In this interview, we talk to Inemesit Graham, fitness professional (and all-round incredible woman!) based in Yellowknife, Canada.

This was a fantastic conversation that touched on so many topics, including:

• her experiences moving to the UK from Nigeria and growing up in a predominantly white neighbourhood
• her journey as a child having surgery for abdominal hernia and the trauma associated with that experience
• how after her second child she struggled with body image issues related to her abdominal profile. She thought she was overweight and went on a weight loss journey and eventually discovered that she had diastasis recti.
• her experience living with DRA and hernia and how she felt strengthening her body and learning to love it as it is was so important
  -how she started posting her workouts online and was told she was being negligent so she went and did qualifications to be certified as a fitness professional
• how her whole life she has lived outside of other people’s expectations. As a Nigerian it was expected that she study law or medicine, but she studied politics indeed and moved to Canada.
• how she rarely sees people who look like her – at school, in magazines, in Canada. There was a period of time where she didn’t want to be black, so she actively sought out black people to follow and listen to so that she could learn to love who she is.
• covert versus overt racism and how important black representation is in the health and fitness industries as well as in tv/magazines.
• how important it is to expose ourselves to different voices – how we need to be intentional in cultivating our social media feeds, so that we aren’t just hearing one voice.
• the importance of the Black Lives Matter movement. We have one world view and we have to listen to other people’s life experiences. Ours is not the only story out there. Some people may not see racism but that does not mean it doesn’t exist. How acknowledgement of other people’s experience takes nothing from us, but could make the world of difference to that person.
• her thoughts on the phrase “I don’t see colour.” She discussed how difficult it is to find makeup that suits her skin tone or to see women like her in advertisements. “When you don’t see colour, people of colour become invisible in your society.”
• how #alllivesmatter is often posted out as a retort to #blacklivesmatter and that acknowledging that black people are 2.5x more likely to be killed by police is important. It diminishes the plight of black people to post this hashtag in a reactionary way.

If you want to learn more about Inemesit or work with her, you can find her

Email: mummyfitness@live.com
Facebook: www.fb.me/MummyFitness
Twitter: www.twitter.com/inemesitg
Instagram: www.instagram.com/mummy_fitness

In this interview we talk to Amy Dawes, founder of the Australasian Birth Trauma Association (ABTA).
ABTA is a national charity committed to reducing the instance and impact of birth-related trauma whilst supporting affected women, families and health professionals.

Amy discussed:

• her birth experience and diagnosis of pelvic organ prolapse 16 months later. She talked about how this diagnosis affected her psychologically and impacted on her quality of life. She became scared of doing any movement or exercise and felt that she would make things worse.
• how, with some assistance of a pelvic health physiotherapist and connecting with other women who had returned to exercise after prolapse diagnosis, Amy started to feel more confident in her body
• how she connected with Elizabeth Skinner, psychologist, who mentioned the need for a birth trauma association here in Australia…and how the ABTA was formed (and a special shoutout to Christine Percy and Christine Pistone!).
• the goals of the ABTA and how they support women through Peer to Peer mentoring.
• that birth trauma can be physical, psychological or both.
• the need for more comprehensive antenatal education, so women are aware of the potential risks associated with birth, without scaring the heck out of them. “Why didn’t anyone tell me that this could happen?”
• the fact that health care providers can also suffer trauma associated with supporting women in birth and that they don’t always receive the help that they need.
• how important it is to have care in birth that is supportive, nurturing and empowering.
• how birth can trigger past trauma, which women may need psychological help for
• how we can help support the ABTA and spread the word of these services to the community

The ABTA relies on donations, so if you would like to help please reach out to the ABTA via the links below. Please share this information with anyone who you think might benefit!

Website: https://www.birthtrauma.org.au/
Email: amy@birthtrauma.org.au
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/birthtrauma.org.au/
Twitter: @AusBirthTrauma

In this episode we talk to Vicki Webber – CrossFit Competitor and Box owner.

Vicki shares with us

• how she fell in love with CrossFit and went from being someone who never really did much lifting to being an international competitor
• her pregnancy and birth experiences… and how different number four has been in comparison to the first three!
• her recent postnatal experience including difficulties with bladder control and heaviness in the perineum
• her experiences returning to CrossFit in the postnatal period
• how she has found that changing the way that she moves (with guidance from her physiotherapist) has helped her symptoms of heaviness in the perineum.
• her experience as a coach of the changes in post pregnancy information that is provided to pregnant and postnatal women
• how her coaching has changed since having recent symptoms of pelvic floor dysfunction We hope to chat to Vicko again in the future to see how she is getting on in her journey.

You can learn more about Vicki here:

https://www.steelcoastcrossfit.com/

https://www.facebook.com/vicki.webber.75

https://www.instagram.com/vwebbs2011

vickwebbs@gmail.com