Who runs Fitness Shares?
Hey there! My name is Cathy and I pretty much run the show over here at Fitness Shares
My health journey really began when I was in my 30s. My husband had gained “sympathy weight” while I was pregnant with my second child and was now facing some major health issues.
His blood pressure and cholesterol numbers were off-the-charts high and the doc told him if he didn’t make a change, he would die.
Harsh words, but it’s exactly what we needed to hear to clean up our diet and start living healthier lives.
With the help of documentaries like “Food Inc.”, I learned what it meant to eat real food. It seems so obvious now, but it never occurred to me at that time that boxed, processed foods are full of crap and aren’t good for us. (facepalm)
That was 12 years ago, and I’ve been on a journey to improve my family’s health ever since.
We’ve tried a few variations of whole food diets along the way, even going Vegan for 6 months, but settled in on a low-carb diet 3 years ago. This WOE (way of eating) proved to work best for me and my family!
I LOVE to read health books and I love learning about and trying different diets.
I’m a firm believer in the N=1 concept for nutrition, which basically means testing out different diets to see what works for YOU! I don’t believe in a one-size-fits-all approach to health.
On the fitness side, I’ve always preferred strength training to cardio. No many how many times I’ve tried the Couch-to-5K program, I’ve never been able to stick with it.
But hand me a set of dumbbells, and you’ve got my attention! Until the tendonitis flairs up. The struggle of getting older, I guess.
But one thing I’ve recently turned to when lifting weights isn’t an option, is yoga.
I got into yoga this past year and was shocked to learn I actually enjoy it!
I think it’s one of the best ways to stay fit and toned and I honestly love the constant challenge that yoga presents. The strength and flexibility work involved allows you to see your progress in real-time.
I have many goals for myself with yoga — especially forearm stands and handstands! I could do them easier in my younger years, and I know with a little work, I’ll get myself back upside–down with ease!
As you can see, I’ve been passionate about health and wellness for a while now. The more I learned about health and wellness, the more I wanted to share that knowledge with others.
Starting a health and wellness blog seemed the obvious choice and so that’s what I did!
Little did I know where that decision would eventually lead me.
As fate would have it, I learned the ins and out of building a successful blog through Alex and Lauren.
After seeing my potential, they brought me on board as one of their core team members for their business, and eventually ask me to take over the management of this blog, Fitness Shares.
Why Start Fitness Shares?
The internet is full of advice when it comes to diet and exercise. The givers of that advice are often very passionate (and often close-minded) about their beliefs.
But taking the time to really study diet and exercise with a willingness to view all sides objectively helped to sharpen us on what was really going on in the health and wellness space.
We stumbled upon some interesting statistics about the ever-growing problems in the health and wellness industry:
- The average dieter tries 4-5 diets per year.
- Less than ½ of 1% of those dieters are successful in their long-term weight loss goals.
- Health and fitness is a trillion-dollar industry, yet 70% of Americans are overweight and 40% are obese.
Those 3 statistics alone boggled our heads a little bit. Imagine if only ½ of 1% of kids graduated high school?? That’s an outright problem, not a minor issue. Something is VERY wrong with the health and wellness industry.
Doing more research and from our own personal experience, we noticed some strange things. Things in both the plant-eating community and amongst the carnivores. Maybe some of these will resonate with you:
- So many myths, scams, and outright lies exist that people have just become completely immune to the meaning of good health and wellness. Some have even become resigned to the “fact” that they can never be healthy and should just “accept” being overweight and tired.
- People have become sanctimonious about their own beliefs about nutrition. We all have that Facebook Warrior friend droning on and on about diet X and how amazing it is, blindly following every word preached and ignoring any counter-evidence or ideas opposed to their viewpoint.
- There are so many unhealthy “healthy” recipes out there to make you feel better about yourself for eating crap food. Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies. Paleo Ice Cream. Atkins Pumpkin Pies… These things are really just confusing people more than they are helping.
- People are, in general, just confused about how to lose weight, yet there is more information out there than ever before.
As we delved further into the rabbit hole of health and wellness, we learned a few things that became the principles of this website:
Principle 1: We believe that your diet determines most of your health and well-being.
When most people have a medical issue like dry skin, they usually turn to a moisturizer to solve the problem. While moisturizers are great, this is still the wrong “pill fix” mentality. The right question one should ask is “WHY do I have dry skin?”
Maybe your skin is dry because you are drinking virtually 0 cups of water a day! 
Did you ever think that maybe those persistent headaches you get are not just random, but actually caused by a food intolerance?
These are just some of the many examples why…
Food is medicine.
Now, food can’t cure everything, but you’d be damn surprised by how many “problems” people currently have and how their diet affects (and sometimes causes) them.
Your health, wellness, and beauty should not be a never-ending cycle of putting on bandages to cover things up. If you eat healthy on the inside, you will radiate on the outside.
Principle 2. We believe in quality over quantity.
Counting calories is mundane, boring, and most people are terrible at it.
We’re not big fans.
When you focus on eating lots of high-quality nutritious foods, getting in under your calories becomes almost automatic.
It’s not just about the calories, it’s what each of those calories is doing for you!
Principle 3. We believe that there is no one-size-fits-all diet.
What you eat should be determined by your individual goals, tolerances, and intolerances.
Some people have celiac disease and cannot process gluten, and some people can. Having a one-size “cure-all” diet does not make any sense.
How you eat should also depend on your individual goals.
The optimal diet for weight loss is different than the optimal diet for skin health. The optimal diet for muscle gain is different for both of those.
What you eat should be determined by your goals as much as your individual needs and problems.
