How Shifting Habits Helped Me Lose Weight, Regain Health, Manage Chronic Pain and Reclaim Joyful Living!

Hi there!

My name is Maureen and this is my personal story of how pain, shame and despair drove me to change from an ignorant, overweight teen to someone who – now in my 60s – is still happy, lean and fit.

It’s an important part of my background because I want you to know that when it comes to frustration with one’s body, I’ve been there. So please know this story is coming from a place of building rapport with you and not from an egocentric place, okay?

So you get the feel of how my mind works, this pic was taken in 2021 on a hike with my sons up Pu’u Wa’awa’a, a popular hiking destination, on the Big Island of Hawaii, where I live. We were laughing at my close inspection of an … ahem … “pile” an animal had left behind.

What can I say… I am fascinated by biology!

How Learning About Diet and Exercise Changed My Life

I know I’m not alone in having this experience, but if you’ve not yet felt the miracle of how life changes when you look, move and perform the way you really want to, you’re in for a real treat.

Because it’s AWESOME.

Before we start, though, there are 3 things I want you to know about me:

1. I LOVE my clients and put my heart and soul into personalizing their programs to give them the best chance at success – adjusting the details until we get it juuuust right.

2. I’m weirdly passionate about understanding why and how our diet and exercise can influence so much of what makes our lives fun … the energy to feel good all day, the ability to eat food you love while enjoying great health and effortlessly staying at a healthy weight.

3. My clients see results, period.

A Little About Me

I come from a big, Irish, Catholic family and am the third of seven children, all born within the span of nine years! The house was jumping with activity, especially since the neighborhood was chock full of kids.

Ours was a middle-class suburban home, with my dad working as an engineer and my mom going back to work as a medical technologist after the youngest got into first grade.

Being one of the “big kids” meant that when Mom was at work, I was often responsible for taking care of younger siblings and making a lot of dinners. I didn’t mind making full meals, but for me the fun came in baking.

Because that’s where all the sugar, butter, flour, chocolate, and all kinds of yumminess was found! Not to mention the savory goodness of pizza, bread, biscuits, bagels… you get the picture.

Maybe it all started with my first birthday cake…

Although baking was great for creative experimentation, eating the finished product on the regular was terrible for my body. Plus, I had been using food to relieve emotional pain that I didn’t know how to resolve. I eventually realized these truths and cut back on the goodies, but all that extra weight remained… and I kept gaining MORE.

No matter how many weight-loss programs I tried, I continued to get bigger and more unhappy with each passing year. Until one Saturday morning, when the bathroom scale needle swung past yet another 10-pound mark (remember analog?) I declared WAR on my fat!

I obsessed over every calorie, practically memorizing my mom’s little handheld calorie-counting book. I skipped meals and started running… slogging out half a block of walk/jog/walk at first, then working up to several brisk miles every day.

And it worked! That fall, my classmates who had seen me 30 pounds heavier just a few months prior were shocked. Happily, my social life got to be a LOT more fun!

My Extreme Enthusiasm Bit Me in the Backside… and Led Me to My Calling

But there was a dark side to this story of weight-loss success: I didn’t know how to eat for health. I became anemic, bulimic, and constantly fatigued. My long, thick hair fell out and blocked the shower drain with every shampoo. Something was wrong.

Fortunately, “Mom the Med Tech” analyzed my blood and discovered the anemia. My pediatrician prescribed iron pills and eating more iron-rich foods. This yearlong episode of challenging ups and downs created a hunger in my to understand what was going on with my body and launched my obsession with nutrition, exercise and health. This desire to understand all-things-physiology drove me to earn a Bachelor’s degree in Athletic Training/Sports Medicine from San Diego State University.

Here’s a shot of Mom and me at my college graduation party on the sand outside my front door (we had a pretty sweet spot there in South Mission Beach).

That degree kept my focus on optimizing athletic performance, including injury rehabilitation and nutrition’s influence on health. I’m a big-time science nerd. In fact, a couple of years after graduating, I finished my remaining pre-med requirements at Stanford University while working in a medical device engineering lab. I ultimately decided against medical school and chose medical device research instead.

I spent a decade in clinical research for cardiovascular devices, perfectly matching my need for attention to detail, investigation of the clinical relevance of findings, and scrutiny of claims being made.

That same research mind lives in me today. I love data and investigating “proof” of a hypothesis.

Here’s How This Relates to YOUR Health

I’m sure you recall how the fitness industry of the 80s preached low-fat diets and long, slow cardio. I adhered to both directives religiously (though was definitely an outlier by also lifting weights) and developed a strong, athletic physique.

BUT… I made mistakes and disrupted my hormones enough to develop Female Athlete Triad – a sign of too much exercise and too little food – and developed foot injuries serious enough to require surgery!

Fortunately, the health and fitness industry has evolved and I have learned a lot since those early days, whether from clinical studies, my own challenges or the struggles of my clients.

Now that I’m officially middle-aged and working exclusively with older clients, I appreciate how life constantly serves up new challenges. Obesity, musculoskeletal weakness, joint replacement, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, neurological impairment… these are the everyday reality for so many!

In my heart I am convinced, though, that it doesn’t need to be this way.

I’m a believer because I’ve seen it time and time again with clients. Plus, I’ve rehabilitated my own body MANY times, most recently from chronic pain due to scoliosis. Despite being just past 50, I felt like I was 100 years old!

I felt depressed not knowing how to fix my pain. I had gone to physical therapists, chiropractors, medical doctors, acupuncturists, massage therapists…

I had tried multiple nutritional patterns and supplements. I took up meditation, yoga, journaling, praying, connecting with friends, being more grateful…

Yet the pain persisted. What was the answer?

The Seismic Shift: No More Martyr!

I needed to take better care of myself, and that took time.

Time away from tending to everyone else’s needs ahead of my own.

Mental, physical, emotional, nutritional, medical and procedural interventions all found a place in my tool kit. It wasn’t easy, but now instead of feeling years older than my chronological age, I feel years younger!

And because of my experience helping so many clients with their own challenges, I am convinced that with consistent right action there is a way for just about everyone to feel they’ve turned back the clock, too.

This is why I help my clients develop their own path to their best health, no matter what the obstacle: overweight, out of shape, recovering from injury or living with a chronic metabolic condition.

We can all feel younger, more energetic and more optimistic about the future.

Nutrition and movement are my playgrounds. Come play with me so you can thrive at any age, too!

I Would Love to Help You Feel Younger!

If you’d simply like to focus on eating for vibrant health and weight loss, it’s easy to meet online and accomplish all your goals using video calls. If there’s an upside to the pandemic, it’s that we’ve all become more comfortable meeting via online video.

If you want to improve your balance, strength, and movement patterns, you can enjoy the customization and convenience of a traveling personal trainer. I will meet you in your association’s gym or in your home, anywhere near the Kohala Coast.

Physical therapy visits covered by insurance exhausted, yet you’re still not back to 100%? Don’t assume you can go back to your normal life and have that body part magically rehabilitate itself.

Many people live with physical impairment for years after surgery – sometimes the rest of their lives – because they never did enough therapy to regain normal function. True rehab takes months, and the older we get the longer it takes.

Let me help you continue with your PT exercises and methodically progress your programming until you’re feeling and performing your best.

If you’d like to ask me a question, shoot me a note using the form below!

To your long and healthy life,