TRANSCRIPT

Gissele : [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele.  We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today we’re talking to Krysti Beckett, who’s a passionate plus size personal trainer and pelvic fitness specialist.

Her goal is to get moms to move with confidence and build strength at any size without worrying about their size or weight. Krysti resides in Burford, Ontario with her husband, three children and beloved dog Ozzy. Please join me in welcoming Krysti Hi Krysti.

Krysti Beckett: Hi. Thanks so much for having me.

Gissele : No, thank you for being with us.

I wanted to ask you if you could tell the audience how you got started in this business that you’re in.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah, I mean, as a young person, fitness was not [00:01:00] really on my radar. I’ve been a plus size my whole life, but I actually was a nanny in my early twenties and one of the women I was a nanny for had a fitness business and she said, you know, you’d be really good at this.

So I kind of started doing admin work and then I got certified as an instructor and really like, found movement that I liked. ’cause I think for a lot of women I grew up. Just doing fitness, like you exercise to be skinny. And it had to be hard and it had to be uncomfortable. But I kind of fell in love with it, trying different things and decided that that was the career path I would take.

So I became a personal trainer and I kind of did follow the grain for a long time with the fitness industry and selling weight loss and teaching people how to basically always be on the journey to lose weight And then I kind of understood and, and saw some research that showed that [00:02:00] most diets are actually designed to fail.

That’s how we make our money. And started to learn more about. The benefits of strength training for longevity to relieve pain. the benefits for your bones, all sorts of things that have nothing to do with the scale whatsoever. And through that, also becoming a mother at the, around the same time learning about pelvic health.

So as a pelvic fitness specialist, I’m working with women to overcome things like pain, leaking, painful sex something called prolapse, where your pelvic floor, if it’s not supportive enough, the organs can actually descend from your body. And it’s actually fairly common, but it’s, it’s something we just don’t talk about enough.

Gissele : Mm mm I love everything you just said.

Krysti Beckett: Thanks.

Gissele : The first thing is really that, you know, reflecting on as a society we’re very plus size phobic, right? Like we, we think that skinny is the place to [00:03:00] be in. When you think about. You know how much we try to get everyone to fit in a box, right? Even like plastic surgery, everything.

Everybody has the same nose, everybody has the same face, everybody has to have the same body, and that is such a disservice. What sort of messaging did you see around the fitness industry about people embracing their own sort of like body shape?

Krysti Beckett: So unfortunately, I think the industry as a whole doesn’t, if you were to Google Fitness, if you were to Google Gym, you’ll find young, white, thin bodies.

 that’s the general representation that comes to the fitness industry. But it’s interesting because first of all, we white people, I mean, I’m a white person. We are the global minority. It’s people of color, the global majority, and yet this [00:04:00] industry has only reflected that in, you know, visually especially it’s become an aesthetic rather than about health.

There are certainly other professionals like myself that serve as health at any size or fitness at any size, but there’s comparatively very few of us.

Gissele : Hmm. You just got to triggering in my head, when I think about fitness and I think about what you were just talking about, I envision sort of the Lululemon.

Yes. Even like yoga has sort of been sort of taking over. ’cause yo yoga’s supposed to be a spiritual practice as well as a physical one.

Krysti Beckett: Mm-hmm.

Gissele : Right? But then you, and then I’m not trying to judge the Lululemon wearing. Yoga people. It’s just that, you know, I sort of envisioning how everyone’s trying to fit that mold.

And if you don’t have workout gear, that makes you look acceptable. I was one of [00:05:00] those, I never had workout gear that would be presentable, right? I half the time didn’t remember to shave my legs And so, yeah, the messaging that people are receiving is that they’re not good enough, right?

Krysti Beckett: A hundred, a hundred percent. And to tie in into what you just mentioned a lot of traditional practices that belong to other cultures. Like yoga have been whitewashed. And so there’s this, I can’t even think of the comedian’s name, but she is East Indian and she has this hilarious bit where she talks about like, if you are rushing to yoga, you are doing it wrong.

The whole purpose of yoga is to slow down and restore yourself, and it’s something people do in their pajamas. But in our western culture, it’s people hustling to get to class and they’re taking their fancy yoga mat and they have to, like you said, the Lululemon [00:06:00] clothes. And it’s you know, on, on Instagram, especially when we see these influencers, they’re very thin.

They’re wearing all the fancy gear and, and doing the very extreme poses, handstands and floating and, it’s incredible the things we can do with our bodies, but it’s also an, that’s an ableist perspective. Most of the population cannot move their body that way, could they? With training and display, I mean, it’s very possible, but for most people, that’s not what their bodies do, and that’s not necessarily what fitness looks like for them.

Gissele : Yeah. And I was just contemplating on the fact that there have been now yoga studios that do drinking and yoga, right?

Krysti Beckett: Oh yeah.

Gissele : And so they do drinking and yoga, and then they do like the puppy and that, that’s all great. Like if that’s what you wanna do.

