3 critical questions to ask before training expecting mothers:

Your eyes are not playing tricks on you. There are way more pregnant women and women pushing prams than usual. The HCF (this is the private insurer – Hospital Contribution Fund of Australia) reported an increase of 22 per cent in newborn deliveries to the end of the March 2021 quarter. The numbers are in stark contrast to the statistics from 2020 when births fell to a 13-year low.

This equates to 1,400 extra babies being born in Victoria alone between April and August. With the other states following suit with increases.

Yes… we are having a baby boom!

Certificate III + IV in fitness are not adequate.

For nearly 2 years I was on the board that reviewed the educational content that makes up Certificate III + IV in fitness. This process is routinely undertaken to ensure that the qualifications reflect the needs of the marketplace. I was invited onto this review board because of my work with COTA (older adults) and also for decade-plus work with promoting women’s health.

With my starry-eyed naivety and optimism, coupled with my force of nature, I believed I would be able to swoop in and make huge sweeping changes.

But alas from this process I learnt 2 things:

1. No one person, or indeed a board of people can impact the path of a huge lumbering beast that makes up the education content of Cert III + IV in fitness
2. Exactly what is in each and every module of these qualifications

This second point is important because I am here to tell you, the information and education given in the pre-post natal period are seriously lacking.

The missing topics in Cert III + IV in fitness.

Here is a list of exactly what is missing from the current education. Can you check off if you have adequate knowledge to cater to the women who will be coming to you with their pregnancy? Or for those clients coming to you post-birth?

• The changing training needs of each pregnancy trimester
• How to assess DRAM (the splitting of abdominal muscles) post-birth
• How to modify training if your client has DRAM. And spoiler alert: Your client’s baby may not be a baby anymore and this still might be an issue. Therefore, you need to check for all postnatal women
• How to empathetically engage (say the right thing) when your client experiences miscarriage and/or stillbirth
• How to ask the questions that need to be asked. For example:
  • Did you have a cut (episiotomy) or a tear?
  • Did you experience any birth trauma?
  • Has someone checked your pelvic floor?
  • Do you have any incontinence issues?
  • So you have any heaviness / dragging feeling with your internal pelvic organs
  • Are you mentally coping? Do you have an adequate support network?
• How to design/modify training programs to work with these answers

Scope of practice

Asking these questions is NOT outside of your scope of practice. However, declaring that you can assess and fix the problems, is. That is why it is essential you team up with like-minded* pelvic health physiotherapists who can appropriately assess, diagnose and support your programming.

*Like-minded because not all pelvic health physiotherapists are created equal. You will want to partner with one who

• appreciates that you provide an important ongoing role with working shared client
• is going to support your shared clients’ exercise goals

However, NOT asking these questions, or training women with a guesstimation of what you think you should be doing, or repeating with what worked for you when you were pregnant, does infringe on your duty of care.

Having the words “I can’t fix or diagnose” should live in your back pocket. Ready to be pulled out when your client (inevitably) asks you a question that would require you to have x-ray vision to answer.

Sure, it is ok to share your own personal experience, or that of other clients… but for true diagnosis – this has to come from a professional in that field.

Awkward conversations made easy.

I have written many courses to support Fitness Professionals – with this one and this one being best suited to working with pregnant and postnatal women. Thousands of fitness professionals have taken these courses. Here is some of the feedback.

“Appreciate your effort it creating your comprehensive course. Thank you for your supportive words & positive feedback. As with your good self, I like to be thorough! Keep up your fine work!”

-Bruce Schulz

“I recently competed the mishfit® Pregnancy and Post Pregnancy Course and absolutely loved it. It’s a great course for those wanting a good sound knowledge about what women experience/feel during and after pregnancy and the types of exercises to prescribe and to be careful of. The course is easy to understand and read and it doesn’t take too long to complete.

I definitely recommend this course for both female and male personal trainers and give this course a 5/5 rating. For the guys, if you are training women in general not just pregnancy and post pregnancy, you should really take this course as it relates to all women.”

-Nancy Callaghan

“Thank you for this course, I will make sure I build the information I have learned into my sessions.

