Reclaim Your Energy Through Exercise with Giorgia

Welcome to the Real Life Momz podcast. It is time to take a break from all our to-dos and carve out this time to focus on ourselves. I'm Lisa Foster, your host, and today I am here with fellow mom and fitness instructor, Giorgia. And we are here to tackle the topic of exercise for moms.

So, hello Giorgia. Welcome to the show. Good morning and welcome everybody. It is bright and early. I usually record at night, so I was telling Giorge, I'm like, oh my God, it was so hard to get out of bed, so I'm so glad 'cause you were so motivational about fitness, getting up and doing it.

So I'm excited 'cause I actually need this. I've had a cup of coffee, so I have more energy now. But yeah, I think that it's always important to know why we are doing things. So can you tell us a little bit about the whys, like the benefits of why we wanna exercise and how it affects us and our health?

Yes. So just to give you a background of how I [00:01:00] became a fitness instructor, , I'm a former Judo athlete. I started to do judo when I was five years old. So fitness as being like a big part of my life since I was a kid. And then I became a ICU nurse, , in college. And I did work in ICU post heart surgery for,

over, eight years. And then during pandemic I had to shift, my career and I became a fitness instructor. So I do call myself a fitness nurse because finally my two passion, first part and nursing got together. And now I can serve my moms. My community, , in the best way possible. , but yes, working with moms since the pandemic, so is about five years now, I do believe that, the first thing is that they need to listen to their inner motivation, the health guidelines prescribe, around like [00:02:00] 1 5300 minutes of activities a week. That it's kind of a lot, breaking down on seven days a week. It's around 20, 45 minutes a day. And honestly, from my nursing experience in the heart surgery. I can tell that we need to move our bodies. It's a priority number one that we should make happen, , in order to have some good prevention.

What I always tell to my students when they join my program is that I want to be able to lift my grandkids if I will ever have grandkids on my shoulders. Not only being able to carry my kids right now. But in a long term, I want to be that active grandma that go on a hike with her grandkids. So yes, wise are so important.

And again, looking at starting five minutes a day to day to build a very strong, active routine, [00:03:00] to have some good prevention for the future. And then the other couple of things that I always try to talk with my moms to like help them to get the right internal motivation is that, having a solid, active routine can help them to recharge their energy, our life.

Are so busy, we go from one task to the other one. And we all know that our days goes by so fast, our week goes by so fast. But if we have that hour, that 30 minutes for ourself every day. It's not a waste of time. Sometimes like moms that don't move their body, they're like, oh no, I don't have time. That's the excuse number one.

I don't have time. Instead, I tell to my moms, to my students, those 30 minutes, that hour. Are going to recharge your [00:04:00] energy and they are going to double your time thrive for your time. So you should literally invest into that self-care, daily self-care in order to be able to do even more. We are going to sleep better.

For example, those seven hours, six hours, especially postpartum, we don't get a lot of sleep, but they're going to be solid. Hours, the other thing is that, if once the routine is established, we, it's, it becomes our comfort zone in all the hustles of the day, all our task, it becomes something that we are looking forward to.

Happen and we have a meeting, we have drop off, pick up, uh, soccer practice, whatever. It's in our busy life. But then we know that at 10:00 AM at 6:00 AM at noon, it's our time and we show up for ourself. So [00:05:00] it's literally a stress relief. Task that we put into our schedule. The other thing is that, , as a former Judo athlete, I did learn very early in life how to be efficient.

Because if you want to be an athlete and, you want to be a good student, you need to be efficient, you need to have a very tight, , daily schedule. To have time to study, to go to school, but then to practice to eat a good meal. And that literally cut the time of scrolling on our phone, on, going around and cleaning the corners of our house.

That we all love to have a perfect house. We all do. But I always tell to my moms do you prefer to like, have a perfect house? Or do you rather. Invest into your body. , so again, be efficient. , [00:06:00] when we start to see our daily routine and we are like, okay, if I cut those five minutes there, those five minutes there, and five and five, oh, I have 30 minutes.

Where I can put a workout in, where I can go for a work with a mom, where I can go to do some yoga, whatever like you, like. , so again, prevention, recharge your energy, stress relief, our comfort zone. Be efficient. In the big picture, in the long lasting active routine, really help us to be present that honestly, I'm in my third postpartum phase.