But like you said, like, are we abiding by the true essence of [00:07:00] the practice? Right? Right. And are we creating environments that are. Open to different body shapes, different sizes, and let me know your thoughts about this, because I always thought these sorts of things are just a mirror of us, how we reject ourselves, right?

 plastic surgery these are billions of dollars. So these are people that are realizing or thinking that they’re not enough, that they need to look a certain way. the diet industry is billions of dollars. Ozempic, I’m interested in all your thoughts.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah. I, so to start off, culturally, we are people that expect instant everything. I mean, we no longer wonder or search for information in our brain. Like, what was that actor’s name again? Or what was that thing that happened last week in the news? We instantly can pull up our phones and we can get the [00:08:00] answer in seconds.

And so when it comes to something like our bodies, everything takes time, everything. And so to expect that you can change your body, particularly in appearance instantaneously, is not realistic. And. Unfortunately, I think a lot of pressure is put on us. One of the ways that the diet indu industry really messes with our heads is before and after pictures.

And though the intention maybe, and I did, I used them for a time as a personal trainer. The, the intention was to show if you put in the work, you will get results. But that’s not what it ends up doing. What it ends up doing is telling our brains, here’s a body ideal. Here’s what you have. It’s not enough, it’s not worthy.

Here’s what you can [00:09:00] have that is worthy. You will be a better person. We will respect you more. We will see you as far more valuable if you have a smaller, more chiseled body. And with Ozempic it’s such a weird time for us. In the states, especially celebrities can market pharmaceuticals. So we have

Gissele : mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: These beautiful people

Gissele : mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Who may or may not be using the drug being paid to market it. So using their influence in order to sell it. And I’ve had three clients that were on ozempic, two of them for diabetes but all three with the goal of weight loss. All three of them women in their fifties and no, maybe sixties have come off it because even though they did say it did help them reduce their eating, they found that they were always overeating and they were always thinking about food.

They all reported low [00:10:00] energy and muscle loss. And no one is talking about this because especially after 50 perimenopause, when your estrogen drops, it is harder to keep your muscle, let alone, to grow it, to make more muscle. Mm-hmm. With ozempic. You are making it astronomically harder because it’s actually removing some of that muscle.

And above and and above that there are other things that people are reporting. It’s hard, it’s hard to really know what the, the landscape is going to look like. Yeah. Over the next decade or two because it is so popular and seeing the effects. But every single medication out there, and I’m not knocking medication.

I have used medication, you know that is a discussion between you and your doctor. But that discussion should always, always include the risks. And there are always risks to medication. You have to make that decision with your doctor. Is the risk worth it? Are [00:11:00] you going to get significant benefits to improve your health and your life?

Right? But going on Ozempic because you saw a celebrity selling it because you think it’s going to solve all your problems with weight loss. I don’t know. I don’t know that it is.

Gissele : Yeah. And I think one of the things that you just mentioned, which triggered in my head, it’s one thing to take a pill to help yourself, like as a stepping stone,

But if it’s impacting your ability to create healthy habits, that you can continue beyond that pill, I think that’s where I start to wonder whether or not it’s really helping. Right? So if you take for example, something that can help you, manage your pain so you can start walking and out there and getting more physically fit,

Krysti Beckett: right?

Gissele : That makes sense, right? You wanna manage the, the symptom in the moment. But if it’s impacting your ability in the long term, and you and I have chatted before about Blue Zones [00:12:00] and about the importance of movement, right? And so if that’s preventing you from moving and creating those long-term habits, it’s would be concerning to me that that’s an option.

Krysti Beckett: I think even, and speaking from experience with you know, having seasons of debilitating mental health, there were periods of time where I did need medication to function. I did need medication to get out of bed to be able to think clearly without I go back to the word debilitating, right? There are seasons of our lives where we need this, and of course there are, you know, lifelong chronic struggles where people are dependent on medication, and I’m so grateful that we live in a time where so much is available, but again, we have to have those discussions with knowledgeable professionals to know what we’re getting into because it can, it can lead [00:13:00] to alternatives that maybe we weren’t anticipating or thinking about.

Gissele : Yeah. Yeah. I just wanna clarify for my listeners, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to change, right? Like, so there’s nothing wrong with, you know, wanting to be thin or wanting to be plus size or wanting to be fitter. Mm-hmm. It’s the way that it is marketed, the way that the messaging is you are not enough.

Krysti Beckett: Mm-hmm. If

Gissele : you are not thin, you’re not enough. If you don’t look a certain way. I think that’s probably the most damaging thing, that we accept those messages and then change ourselves because it is okay to love and accept yourself and choose to change.

Krysti Beckett: Absolutely.

Gissele : Right. And say, you know what, because I, I dye my hair, I just like my hair darker right now.

It doesn’t mean I, I don’t like my gray hair. And sometimes I grow up my roots quite a bit. I’m not rejecting myself either way. I [00:14:00] just have a preference, but it’s not gonna make or break me if I don’t go a month or two months without dying my hair.

what has been your experience around the women that you have supported about their worthiness, around weight issues?

Krysti Beckett: Yeah, it’s interesting ’cause what you just said about being content with who you are, but also wanting something different is, is not a bad thing.

And I a hundred percent agree with you. It is a very uncomfortable conversation to have with yourself, to sit with the reasons why you’re doing something when it comes to your body. When you really start to think about, am I doing this because I want it? Or am I doing this because someone said something?

