Introducing me!

Hi everyone, I’m Karen. It's great to have you here!

I thought it was time to introduce myself and tell you more about how I became obsessed with all things health!

I've always loved biology and studied biochemistry at university, but over time, my career as a project manager took me behind the scenes. I gradually moved away from human health until my own health suddenly became a priority.

My fitness journey began in my late twenties when I hired a personal trainer to help with sluggishness, poor mood, and Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) symptoms. I was grieving the loss of my mum and starting to notice the toll of my lifestyle on my health. I didn't think my lifestyle was anything out of the ordinary but my body didn't care about that! My lack of movement and poor eating habits were catching up with me. I started seeing a brilliant personal trainer, the wonderful Rachel Amies, who helped me overhaul my movement and nutrition. It wasn’t an overnight change, but over time, my energy, mood and IBS symptoms improved and then my IBS disappeared. I felt AMAZING, the best I ever had. A few years later, I became a personal trainer to help other women experience the same positive transformations. I’ve been supporting women to improve their physical and mental health through movement for 4 years now! My approach isn’t about quick fixes. It's about creating a sustainable, healthy lifestyle that you love and can maintain for the long term. I specialize in online resistance training, allowing you to build strength and endurance from home with minimal equipment.

My health journey hasn’t been a straight line. I had an acute stress response, complete with panic attacks, anxiety and depression, brought on by a demanding day job during the coronavirus pandemic. I recovered though a mixture of cognitive behavioral therapy and prioritising my own health habits. Soon afterwards I added yoga to my health coaching services. I use yoga, breathwork and meditation to promote relaxation and reduce stress. In today's fast paced world, we can spend a lot of time with our sympathetic nervous system highly activated. You'll most often hear it called fight or flight, although we can also freeze, flop or friend as part of this response. When we spend too much time with our sympathetic nervous system activated, we set ourselves up for a whole host of health problems, both physical and mental, as I found out the hard way! I encourage my clients to build relaxation, like yoga, breathwork and meditation, into their daily routine to dial down their sympathetic nervous system and dial up the parasympathetic nervous system, sometimes referred to as "rest and digest".

More recently, I spent 18 months battling long COVID. I experienced extreme fatigue, brain fog, pain and weakness, which left me housebound and using a wheelchair. I even eventually resigned as a project manager due to my health. I wasn't until I found Dr William Bostock (Long Covid GP and Cambridge Progressive Medicine) and a mind-body approach using an app called Curable, that I gradually regained my health. Mind-body approaches are all about treating the person holistically and understanding that humans are a single complex organism without an artificial separation of mind and body. My treatment focused on maintaining the foundations of health and retraining my brain and nervous system to gradually dial down the overactive danger response that was causing my symptoms. As I recovered, I trained as a health coach. Health coaching is a talking modality that also supports people holistically. Through health coaching, I help clients understand their behaviour, remove blockers and make lasting changes to support the 5 foundations or pillars of health: movement, nutrition, sleep, stress management, and connection.

I know first hand what it's like to completely lose your health and how precious it really is. Great health truly allows us to live the life we want. Now, I’m on an exciting new journey I couldn't have even imagined a few years ago when I was chronically ill: pregnancy! So that’s a bit about me and my story. I’m happy to chat if you’d like to know more! 🎉