You had a baby. Or tore your ACL. Or injured your back.

You still feel like a hot bag of garbage.

But your MD says all imaging and labs look great and you can just ease yourself back into your "normal" activities.

Except nothing about how you feel feel normal to you.

You ask if there's anything else that can help. "What about PT?" you say. "Nah, IDK what they would work on since it looks like you're healing fine, you're walking fine and you're not at risk of re-injuring yourself. Just take it slow."

If this sounds familiar, have I got the episode for you!

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist Here! https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/b1x9z9

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

Ever follow a health & wellness "guru" on social media, only to find out, down the line, that what they were saying holds no merit?

I say it often: social media is both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, it allows us to connect with professionals all over the world in so many ways; however, because there isn't really a way to regulate the content accounts post and sell (especially if they skirt around the legalese of it all), it's difficult to know who's legit and who's full of...you know where I'm going here.

Today we are talking all about the parameters I personally use when vetting health and wellness professionals I'm considering hiring for myself or recommending for clients to check out, or when someone new comes onto the scene and gets a ton of hype.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist Here! https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/b1x9z9

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

I was scrolling through my IG wall the other day; the two things I post about most are the pelvic floor (cuz, duh!) and the absolute nonsense that is diet culture. I started thinking "here I am, a physical therapist, talking about the harms of diet culture; do people understand how closely this intertwines in traditional healthcare?" The answer is, I'm not really sure.

After working in traditional healthcare for 4 years, there was a lot of brokenness that needed to be fixed; I couldn't change the systems already in place, so I decided to build my own system. On the flip side, I've also escaped diet culture and feel like that move alone afforded me SO much more than I ever could dream: I'm finally a participant in my life and no longer use exercise as a form of punishment or to "undo" everything I eat. Both worlds collide SO often and there is so much bullshit in the health and wellness space that is engulfed in diet culture that I don't think most people recognize.

This episode talks all about how I approach work with my clients in ways that are SO incredibly different from what's offered in the traditional healthcare space, taking into account the harm that diet culture also provokes in these types of spaces. My goal with this episode is to get you to start thinking of how it might not be you that's the problem when it comes to your performance or pain, but maybe it's the system in which you're stuck.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist Here! https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/b1x9z9

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

Today, I'm challenging how you go about your workouts, especially if you're doing them in the gym. In this episode, I am reviewing 3 of the most common mistakes I see in the gym that I wish more people were aware of: because your body will thank you for it!

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist Here! https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/b1x9z9

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

This week, I ventured into one of the places I hate the most: the fitting room.

In the past, trips like these would send me into a spiral of striving to squeeze my body into the size I believed I "should" be, not being "successful" in doing so, then going down a spiral of self-loathing followed by shame followed by vowing to increase restriction in my diet and increase my workout efforts.

And guess what? It was anything but healthy.

Join me for story time today where we revisit what it's like shopping for a new holiday outfit when you're living a life ENTRENCHED in diet culture vs. what it's like to do so when you're healing yourself from that part of your life that just doesn't serve you, regardless of it being under the guise of "health." How can you get over those fitting room fiascos and instead use actual tools to assess your health and whether parts of it need to be addressed vs. just going on ANOTHER diet that has you striving to fit into a smaller size instead of actually improving your health?

Because I know how much life this thought process sucks out of you, especially around this time of year. And I want to ensure you never have to experience it again.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist By Clicking Here!

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

"Once I lose 20 pounds, I'll go on that trip." How many of us create this compromise? That if we lose weight and reach a certain number on the scale, that THEN our life can really begin? How many times have we put off going on a life-changing trip, joining a gym, trying a new restaurant, buying a new outfit, all on this condition that IF we lose this arbitrary amount of pounds, that THAT will be when we can finally start living?

Sounds crazy, doesn't it? That we focus so much on some number we were told was this magical goal that will make all our dreams come true, so we basically put off our dreams in hopes of what? Fitting into a different size pant? See how awful this sounds?