Am I doing this because my mom commented on what’s on my plate at Thanksgiving? Am I doing this? Because every time I look at my pre-pregnancy jeans, I cry, am I [00:15:00] doing this because I saw another ad on my phone that’s telling me that I can lose 20 pounds in just six weeks? And why can’t I just do this on my own already?

 the conversations I have with my clients are truly, is it what you want or do you need to set boundaries with your mom? Is it what you want? Or do you need to get rid of those jeans and just spend the money and buy jeans That feel good?

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Is it what you want or do you need to tell that ad on your social media?

No more? Like, what is that function where you’re

Gissele : like, I don’t

Krysti Beckett: wanna

Gissele : see this kind of ad anymore.

Krysti Beckett: there are things that we can do. We do have choices. And understanding that you can take that power back.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: You can. You can.

And it’s, again, it’s uncomfortable, which I think is why it stops us. I’m totally guilty of not being assertive to somebody [00:16:00] in the moment and saying, I don’t like what you’re saying to me. Sometimes I go back, sometimes I let it fester. Like I’m gonna be totally honest, right?

Gissele : Like, yeah, yeah, we do that. Yeah,

Krysti Beckett: we, we do that.

And that’s,

Gissele : mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Some of it’s human nature. Some of it’s how we were raised, some of it is cultural. Women are not to be loud. If we are if we are assertive, like we are called a bitch, like it’s

Gissele : mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Right? Like there are just things that culturally are not acceptable or that we’ve just learned to act a certain way.

And so sometimes with my clients, it’s before they gain the confidence to do something different, they have to sit with that discomfort and give themselves permission to do whatever the heck they want and what’s actually going to benefit them.

Gissele : Mm-hmm. Bravo I think figuring out like whose voice are we listening to, and is [00:17:00] it our true desire from our heart or is it someone else’s criticism of us that we’re listening to and maybe some people were raised with parents that, taught them those self-regulation skills.

I certainly was not, my parents really didn’t know how to emotionally regulate themselves, and so I was not taught how to sit with those uncomfortable feelings. for you, what do you find helps you sit longer in that conversation or dialogue without pushing the eject button?

Krysti Beckett: Ooh, I find that journaling is helpful because otherwise I ruminate.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: And one of my. Funny enough, one of the, the pelvic physios that I’ve had and her assistant were like, absolutely life changing because they came at pelvic health and physiotherapy from a perspective of rest.

Gissele : Mm.

Krysti Beckett: So it wasn’t about what can you do to fix this? It was about [00:18:00] slowing down and breathing and releasing tension before you went to the exercises.

And Al Pat is her name and she taught me the phrase, rest is productive. And so in our sessions sometimes she would walk me through a meditation and then she’d say, whatever came up for you right now, let’s journal it.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: What came up for you in that time? Where did your brain wander?

And she presented me with this concept that I didn’t realize how often I do it, but she called it time traveling.

 So like chopping vegetables, I’ll be standing at the counter chopping vegetables and I’ll start to think about that thing I said to that person in the grocery store that I was really embarrassed about.

Or I’ll start worrying about what my kid is going to do at that play date with that other kid that he’s been fighting. You know what I mean? Like, we start to either worry about things that have happened that we can’t change or worry about things that have [00:19:00] not even happened yet, or maybe they won’t ever happen.

We, we are really good at this.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: And so journaling and just bringing ourselves back to the present and telling ourselves, Nope, I’m not thinking about that right now. No, I don’t need to think about that right now.

Gissele : Mm-hmm. Yeah. Thank you for that. It’s interesting ’cause one of the things I’ve learned about myself is that.

What I find when I do too much past, it kind of leads me to feel more depressed and too much future can cause anxiety. So really being in the present moment is important. And I love what you said about those monotonous behaviors because I now use my monotonous behaviors to envision my ideal life.

Krysti Beckett: Ooh,

Gissele : I love that. So if I’m doing something, the socks, either I’m listening to someone that is inspiring, or I am daydreaming I’m going to use that time to think about what I wanna create, to think about the things that are exciting me, because I used to do the same thing.

It was like that constant [00:20:00] back and forth past future, past, future, past, future, in my mind was not kind to me, right? Like it would go to the most negative thing. So I’m like, you know what? I’m wasting my energy. I’m wasting my time. That time could be better spent planting the seeds that I want to create.

Right.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah, absolutely.

Gissele : Yeah. I wanted to switch gears a little bit and talk about pelvic health.

Krysti Beckett: Hmm.

Gissele : Because, and that’s obviously related to movement because like you said, it’s something that’s not really talked about in women unless you live in like Denmark or something, or one of those Scandinavian countries where they actually apparently invest in women’s pelvic health.

Why do you think we don’t talk about it? Why is it so taboo?

Krysti Beckett: Oh gosh. Okay. So yes, you are right in some European countries, including France. Oh, of

Gissele : France. That’s the one. Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.