My two older kids are eight and six, and I was, into my career transition. I mean, moving from, as you probably go, guys got my accent. I'm originally from Italy, so it was, uh. A big mess, when I had my [00:07:00] two oldest one. And, , I was not able to enjoy my babies at that time. This time with this new career, new life, a good solid, long lasting activity routine that I have compared to like.

Being an athlete and going so hard. Again, I loved it, but it was, you know, it was something good in my twenties. Right now, I am another person. So now I go to the gym at noon, try to go to the gym every day and noon. I am in the rehab process of, , my core and pelvic muscles. I always had a big injury on my knee.

When I found out that I was pregnant. So again, big, big challenges, uh, but having that hour for myself every day make me a better and happier mom. , and I can really, [00:08:00] yeah, share my love with them when I am with them.

Yeah. I love that you said so much great stuff in there and it's so true.

It's like giving yourself that hour just. Allows you to give more to others. However, I think a lot of moms like myself, like this morning, I just could not get up out of bed this hour. I've had a morning routine for like, I don't even know, like 30 years now.

Like so long. And I do similar stuff every morning. And yes, when I do it, I feel better. I'm set. My heart feels like just more relaxed and I feel more calm and I'm happier. But some days it's cloudy and I don't wanna get out of bed. So

how do you get. Out of bed or it's my hour, maybe my hour's in bed today. You know, like, right, it's still my hour, but that's not what we're talking about here. So like how do we get over that? Yeah, [00:09:00] that's a great question. And as we mentioned before, I. The first step is literally like understanding why we want to do it, right?

So we did cover that and uh, I want just to like underline one more time that, I had a lot of students that joined my program. But they were not ready for it. So if they don't have their solid wise, I can work on the external motivation, like preparing amazing workouts, uh, taxing them, uh, to, you know, motivate them to go out of bed.

I. But they need to take the first step and then I can help them to build the routine after that. But, uh, yes. How is the second step? , and, , since we are busy moms, , I never, give them. Very harsh plan with like a all [00:10:00] in, plan. I usually try to help them to establish their routine with baby steps, , because that's.

That's the only way that busy moms can, make it happen. I had students that they were like, oh, okay, I want to start with five days a week and let's talk about nutrition and let's talk about everything. Boom, boom, boom. I want to sign up. For a marathon in three months. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

, let's take a break. Let's think about it. Let's, , talk about it together. So the first, I have this like bullet point of like five points that I usually make my students go through it. The step one is, . Observe, observe your current life. Like literally get a piece of paper. I love to work with markers and pansies colored.

Use a ruler, make your schedule. And I ask them, [00:11:00] what do you do from six to seven to seven to eight? Like literally write down everything. And I want specific task. I want them to. Tell me what they do for their family from eight to 10 in the morning, what they do at work from 10 to noon. Because I want them to realize how much effort they put into their daily task, and then from there, so number one, we go to step two.

That is like prioritizing. We need to make our ourself our number one priority. We need to show up for ourself. So from writing down all their daily task, I want them. To flip the page and write down what they are, their priorities. [00:12:00] So usually what I see is that we have four to five priorities and in order to make space.

To work out, to move our body to hike. Whatever feels good in term of movements, we need to go down to three priorities, and one of course should be ourself movement, then usually it's family and then depends if they work. If they really like their career, it's usually work. If they are home staying mom, maybe they have more time to take care, like to enjoy their friends, and their community.

But so usually I try to go from five to three priorities saying that number four and five is not that we're going to erase them forever, but we need to cut the [00:13:00] time for those two. And I'm a great example because I love my friends. I love hanging out with my friends. But, especially since we had the baby, now the baby's, , seven months old.

I am, I'm struggling. , my friends now, they're not a priority number one anymore because again, in order to serve my family and to be happy to be a mom again, I don't want to be a perfect mom. I don't care about it, but they want to be happy. Being a mom, I know that I need to work out.

I need, to take care of my kids. I need to cook. I love cooking as an Italian mom. And I love my work. Yes, so those are my three priorities. My friends are still there, my community is still there. , but for sure I'm putting less effort than last year. For example, and again, I see I work with [00:14:00] mom from, prenatal to postpartum and moms that have kids in college.