The certification should, in my opinion, be part of every PT’s tool box.”

-Peter Davies

Unfortunately, undertaking the “extra” education is only step 1.

There are another 2 factors that often trip up fitness professionals to adequately cater to their pregnancy and postnatal clients:

1. Creating the systems inside your business of client induction / initial assessment that give the space and time to ask the questions
2. And the confidence to ask these questions

EVEolution™ is here to help.

That is where my brand new course EVEolution™ is here to help.

As an experienced online educator, and with the 2021 Educator of the Year award under my belt… I have created an online course for YOU to work with YOUR clients.

EVEolution™ has a whole module dedicated to pregnancy and postnatal. This includes how to assess DRAM. And what to do about it.

EVEolution™ is organised in such a way, that you can be one step ahead of your clients, learning and then implementing the “doing”. The best learning comes when there is a dialogue between the learners – EVEolution™ is delivered module by module – allowing women to learn together and revolutionise how they see exercise, themselves, and YOU as the coach and the expert.

EVEolution™ is a 50% partnership between me (the course creator) and you, the on the ground expert.

EVEolution™ has a 100% money-back guarantee if you do not make your initial investment back in 3 months.

EVEolution™ partners have 3 months FREE on the EVEolution™ directory. A way to connect with more clients.

Interested to learn more?

If you’re a fitness professional or any other service provider for women and want to become an EVEolution™ partner CLICK HERE.

If you’re interested in learning more about EVEolution™ CLICK HERE.

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These two things may seem like an unlikely blog title. But allow me to share a story with you.

I have been a mover and shaker in the fitness industry for more than a decade. My passion has been to create a greater awareness of women’s health issues. And to build on this awareness to challenge the traditional ways women are trained. This motivated me to start my own women’s only fitness franchise (mishfit®), write education for the fitness industry and start the Women’s Health and Fitness Summit.

My advocacy often attracts other passionate women into my orbit. One of these was Amy Dawes. I fielded a few phone calls from Amy, who seemed quite determined to get to know me. She had recently had her second baby, however, it was the details around the traumatic birth of her first daughter that had led her to contact me. Amy had a vision to bring support and awareness to women (and their partners) of what birth trauma was. And just how prevelant it was.

However, Amy lived in Brisbane and I lived in Melbourne. So our communications were limited to phone, text and email. But she was persistent. At the end of each call, she would book the next, determined that our conversation would continue. By chance, a few months later I had the opportunity to fly to Brisbane for a long weekend. (Pre-COVID I would often travel with my husband for his work and then stay on for weekend retreats). So I called Amy and offered her the opportunity to meet me at our inner city Brisbane hotel. The hotel had a pool and I thought it was a perfect opportunity for her to get out of the house, and we could all use the pool to hang out and entertain her toddler at the same time. This was the plan.

On the morning of our meeting, I received a text message from Amy. It was short and filled with angst. “I just can’t manage to leave the house. I feel so overwhelmed at the moment with going out by myself with the girls. I’m sorry.”

I put myself in her shoes. Although it had been a while, I vividly recalled the drama of getting a toddler and baby dressed, sorted and into the car. It was an event of massive proportions. I replied “What about I jump in an Uber and come to you. I’ll hold the baby while we chat. On condition: you MUST NOT clean for me.” She replied immediately with a yes and a barrage of emojis.

While I was in the Uber and on my way to Amy’s house, I received another text message. It said:

“Is it too early in our friendship to ask that you pick up a coffee for me?”

Were we friends? The Uber driver knew a coffee shop enroute, so we made a short detour and he waited while I jumped out to order two lattes to go. While waiting in line, I received a second text request:

“And an almond croissant too?”

I laughed out loud and immediately knew that Amy and I were to be firm friends.

In 2019, Melbourne – at the Brene Brown event

In this blog I wrote about Jenni who had a condition called levator avulsion, where the pelvic floor is partially torn away from the bone. Pelvic floor dysfunction is wide and varied and this condition has only just been acknowledged by the medical profession. As crazy as that might sound, there may still be women who do not know that this is why things don’t feel quite right for them.