Krysti Beckett: So France is like, they are like the topnotch country, in my opinion, when it comes to pelvic health. Mm,

Gissele : [00:21:00] mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Women postpartum are given 12 weeks of pelvic physio. Women in France do not pee their pants. They do not deal with incontinence. It is part of their healthcare system. And here in Canada and the US physical therapy is generally not part of our healthcare. It occasionally is part of a surgical rehab.

Although major abdominal surgery, like C-sections, hysterectomies, my ectomies, there is no rehabilitation investment whatsoever from our healthcare system, which is mind blowing, considering how small, how common it’s,

Gissele : yep.

Krysti Beckett: But when it comes to our healthcare system and, pelvic health, I think we don’t talk about it, number one, because it’s quite honestly, it affects women The most.

Men have pelvises. They can have pelvic dysfunction, they can leak, yeah, they can [00:22:00] have pain during sex, things like that. But generally speaking, it’s not as big of a male issue. It is a female health issue. And when it comes to all the research that we have, women get a smidgen, they get like a little bit.

And even the stuff that we do have, it’s geared towards, again, white women. And a lot of the standards that we have are, are based on the general population and not even for women. So for example menopause.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Had men included in the studies up until the nineties.

Gissele : Wow.

Krysti Beckett: So only the research.

Yes. The research that we have for menopause.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Only in the last 30 years was it exclusively women.

Gissele : Wow. talk about not generalizing to your target population.

Krysti Beckett: When you think you, you think about the struggles that women have in health [00:23:00] and we’ve been taught not to complain and the common complaints are incontinence, so leaking pee when you don’t want to.

So jumping, running, sneezing, laughing, coughing or painful sex, which is talked about even less.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: And then prolapse I mentioned, or just pain in general in the pelvic area. They’ve become very common jokes in our culture. Like now that you’ve had a baby, you’re gonna have to wear Depends.

Gissele : I was just gonna say that.

How, how have we come to just accept that now there’s a diaper aisle for people?

Krysti Beckett: Yeah.

Gissele : Like, have you seen those commercials that are just basically like, here’s a diaper. Oh, this one feels comfortable. Like, why are we accepting that

Krysti Beckett: and they market them sexy. Why are we

Gissele : accepting that? Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: They market them as sexy, like the, the, it’s like invisible panty lines, but it’s like invisible diapers.

Like you can’t tell that you’re wearing it underneath [00:24:00]

Gissele : diaper.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah. Yeah, it’s, it’s really interesting and I think the quick answer is that anything that can be capitalized is. Like truly,

Gissele : ah, that’s,

Krysti Beckett: yeah.

Gissele : We’re accepting it, like you said.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah.

Gissele : We are giving it power. We are choosing to just use that instead of saying, no, I’m gonna heal this.

Right. Yeah. The only advice I got post having two babies that like to some real movement down there and it, it was basically just do like as many Kegels as you can during the day. And I gotta be honest, that’s so freaking uncomfortable. I would never do them. I would never, ever do them. Like I’m telling you, it’s, it was until I started having some issues and then I’m like trying to kele myself to death.

Right. And there are some tools out there that you can use, right? There’s the, there’s like a thing that you can like. [00:25:00] Exercise, right? There’s like that. Oh

Krysti Beckett: yeah, yeah,

Gissele : yeah.

Krysti Beckett: So there’s, there’s lots of things out there, whether or not they’re beneficial, mm-hmm. To everyone’s situation. Really, really depends.

 so Kegels, for anyone that’s listening or watching and doesn’t know what that is, but that is the term for the pelvic contraction of the muscle. So the tightening, and you have several muscles in there. Think of them as like, think of your pelvis. Your pelvis is actually two bones that joins at. Your spine think of that as like a basket.

And the lining of the basket is a whole set of muscles and they have many functions. But they do hold in your urine and your feces and they do provide sexual function and pleasure. They hold up your organs, they actually contribute to blood flow in your body to help return blood flow back to your heart.

So they, they do have a lot of functions and just like any other muscle. Every [00:26:00] muscle that functions in your body needs to be able to lengthen and contract. So when you’re feeding yourself cereal, when you reach for the spoon, you’re lengthening. And when you’re pulling the spoon towards your face, you’re contracting.

Okay? When you do a bicep curl, you lower the weight. That’s a lengthen. When you bring it towards you, that’s contracting. You’re making the muscles shorter. So when we do Kegels, when we tighten them, that’s making the muscles short and strong. What happens to a lot of women and a lot, a lot of women, whether they’re doing Kegels or not, we tend to have an imbalanced pelvic floor.

We tend to be very tight on one side and not tight enough in another, and that’s what causes the dysfunction. So dysfunction is anything that is not working properly. So to tell someone to just do Kegels, well, if you’re already too tight and you add more strengthening. It’s going to not help, it might [00:27:00] even make the problem worse.

So in that case, that person might need to do some relaxation to release the muscles. And I don’t know about you, but having children is not relaxing most of the time. So for most women who have had children and over 85% of women will become mothers. Mm-hmm. They will have pregnancies and births. They need to manage their pelvic floor rather than worrying about being too tight or tight enough or pleasing their partner with their pelvic floor, which is another really awful message in our culture that pleasure is only for the man.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Sex should not hurt like ever.

