athlete’s body. she’s also Black, and the bmi is based on measurements of white men, making it an inappropriate measure for a great deal of the population. the bmi is racist. this is not ok. 

• your jeans. sure, but it's not only fat that makes jeans tight. your ass is a muscle (actually 9 of them per cheek). plus bones change. and burritos exist. also: dryers.

• calipers. ok but gross.

thus, fatness can’t be measured absolutely - only comparatively.

this means we can't actually determine how fat is too fat, or for what purpose. 

the quality of fatness in a body is a comparison, nothing more. while i have never exactly qualified as a person of size, i know that my same-sized body that was described as “athletic” in denver suddenly became “voluptuous” in nyc, and the *only* time i’ve been consistently complimented on my figure in the past 15 years (aside from my husband's continuous adoration) was when i returned from west africa with malaria and hadn’t eaten in a week.

if that ain’t relative (and way, way culturally loaded) i don’t what is.

and because we can't truly measure it with accuracy, fatness is therefore an unreliable criteria for evaluating anything else. 

culturally, when we see fatness on a body, we make subtle evaluations about that body, including but not limited to its beauty, health, athleticism, fitness and, when it's our own body, self-worth. but as someone who works with many different bodies, let me tell you - you can learn a lot more about a person from their posturethan you can their spare tire or double chin. so we must stop drawing conclusions from the possession of qualities of fatness.

from our tinder dates to our doctors to the little voice inside our heads, here are some incorrect assumptions often made about fatness that need to be checked:

• fat people overeat, binge eat, or emotionally eat 

• fat people eat too much of one thing - sugar, meat, carbs, dairy, junk food, fast food, soda 

• fat people are greedy, or lazy, or incapable 

• fat people have low self-confidence

• fat people are unhealthy. (this one reeeally gets my goat, but health shaming is a topic for another conversation entirely)

• finally, that fat people would be better if they were less fat.

this last point is the one i want you to take home from this newsletter. it's wrong and it sucks and yet, it persists.

a dear friend said something recently that stuck with me. we were talking about being afraid to get pregnant because what if we never “got our bodies back” and she said, “people like you and i would never let that happen.” i know she meant it as a compliment, but it made me sad.

y’all. i’m a career exerciser. a movement teacher. a fitness professional. i am not a better person than anyone because i have (semi-)thin privilege and can still fit in my pre-pregnancy jeans (kind of). it is literally my job to exercise, i happen to live within a couple blocks of high quality food that i can afford to buy and i have no moral high ground because of it.there is zero moral failing if a new mother isn’t exercising or losing the “baby weight”because she’s simply being a human woman in a certain time of life.

and there is zero moral failing in possessing, eating, or otherwise enjoying fat.

so, what now?

as i step down from my soapbox today, it's worth mentioning that i logically understand the observations made above, but - and this is a big but, so to speak - when it comes to applying them to myself? sheeyit. different story.

i'm as prone to having a bad day on account of a scale as anyone (which is why i rarely step on them). i appreciate curves everywhere on others but i have constant body dysmorphia and if i think i “look fat” i am frustrated and despondent before i'm cheery and stiff upper-lipped about it. and as much as i'd love a bigger backyard, i still have to talk myself down from the ledge when i can't button my size 4s. i’m trying, but i can’t fully shake it. it's that internal scolding when shit don’t fit, or the flush of shame being caught with my hand in the literal cookie jar.

but i have started to ask myself two questions:

1) will anyone else care about this? 

answer: only if i treat them worse, communicate poorly, or get all moody on account of hating myself.

2) would the people of size who inspire me and whom i dearly love be more lovable, valuable or worthy if they were smaller?would Lizzo be more beautiful or talented if she were thin?

answer: clearly not. they are all of those things - lovable, beautiful, talented, worthy, significant, inspiring - just as they are.

and you know what else? so am i.

and so are you. 

that's it for today, babes. i close with a final call to stop fat shaming ourselves and others - and stop nonfat yogurt! 

baby we were born to run

i have some news: i run now. not very far, not very fast, but for the past month or so, i've consistently hit the track 3 times a week and it feels AWESOME. i went for a few runs last fall but got busy (you know, what with mothering 2 kids, running a studio & surviving a pandemic) and thus didn't so much as set foot in a running shoe for a good 8 or 9 months. but i think this time it's gonna stick, and i wanted to share with you why that is and what i'm getting out of it.