Bi-lateral levator avulsion is when the pelvic floor muscle in completely torn off the bone.

Amy’s post birth recovery started with knowing something was not quite right. Although being told that there was nothing wrong after her traumatic first birth, Amy just knew differently.

Again, her perserverance reigned supreme.

Amy was sixteen months post-partum when she was given the correct diagnois of a full bi-lateral levator avulsion.

Amy learned her bi-lateral levator avulsion, was the direct result of her forceps delivery.

Amy did what most of us do when we need to know more about a subject. She consulted Google with the search term physical birth trauma and could not find even one website that could offer support during this difficult and confusing time.

Armed with my almond croissants and coffee, I was about to discover just how determined Amy was to be the voice of women who suffer in silence.

Let these statistics sink in for a moment:

ABTA

Amy has created a Not For Profit called the Australian Birth Trauma Association (ABTA).

Amy is truly passionate about raising awareness of the physical and psychological consequences of birth injuries.

ABT’s purpose is:

• Raising awareness of physical and  psychological birth trauma and the significant consequences for the woman and her family
• Working with obstetricians, physiotherapists, mental health experts, midwives and urogynaecologists to prevent or address these injuries more effectively
• Supporting affected women and families

Amy created the ABTA website and the logistical set up for this Not For Profit, all while having her second child.

The time when your babies are babies and toddlers are mini teenagers, being a full-time mum… is a full-time, all consuming job! Starting a Not for Profit is no simple accomplishment.

There is a physical recovery from birth trauma. But there is also psychological healing. Also an adjustment to your perception of parenthood. Amy had imagined she would be an active mum, working out with her daughter in the park. Amy wanted to model to her daughter a mother that was strong and full of vitality.

This was the role model that Amy both wanted to be and imagined as her right.

“It’s difficult when you realise you’re not going to be the mum that you thought you’d be. I wanted to show my daughter strong women. Strength used to mean me being physically fit.

But they don’t know the mum that I thought was going to be.

They only know me as I am.

And that’s ok.”

I reckon Amy is one of the strongest women I have ever known.

It is important to acknowledge that birth trauma does not always mean physical damage or injury. It can also encompass psychological trauma. 

If your birth felt traumatic to you, then it was. Experiences of trauma are unique and what may be traumatic for one person, may not be traumatic for another. Also, try not to compare your experience to other people’s. Your personal experience is valid and worthy of acknowledgment, treatment and recovery.

– Australasian Birth Trauma Association

Since our first coffee and croissant meeting, ABTA has gone from strength to strength. In 2018, ABTA expanded to include a Peer-2-Peer mentorship program. 

The Peer-2-Peer program provides support for women and their families impacted by trauma from childbirth. Amy and her team have developed the training package for volunteers. They are in the process of training support staff all across Australia, with plans to expand into New Zealand.

All of this work equates to untolled woman hours and as ABTA is a Not For Profit, Amy donates her time on a voluntary basis.

Birth Trauma Awareness Week starts on the 6th September. This year the theme is journeys. ABTA is aiming to raise awareness and much needed funds by encouraging women and their families who may have experienced birth related trauma to register for the walk and #starttheconversation.

ABTA is aiming to raise $50,000 to provide Australian and New Zealand women with free access to the Peer-2-Peer Meets, a six week, trauma-informed program. The Peer-2-Peer program is ready to go nationwide to ensure no woman is left feeling alone and unheard.

Here is how you can help:

• Join me in setting up your own fund raising page for the Walk n Talk
• Sponsor me on my Walk n Talk
• Join me in purchasing a Tshirt with the message #starttheconversation

If you want to hear more about Amy and her story then enjoy this wonderful interview that Amy did with the delightful Kylianne for the 2019 Women’s Health and Fitness Summit.

 Last words of advice from Amy:

And our friendship, forged over almond croissants, is still as deliciously warm and funny today.

If you’re a fitness professional or any other service provider for women and want to become an EVEolution™ partner CLICK HERE.

If you’re interested in learning more about EVEolution™ CLICK HERE.

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