And of course things get easier and I want to tell it to all the listener of, uh, today's episode, things get easier. My kids before, , having the baby, they were seven and five and our life was. Way easier. So I know that in a couple of months, couple of years, things are going to get easier. I want to enjoy my baby now. I want to be present and stay with her, , as priority number, you know, one family. , and then my friends will be there for me. I know that they're not going away if I dedicate a little bit less time, to them.

So yeah, after we set our priorities, . We need to make it happen and we need to plan our self-care routine. , I, if [00:15:00] they're working moms, I want them to see the self-care hour, 30 minutes as a meeting. With their boss, with, uh, their, uh, perfect client, that, that cannot be skipped. Mm-hmm. We cannot delay it.

, it's in the calendar and it's there. What I love is also a Sunday reset. So on Sunday, maybe in the afternoon if, the baby's kids are napping or they have their quiet time or you send them in the backyard to play, or you ask to your partner to bring them to the bike park, whatever. You sit down and you review your upcoming week schedule and you check, you know, grocery is going to be, uh, on Monday at 9:00 AM and then, uh, workout is going to [00:16:00] be after grocery meetings are schedules there.

Um, library with my kids is going to happen on Wednesday, so I literally have a good. Big picture of the week that is going to start in a couple of hours. And that literally help our brain to like being aware of what is going to happen during this week. And, also like relief, our sense of, multitasking and, uh, okay, there is the birthday party on Sunday and that, and that if we take a view to the week.

We can start our Monday with like a serene mood more than like waking up on Monday and like, oh my goodness. Like feeling already the pressure of the week on our shoulder and neck. Right? Yeah. Um, and then super important [00:17:00] is, ask for help to our friends, community and family. It's something that I did learn moving abroad.

I was that type of person, that strong athlete and a nurse woman that had to show that she could fight the world on her own without any support. But then moving abroad and being completely alone at the beginning, when I met my first friends at, you know, breastfeeding group or whatever, um, I slowly, slowly realized the importance of, uh, asking for help if we need, and also sharing.

Our goals and plan with our partner community friends. , so yeah, involve your, , loved ones into your, , [00:18:00] plan, into your self-care routine because, and it's also good for them because probably if you ask for help because you want to go to workout, they will realize that they should do the same. And maybe next time they. They will ask to you. Yeah. So sometimes it's hard for a mom to ask for help.

So like by you asking them to help, then you're also allowing them to ask you for help. So that's, that's a gift in itself, right? Yes. No, that's, uh, that's something that, again, I learned moving. To the United States.

. And um, the fifth point is accountability. It's such the best key to make it happen. . I see a lot of my moms, a lot of my students that, uh, um, start to go to the gym with a fitness body.

If the schedule allow them to get together once a week, twice a [00:19:00] week. I'm organizing a hiking moms group. I did start, uh, in the fall. And, , it's so funny because everybody knows at school that I am the, the fitness coach. , their motivator, , but few of them are my students, but not, not all of them are in my program, of course.

But, , slowly, slowly, they, all the moms have been joining to this like every other Friday hike. And it's beautiful because, uh. You know, I do schedule the two hikes a month and they just need to join. And. I know it's hard, it's hard to block your calendar for one hour on Friday. , but then when we get there at the bottom of the trail, we are all like so happy to be there.

And it's such a nice way to end the week, like hiking together. And the last hike that we did was, , in a kind of harsh [00:20:00] weather. The storm was coming so it start to snow. Uh, but we had a one hour and a half hike. We were only in three. And we were two international moms, so we were sharing all the struggles of, , moving abroad

and we had an amazing one hour and a half conversation while moving our bodies. Yeah. We couldn't do the same calling each other while we were in bed, , or a meeting at the coffee shop. But, being in a natural and moving our bodies like yeah, literally recharge all of us. , so yes, uh, accountability.

It's so important having a person that is waiting for you, , especially in the first few, , weeks, month of establishing the routine. , it's such a bless. Um, and then, um, how I work with my students and in my program is that usually I tell them because they're all busy moms, . You need patient, you [00:21:00] need, to respect your body, to be aware that there will be days that.