Gissele : No. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I’m glad you said that. I just wanted to go back to what you had said that your mentor had said about relaxing before doing the Kegels.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah.

Gissele : Can you talk a little bit about that?

Krysti Beckett: Sure. So, a common thing that we do when we are stressed is we tense [00:28:00] muscles.

Mm-hmm. We might not be conscious of how we do it, I’ll talk about three of the most common ones that affect your pelvic floor. One of them, which you can kind of think might directly relate is you actually clench your butt.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: So your glute muscles are not part of the pelvic floor, but every single muscle in the body does not work on its own.

Every single muscle works with other systems, with other muscles. So there, there groups and there are pairs. And so your glutes, your butt muscles support your pelvic floor. Well, by clenching the butt we cause an imbalance. So that’s one area of tension. Another area of tension.

Gissele : Sorry to interrupt you, but if, if somebody has constipation, that could also be indicative of

Krysti Beckett: Oh yeah.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: Okay. Constipation is a pelvic floor killer too. ’cause it causes a lot of pressure and strain on the pelvic floor.

Gissele : Mm.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah, there’s a lot. And dehydration contributes to that as well. Mm-hmm. Yeah, [00:29:00] that’s another one. Another area of tension is a lot of us like to clench our jaws.

Gissele : Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: And there is fascia. Fascia is like like a netting, like a saran wrap that kind of covers our muscles that intertwine through our whole body. It’s a really amazing thing in our body. Mm-hmm. When we clench our jaw, that fascia runs from our jaw. There is fascia that runs from our jaw down our spine directly to our pelvic floor.

And so they together.

Gissele : Oh,

Krysti Beckett: tighten. Another one is breath holding. So every time you breathe in your diaphragm, which is your breathing muscle under your lungs, it actually works like a sub pump with your pelvic floor. And when we hold our breath, whether that’s just thinking and ruminating, or maybe it’s every time we lift the laundry basket or, or lift our toddler or whatever, if we hold our breath, we create pressure in that canister.

And by not releasing the air, by not breathing [00:30:00] through activities, by not breathing through our stress, we are creating tension. And again, that pressure can lead to other issues as well. So honestly, the, the best thing we can do is rest. To relieve tension, to breathe. And I think it’s such a, it’s become such a cliche thing.

Oh, just breathe. Oh, just relax. And if somebody tells you that when you’re stressed out, we just get more mad. It’s not helpful. Fair enough. But, but truly, if we allowed ourselves to slow down, to breathe to rest, to actually believe that rest is productive mm-hmm. It would help us regulate our nervous systems.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: It would help us relax these tight muscles. It would allow us to actually be present, be in the moment, and [00:31:00] enjoy what’s going on, rather than always worrying about what’s next and worrying about how to fix something. Because sometimes the things that we need to fix start with stopping and slowing down.

Gissele : Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Thank you for that. Yeah. I always thought there was a connection with, especially with like incontinence, that there might be an association with a fear or, or Right. Because think about kids when they’re young. Like if they have fears, they usually will pee the bed or they have nightmares, right?

So like is there an emotional component to the pelvic?

Krysti Beckett: So the, the kids part. So from a physiological standpoint, it’s incredibly common. More so in boys. Mm-hmm. Up to 2% of boys with what? The bed until 14 years old. And the highest contributor to that is actually constipation. Oh, so poor diet or you mentioned fears and I have [00:32:00] heard people say, well, it’s ’cause it’s strict parenting.

But like, I think you kind of have to see, you have to know kind of your research before making.

Gissele : Yeah, of course. Those,

Krysti Beckett: those things. But from a physiological standpoint,

 Or they might be afraid of what might happen in the bathroom. And these are real fears. I mean, I was just talking with my clients in a class recently about how. Do you remember in middle school, like hiding the pad in your pocket and then when you got to the bathroom, you waited till the bathroom was completely empty to open the wrapper.

Like you, we couldn’t mm-hmm. Have anyone know that we were menstruating. We like, it was just so, it embarrassing. So we’ve created kind of these conversations as young people. And then to add to that, I think that a lot of people generally have a, distrust and a shame when it comes to their pelvises, when it comes [00:33:00] to their genitals, because we over sexualize bodies.

Gissele : Mm. Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: And so it no longer becomes, you know even the simple concept of saying the words penis and vagina, these are not dirty words, these are anatomy.

Gissele : Yeah. But we didn’t even call it that before.

Krysti Beckett: No.

Gissele : Right. Like Coie and Chacha and all these other words. Yeah. We have, I think now our kids are, yeah.

Before, like during my time, people didn’t really talk about it. And I love what you just said about it’s, it’s so true. This is part of our anatomy, but we have shamed ourselves.

 I think this is why we have so much shame and guilt in, in the antidote to that is to have compassion for ourselves and to be kinder to ourselves when it comes to that discomfort that comes from having these conversations, which is why I love that we’re having it, we’re talking about, you know, pelvises and the importance of that health and, but you are right, like we are so used to [00:34:00] fighting these aspects of ourselves that we don’t talk about it and then we suffer in silence.