first, running is incredibly affirming for me. it affirms why i teach and practice pilates and barre. you know how i'm always saying that pilates makes you ready for anything? it really does. i've literally not run a step more than a few feet across a playground for at least 7 years, but because of the embodied practices of pilates & barre, i am conditioned enough to wake up one day and, with no specific prep or training, run a mile or so with relative ease. that's huge! through babies, a pandemic, basically quitting dancing and turning 40, i am strong and fit. i hop to and i bounce back. i talk the talk and walk the - i mean, run - the walk. i'm stoked.

for context, it's worth noting that even before spending 5 years having babies (i.e., not running), i wouldn't say i've ever been much of a runner. it's something i did pretty consistently for my first few years out of college in an attempt to stay in shape for free (i was a dance major, which meant that upon graduation, i would go from dancing 6-8 hours a day in beautifully equipped studios to being a broke, probably lumpy waitress in possession of a lot of leotards). at that time, i did most of my running in the open space near my little lincoln log cabin on the outskirts of louisville, colorado, and later on the soft dirt paths around wash park in my charming denver neighborhood. but since moving to nyc 14 years ago? meh, not so much. i was too distracted by the traffic, i always felt sick from the fumes, and honestly, i was dancing and eventually teaching so much i didn't need running anymore. i already got more than enough impact cardio and mental health from african dance and was expending all the calories just living in new york. 

anyway, so i run now, but i'm not telling you about it so that i can “be inspiring” or whatever. i don't think you need to go running to feel fit, and goddess knows what i consider running isn't gonna qualify me for the olympics anytime soon. i just felt i needed a little hot sauce to add to my training regimen and the studio is 2 blocks from the track.

it's the mindset shift that's come with running that's important to me, so here's some takeaways for you:

• baby steps and beginner's mind. these are both crucial when developing a new habit. would you give a toddler “war and peace" to help them learn to read? clearly not. you'd stick to lift-the-flap books and “chicka chicka boom boom" until they demonstrate readiness for something more. and it's the same with exercise. you have to let yourself be new to something to really learn it. part of that means being curious instead of judgy, recognizing that it doesn't matter if it feels like i'm the slowest one on the track, or that to most people running a single 11 minute mile in a day doesn't count as “real” running. (there's beginner's mind.) i promised myself to run a mile until it's easy and then add a lap, until that becomes easier. (and there's baby steps.) there's no rush.

• the training should fit the goal. when i have the goal to run a marathon, certainly i'll have to run longer than a mile at a time and will hopefully go a bit faster than my current perky trot. but until then, my goal is just to feel strong and look good, and honestly i don't have to run much at this point to progress towards that goal. i pretty much instantly felt & saw the positives from running. the point is that more isn't always better, and harder workouts are not necessarily more impactful - if i'm incapacitated by soreness, overuse or injury, i can't teach or mother as well, so what is really achieved by trying to do too much at once? nothin good, which brings me to my next point:

• make it easy. not that any amount of running in 90+ degree heat is easy - what i mean is to make it accessible, make it fit into your life instead of trying to change your life all at once to fit your goal. i only run a mile and a half right now because i really don't have time/energy to commit to more, but as i get faster and my kids get more independent i can see the 15 minute runs swelling to 30 and beyond, and by the time that happens i probably won't be late getting out the door on account of changing diapers anymore, so there you go. biting off more than we can chew is a surefire way to NOT sustain a new habit. rarely does it work any other way, no matter what the latest 21 day challenge says it'll do for you.

• celebrate tangential gains. in addition to being comfortable with being slow, knowing a short run is better than no run, and being nice to myself when i hate the cramps in my sides and sweat in my eyes, i feel committed to my new practice for all of its benefits, not just getting faster or going longer or looking sleeker. i love the endorphins and the mental space i clear. i dig the fact that i am a nicer person when i've spent time on myself in this way. i love how alive it makes me feel, how lifted and light on my feet. i like the feeling of control i get from it (i think many women do). and not for nothing, it turns out i like running in circles on a smooth surface while listening to self-help podcasts and occasionally returning soccer balls to handsome players.

anyway babes, that's it for today. take care, stay cool, and keep on being your creative, kind, curious and totally rad selves.