It's not going to be possible to show up for yourself. The kids are going to get sick. You have any issues, and that hour just flew away. But we need, I always bring, uh, two concept from judo from Japan. One of them is, uh, iki. So being diligence, see the progression. Through the quarter. I, I work in Quadr master, so in like four months, uh, round, because that's usually the time that for a busy month, it's possible to make changes in her routine.

It doesn't happen overnight. That's we, that's what was happening when we were at twenties. When we were in college, we didn't have any responsibilities on top of, uh, [00:22:00] studying and, enjoying our friends. So we were able to have those 24 hours for ourself. Now it's not like that anymore, so for sure we need to be.

, patient with ourself respect our routine and our duties because we decided that we want to be moms. So that's, that's okay. But then, have like trust in the program, trust into the process, and, , let a coach lead you. Let your friend. Leading you. And, , try to show up for yourself every day.

And in the long run, it's going to be established and it's going to become your comfort zone where you don't have. To workout. You don't have to move your body, but you want to work out, you want to move your body. [00:23:00] Yeah. It's so interesting just listening to all of this. , I have a good friend that I walk with every week and we've been doing it for about, I think like 15, maybe 20 years.

We used to run, so we used to, I made like a walk run group until we could run together. And we did it that way. We got older and so it changed into walking pandemic, hit. And now we just talk and walk. Like we don't live in the same like city, but we're close enough to meet up.

, so now we don't even have to meet each other. We can just walk and talk and literally talk about accountability. We call each other even if the other one's sick. So last week she was sick and she's like, I can't walk. But I know you have to. So she stayed on the phone with me sick while I'm walking around my neighborhood doing my own trail, whatever it is.

And that's what we do. And it, and it like, I never miss a Saturday walk ever, because we walk every morning at eight o'clock for to like 20 years. So it does make a difference. And you're right, not just like walking with her [00:24:00] is yes, it's exercise, but she happens to also be a therapist, which is really great for me.

Sure. However, she also said that actually walking and talking is better than any therapeutic. Session. It's like having a therapy session. I think I get the bonus because she's a therapist, but it doesn't matter how I felt before. I feel like so much better whether I wanted to go or not.

But having that person waiting for you, whether they're coming or not, is so important. So. When you talk about your friends and saying like, I, you know, maybe have to prioritize other things. I'm like, dude, bring 'em to the gym. Like now when I meet friends, the only time I meet them, honestly, it's either I'm meeting them at a trail for a walk or like, sometimes coffee, but mostly it's going for a walk.

I'm like, just meet me for a walk unless it's, you know, snowing. Then I'm like, let's do something different. So yeah, so just bring to the gym, right. Or meet outside or something like that. And then you can kind of like layer both on. So I think that's so important. And I also [00:25:00] wanna touch on. You said giving that hour to yourself, right?

When those little ones are small and they need all the, all that time, ? But as they get bigger, you're right. We have a lot more time and guess what? We get a little lost in that time. We don't know what to do with that time. So starting now, especially when your kids are younger, all of a sudden you have this routine, this time that you're.

Normally taking for yourself in this space that when your kids are older and they're like off and you're like, oh my God, what do I do now? You have something already that you're already doing for yourself that you can just keep growing so you're not just left in this like, I don't know now what stage.

So I think it is so important to take the time, even though I slept in this morning. Don't do it tomorrow. I'm not gonna do it tomorrow. I'm gonna think of you and I'm gonna be like, Nope, get up. It's my responsibility, it's accountability. Giorge's gonna like ask me. I'm gonna have to do it right now. Let me ask [00:26:00] you this.

Is there, , certain phases of motherhood or even as we age that certain exercises are more important to do along the way? So you were mentioning when the leader, when we have leader ones, , my, I do work 50% online and 50% in person. So I'm on Zoom with, two, three classes a day. And then the recordings, if they cannot show up, on Zoom during the classes.

Because during the postpartum phase when the little ones are, leaders, we need to be flexible. And, , I found out during pandemic that working out from our home, it's, , an option and it's a great option that we can fit in between meetings. Um, so. Yes, I would say that, , in order to make it happen, we need to really understand , how we can do it.

So we all love to go in person. We all love to [00:27:00] get together. And I do believe in community. That's why I, I. Once a week I offer an in-person workout. I work for the City of Boulder. I work at Sea of Boulder, so I do offer in-person workouts, but then I found that for busy moms is amazing to work out on Zoom and uh, I'm there for them waiting for them to show up.