Like, how many of us are suffering in silence, not knowing anything about pelvic health or not anything about the things that women are going through, right? Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: I think so many of us were taught messages, you know, like, you know, starting from a young age, you have private parts, you don’t show anyone else.

Well, for some of us that led to hiding in change rooms.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: No one’s allowed to see this and you’re not allowed, like, don’t look. Mm-hmm. And then going into sexual relationships and not understanding that painful sex is not normal.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: Or understanding that like. Self, like self lubrication, like your body does to an extent, makes some, but if it doesn’t, like using a lubricant [00:35:00] is 100% okay.

And encouraged so that you can actually enjoy being intimate on top of that. Self pleasuring is not a bad thing, it’s not a shameful thing. Mm-hmm. You can enjoy that beautiful body you have. And if, if you were raised in a church like I was, guess what God gave you that amazing body. Yes. And he gave you all those amazing functions.

And guess what? It’s okay to enjoy what he gave you.

Gissele : Yeah. And then you think that if we made like masturbation and all those things. Okay. Like if we, if there was a messaging then, then maybe people might be less likely to experiment with like penetration, maybe leading to less pregnancies.

 I think it would open up the likelihood that women are more likely to have full expressive orgasms and have those like great experience and probably lead to less risky behavior.

I don’t know. What do you think? [00:36:00]

Krysti Beckett: I think, I think maybe it’s a bold statement, but I think men would be too afraid of how powerful we would be if we had complete control and enjoyment of our bodies. It’s a bold statement,

Gissele : You know, there’s lots of people talking about like, the key to manifesting is using the O method. Have you heard of that?

Krysti Beckett: I have not heard

Gissele : this. Using an, using an orgasm to manifest your Right. Well, you’re about to orgasm.

You think about your manifestation. If you just

Krysti Beckett: wanna manifest orgasms, can you start there?

Gissele : Exactly. That was brilliant. I gotta take my hat off of that one. In terms of pelvic health, are you seeing sort of a shift in terms of people engaging in more conversations with less shame and guilt over their bodies?

Krysti Beckett: I think once women become aware of what is normal and what is common, like leaking is common. But a healthy pelvic floor, [00:37:00] you can control, you can pee when you want to.

And you can enjoy sex and live pain free pain is your alarm system, right? So once people kinda hear, oh, I can do something about this.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: I do find that more women are taking those steps to book their assessment with a pelvic physiotherapist to understand how they need to change some habits to feel better.

And for some women it’s as simple as drinking more water. And for some women it is a little bit more work like doing the exercises. And of course there are still barriers, physiotherapy, like I said, it’s not covered in our healthcare system. And as a fitness professional, I can’t diagnose your symptoms.

I can help you improve your symptoms with my knowledge, but I can’t do an internal exam or anything like that. [00:38:00] So there still are going to be barriers where women will just not have the money to go get an exam. But we do the best with what we can. And I’m really glad to see the conversation shift that women are open to having these discussions, that they’re open to saying, okay, yeah, I did have painful sex, or I am having painful sex.

Mm-hmm. And I would, I would like to not like to actually enjoy it again.

Gissele : Yeah. Do you find certain ages are more open and receptive to talk about things like pelvic health?

Krysti Beckett: Yeah, there’s a lot of women I think in the childbearing ages because you do tend to talk about your symptoms a lot in the pre postpartum period with your healthcare professional.

When women start to talk and compare their experiences, that’s happening a lot and I’m seeing it a lot now, [00:39:00] particularly in women over 40 in perimenopause, which is also something that was very taboo. We just kind of had these stories about what women did and how they acted in menopause and you feared them.

They were angry women with hot flashes, right? Mm-hmm. But, but now we’re seeing more women come, come forward and talk about their experiences and. I think that’s not only changing our healthcare, but it’s changing our communities as women, because we need that connection. We need to support each other.

Hmm. And you know, your body, you’re gonna have it your entire life. Right. We have to learn how, how to manage it. And so having these conversations can not only validate you in your experience, [00:40:00] but it can open up doors to find what can help you through your experience. And even if there isn’t a remedy, then maybe it can at least help you understand that, okay, this, this is normal and I can manage it.

Gissele : as you were talking, I was reflecting on something you said. Which really stuck out to me, which is we used to have all this secrecy about our bodies but secrecy is what leads to abuse, right? Like keep it secret, don’t tell anyone.

Whereas making it out in the open forming community like you are. Putting people together as a support system, I think goes a long way in helping us lift each other up and support each other through our most challenging circumstances. I think there we’re sort of in a epidemic of loneliness and isolation that people are feeling I have to suffer through this alone in these opportunities of bringing women together in conversation, in discussion, in support, I [00:41:00] think are so amazing and I think something that definitely should be done, especially about, what people consider taboo topics, right?

Like pelvic health. Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: And when you know you’re right, secrecy can contribute to abuse. Absolutely. But also when you are suffering with something in your body, and even if it involves absolutely no one else, keeping it to yourself, often spirals into shame. And I have had clients who stopped having sex with their partners because it was uncomfortable and they didn’t feel comfortable having that conversation with their partner.