What if we did things that weren't conditional on what the number on the scale reads? What if we gave ourselves permission to, GASP, live our damn lives and explore new things despite what we weigh? And, the hardest part, what if we actually realized we are still valuable human beings who deserve the best from life even if we NEVER lose those 20 pounds?

On today's episode, we are talking about all of this and more: so that you can finally stop living your life on the sidelines and actually start enjoying it. At any weight. At any size.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist Here! https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/b1x9z9

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

You've skipped your workout for the 3rd time this week. Or you've eaten a slice of pizza instead of your usual kale salad for lunch. Does this make you "bad?"

Many of us "fall off the wagon" in regard to whatever plan we have for our eating and/or exercise and then go ahead and label ourselves "bad" for doing so. Did you know that doing so can actually make you less likely to follow through with health pursuits down the line? In today's episode, we dive into why slapping the "bad" label on to your approach to diet and exercise might actually be part of what derails you from your goals, and how we can approach this in a more efficient and helpful way so that you never feeling guilty for skipping another workout or eating another piece of candy.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist By Clicking Here! 

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

Someone sent me a post from a very large social media account, spreading all kinds of misinformation about what pelvic rehab professionals do. No, we don't "finger" people. No, we don't have your legs up in the air. Not only was I upset that messaging like this deters new professionals from entering a field where we need more clinicians, but it also may be deterring people like YOU from seeking out help: because WTF actually goes on when you come to someone like me for issues like leaking, pain with sex, feeling like you have to pee all the time, prolapse, etc etc?

In today's episode, I'm diving deep into what my exams look like when we are trying to figure out how your pelvic floor is performing AND how it performs as you use the rest of your body. You'll see this is way different than what you get at the gyno: we literally look at your entire body, from head to toes, and try to piece together the puzzle that is pelvic floor conditioning. I go over how I work both virtually and in person, so that you know exactly what to expect and why I do things the way I do them.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Check out my YouTube Channel here

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

I'll often have someone reach out after following me for YEARS, finally asking whether working on their pelvic is "weird" because they're young or have never been pregnant. It's so dismissive that we've been led to believe that we are freaks for experiencing leaking, pain with penetration, pelvic pain, pressure in our pelvis, or back/hip pain that never goes away despite our imaging being "normal." The truth is, everyone who pees, poops, and farts has a pelvic floor, regardless of age or birth history (or lack thereof). Over time, our bodies learn ways to move and operate and once those patterns become familiar, even though they might not be the most efficient ways of working, it's difficult to come out of them on our own: and many times, these compensations affect your pelvic floor, causing it to not be as strong as you'd like it to be.

In this episode, we break down the trash belief that only pregnant and postpartum people would benefit from working their pelvic floor, and that you have to be a certain age or have a certain life experience in order to experience pelvic floor dysfunction.

Cuz that ain't how it works.

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Sign up for the Finally Floored Waitlist Here! https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/b1x9z9

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”

Have you ever felt guilty for calling in sick? Or forced yourself through a workout, despite not feeling your best? In today's episode, we are talking all about nervous system up-regulation, which is fancy talk for a body that constantly feels stressed out and doesn't know how to calm down. Remaining in this constant fight-or-flight state actually can keep us from getting over a sickness, and injury, and actually make us more susceptible to things like pain and leaking. Join me to learn more about what you can do as the ultimate form of self care for when life hits you hard + the main exercise I love to help down-regulate a nervous system (and body) that is stressed TF out. 

Healthcare is a difficult territory for women to navigate, as many of us are left feeling dismissed and unheard, our concerns being chalked up to being a "crazy woman" who just needs to lose weight (BARF). That shit ends here and now. Today, we take back our health and speak up: because no one else is gonna do it for us.

Follow me on IG: dr.mel_pt

Send me an email: [email protected]

Work with me: www.yournewquest.com

**Information presented in this podcast is not to be taken as medical advice and is for educational and entertainment purposes only**

Theme music courtesy of Grace Mesa, “Like We Do”