Yeah. And if they don't, I'm going to text them, to make them show up. And if. Something happen, I'm going to send them a recording and I want to, to get a sweaty face, a picture of a sweaty face when I'm done with the workout. So that's how I give them accountability. In term of exercising, I'm specializing in core, because I'm a prenatal and postpartum fitness instructor, strength conditioning.

, so all my workouts have a special core focus. When we talk about core is not, we're not. Talking only about the six [00:28:00] pack but we're talking about pelvic muscles, all the, abs that goes from back to back to forth. And in the diagonal glutes, , lots shoulders. I see all my moms with all the stress in their shoulders and neck.

So I would say that, a great long lasting routine should focus on, shoulders and neck, some easy exercises that you can fit into, like after shower or while brushing your teeth. And then the other thing that I see is like small joints. We don't take care of our wrist enough and during postpartum or even during pregnancy.

A lot of moms have, uh, carpal tunnel symptoms, so I do work a lot on strengthening wrist and ankles. This is another Jo small joints that we don't, take care [00:29:00] enough. So I do a lot of like cal strength. And then of course, for moms is essential to understand how to integrate pelvic muscles and core.

Into their daily, , workout routine. So I do offer pelvic floor workshops, but then during all my classes, I do queue every single exercise, a regular squat, a regular lunch, a dead lift. Thinking about integrating the pelvic floor, movement and core movement into every single exercise. Great. Okay. I am gonna challenge you.

Give us one exercise that moms can do that have no equipment and no time. Okay. I would say, breath work. Ah. Um, I want you to put your hands around your ribcage and I want you to [00:30:00] inhale and expand your ribcage 360. Not only front, but also lateral. And back, try to reach the chair behind you, uh, with your ribcage.

And then when you exhale, close your ribcage together. At the same time. While you are inhaling, I want you to relax your pelvic muscles on the chair, on the ground, and when you exhale, I want you to lift your pelvic muscles. So that's. A amazing workout that you can do without any equipment that you can do driving at the red light that you can do while you are waiting for pickup your kids, um, whenever you want, while you are having dinner with your family.

You take three seconds, you do three breath work, really focusing on working and connecting your brain with your core. I. [00:31:00] I love that because you know, if you can't breathe, you can't function. So That's amazing. I love that. That's it. That's it? Yeah. Okay. Well, where can the listeners find you? So I have my website and I'm going to show you my t-shirt just because, my name is different since I'm Italian.

So it is G-I-O-R-G-I-A, Georgia Fit Mindset. And, you can book an intro discovery call for free, a 20 minutes call. We can talk about your fitness goal and how and why you'd like to start to establish a long lasting active routine. So yeah, I offer this intro call for free because. I really care about helping busy moms to just start to do it.

So please feel free to book a call and, , let's take the first step together. I'm also very active on Instagram, [00:32:00] so same account, Georgia Fit Mindset with the g. Io, uh, and, you can get so many exercises that you can do from the comfort of your home with no equipment during prenatal, postpartum, but then behind, uh, trying to really establish this routine in a good way.

Awesome. . So tell us one thing you want moms to start doing today when they turn off this podcast. So. I want you to take five minutes for yourself today. I want you to close your eyes and, uh, feel where your body is hurting right now.

If there are your shoulders, your neck. Your core that is not there yet when you pick up your kids, uh, your ankles because you're a runner or your wrist, and I want you to start to just move that part of your body, even like bending your neck. [00:33:00] For 10 times back and forth, take five minutes for yourself and start from there.

Yep. Motion is lotion, right? We gotta move. There you go. Right? Yeah. So important for our body and our mind really. So. Yeah. So important. Well, thank you so much for coming and giving us all your insights and motivation. I will not be missing tomorrow at all end. I think I'll probably schedule something just for 30 minutes.

That's all I need, right? To do something today. So thank you. Please do it and uh, thank you so much for having me here.

Thank you for listening to this episode. Georgia is so motivational. I mean, I feel a little bit guilty for missing my workout this morning, but I will not miss it tomorrow and if you wanna connect with Georgia and all her amazing resources, just click on the link in the show notes. And until next week, keep carving out time for yourself. Keep [00:34:00] prioritizing yourself and keep putting yourself on top of your to-do list.