So they just stopped. And that created disconnect in their relationship.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Because it wasn’t just about being in the bedroom. Right. Sex and intimacy is not just physical, it’s about the relationship above and beyond that. Mm-hmm. You [00:42:00] know, when. The second leading cause of being put into a senior’s home is incontinence.

The first is dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Gissele : Really? Wow.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah. So I mean, you’re, our health is incredibly intricate, but also so huge. Like it’s intricate in that there’s so many different things going on, so many systems and our bodies really are so amazing how they work for us every single day. But in that same token it is just one part of you.

Like we are multifaceted beings and so

Gissele : mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Your mental health, your emotional health, your physical health, all of those.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: Like those three categories even have like several subcategories. Your physical health, your pelvic health is not like independent of you. It’s connected. So if you [00:43:00] tend to clench your jaw, ’cause your stress relates to your pelvic health, and then maybe that’s causing your leaking or your pain, and then maybe that leaking your pain is stopping you from going out with the girls on Saturday night.

And then that contributes to your mental health too, because you’re not connecting with your friends. So you’ve got like all these steps and they’re all connected because you yourself are a multifaceted being and you need. Not just physical care, but emotional care, mental care. And, and I think that’s another thing that we don’t do very well culturally, or at least I wasn’t raised that way, was to really look at you as a whole person.

Gissele : Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. And, but that’s how the medical system is, right? Like, again, not to judge it, it has, does very like a number of things really well, which is deal with like sort of acute problems, right? Like you get a cut, you need pain meds. All of those are amazing, grateful to have it right, but it doesn’t do well [00:44:00] with chronic.

 and it’s all symptom management, right? I’m handling this symptom, but I might give you this pill for this other symptom. And sometimes like multiple pills you’re taking for this symptom and that symptom, it doesn’t treat historically the whole person, at least not the North American model. I know that models in other countries are different, so we’re seen as just body parts.

Right. That we’re treating instead of seeing holistically the whole person. Right. What’s going on for you stress wise that might be leading to this particular physical reaction? like people acknowledge that there is the research out there to connects things like stress with heart disease

But we are still sort of treated as limbs as part of a body instead of a whole being that has all of these social relationships. Was it you who was talking to me about like the doctors answer? if you’re a, a person who’s plus size, the doctor’s first answer is always lose weight.

Krysti Beckett: Oh, yeah,

Gissele : yeah, yeah. Okay. Share that story. That’s so [00:45:00] important.

Krysti Beckett: Yeah. It’s very common, especially for women that if they go to their doctor with a health concern. And the doctor will usually go through a series of questions, do you do this? Do you do this? And usually if they can’t come up with a quick answer, they’re almost always the answer is just lose weight.

And in my experience, I haven’t had my current doctor tell me that. But there was a conversation where I was struggling with low energy and we’re going through the markers. And now I was, I don’t remember how many months or years postpartum I was, but I was inexplicably tired. I was getting enough rest.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: And at the time he’s, he said, well, let’s do some blood work. And when it came back, everything was like, textbook or better than textbook. And he said to me, your triglycerides are better than [00:46:00] textbook. And he’s like, did you forget to tell me about a medication you were on? And I was like did you not hear the part where I weight train and I teach five fitness classes a week?

Like I’m incredibly active. It’s not abnormal for someone who’s physically active as me to have load triglycerides like that. They should be, you know? Yeah. But, but no, it was though, though, not a direct accusation, but I did feel as though he was saying that I had lied or failed to share some information.

And I have had clients, you know, report things like neck or back pain and inexplicable. So they were told just lose weight. Where, you know, they are strength training, they’re walking, they’re doing whatever, and, mm-hmm. In one case, it was a client. She needed she finally got an MRI, she had degenerative discs.

Something that cannot be fixed by dieting. So there’s, [00:47:00] there’s so many things out there, and unfortunately between pharmaceuticals, between the diet industry, which is often supported by pharmaceuticals our, our doctors are often kind of, that’s what they’re trained in.

Yeah,

Gissele : yeah, yeah. And like you said, as consumers, we should be looking for more holistic approaches in trying to find people that are creating the whole body and supporting the whole body. I love the idea of interprofessional workers together. Like I would want as a woman to have a pelvic health specialist with my gynecologist, with all of these different individuals working together to talk about.

The whole me.

Krysti Beckett: Mm-hmm.

Gissele : Rather than having me go with all these different individuals separately and have to spend that money separately to come together to have, to figure out how to put all these plans together. [00:48:00] I think as a society, I’d hope that we move to having all of these individuals supporting the whole body, and also the need for physiotherapy and all of these other, additional therapies to be supported by our, healthcare.

Mm-hmm. Like if we’re truly having inclusive healthcare, all of these options should be available. For individuals. Right. So I do hope that we get there.

Krysti Beckett: I would love that too. I mean, if, if you have a good job with benefits, fortunately, you know, my husband’s benefits provide so much for us in that way.

I’m able to have a lot of my physiotherapy, massage therapy, osteopathy, naturopathy chiropractor. Like there are lots of things that are covered. But again, that’s because of his work benefits. It’s not covered by our healthcare. Not yet anyways.

Gissele : Right. And so if people don’t have work that provides those benefits, then who might you punish?

Are you punishing people that are [00:49:00] more vulnerable that don’t have those, those that kind of employment that might be higher paying, better wages? So from that perspective, we have to wonder, ’cause I kind of have this belief that the quality of the government. Is demonstrated by its ability to take care of its most vulnerable citizens.

Krysti Beckett: what an incredible place we would be in if, everyone made a living wage. Yeah.

Gissele : Yeah. They talked about basic income, but I guess that went the way of the dodo.

 because the research on basic income.

and there’s certain, European countries that do basic income and people that don’t need it actually say, oh, I don’t want it, right?

Krysti Beckett: Mm-hmm.

Gissele : But they give it to the majority of their citizens. And people have a higher standard of living, more likely to be better educated.

So people don’t use that just to sit around.

Krysti Beckett: No.

Gissele : Right. Like there’s this perception, the research and it was Canadian research [00:50:00] prove that people’s lives improve when they were outta survival and they had more income. And so there, there was a contemplation that it was something that they were considering applying.

But then that just kind of quietly went away. At least here in Canada. But who knows? But yeah, it would be fabulous to have, those, those sort of options for different people. There’s also like countries that do away with homelessness by providing people homes, right?

Yeah. They give people little tiny homes that they can have space and they’re more likely to then wanna take it to the next step in terms of getting jobs, getting off drugs, and all of those things. So I think when we, when we reach out and help people and see them as a whole being and care about their wellbeing, I think that’s what societies improve and get better about.

Krysti Beckett: There’s really no downside to investing in people.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: I mean, I’m so grateful in Canada that [00:51:00] we have a mat leave, which Wow. Seems like, so in my mind, basic because. we’ve had it for so long. Yeah. But then when I take on a client from the states and they tell me that

Gissele : Yeah,

Krysti Beckett: at the most, at the most they get 12 weeks.

Gissele : Yeah.

Krysti Beckett: And a lot of it depends on either what state you’re in or what your employer allows. It may or may not be paid.

Gissele : Mm-hmm.

Krysti Beckett: But wow. Like in one case I was supporting a mom, a c-section after twins, and she was going back at 12 weeks postpartum as a neonatal nurse. So she’s leaving her babies behind to go take care of other babies.

Meanwhile, she’s had major abdominal surgery and she’s gonna be on her feet for like, 12 hour [00:52:00] shifts. So she needs her body. And here like. Their system was not supporting her. So I just feel so grateful for where we live and that we, you know, even as a self-employed person, I didn’t get a mat leave for my third birth, mm-hmm.

But I still had culturally here, the understanding that I was postpartum, I was stepping back, I was doing things differently and I was well supported during that time. Yeah. You know, by family, by clients. You know, certainly the respect of understanding that that was happening, no expectation for me to rush back into things.

Mm-hmm. But like, what a different world we would be in if we, if we set kind of those bare minimums, those standards of taking care of people.

Gissele : Mm-hmm. Yeah. I was thinking about the time when I had my first baby and I returned back to work, it was [00:53:00] like. Like you opened up floodgates. I was crying all the time.

I was crying at work. This was a year after, like Right. I had been for a whole year with my baby. Right. I can’t even imagine having, giving birth. And then a few weeks later it just like, well, okay, I gotta go. Oh my God. I think I, I think I might’ve quit.So a couple of more questions. I ask all my guests what their definition of unconditional love is.

Krysti Beckett: Ah, unconditional love is

being able to give

when you are at

Any season really at your absolute worst, at your absolute best, but being able to still give no matter what kind of resources you have.

Gissele : Hmm.

Krysti Beckett: [00:54:00] Emotional or other.

Gissele : Hmm. Thank you for that. So last question. Where can people work with you? Where can they find you? Tell us about your website, anything you wanna share with the audience?

Krysti Beckett: Sure. Yeah. My website is http://www.theconfidentmama.ca and I have a blog and I have free core guides and things like that. You can always message me for a free consult. I love meeting people. I love chatting about health and, and whether it’s working with me or just getting connected to somebody that can help you.

I really do love having those conversations. I am on social media and LinkedIn, so if you’re looking for the Confident Mama and yeah, and if you’re in Southwestern Ontario yeah, hit me up. Brant Burford. I’m often in Kitchener and gray Bruce area and Niagara

Gissele : Do you support people in both the physical activity part and the pelvic health as well?

Krysti Beckett: Yes. So I’m a personal [00:55:00] trainer with pelvic fitness specialty, so whether virtual or in person, I offer coaching and personal training, so I work one-on-one. I also have fitness classes here in Burford. But if, if somebody needs help getting started or doing something differently in their fitness, I certainly can help them with an exercise program.

Or if they just need coaching so that they can feel better in their bodies, feel more confident make their health a priority, then I’m your gal.

Gissele : Oh, amazing. Thank you so much, Krysti for such an awesome conversation. I’m so, so excited for our listeners to, to listen to this conversation because we’ve been talking about things that have been taboo and haven’t really been talked about.

 So thank you so much for being on the show, and please join us for another episode of The Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele.

Krysti Beckett: Thanks. Have a good night.

Gissele : Bye.