Episode Show Notes
Welcome to the Pilates Diaries Podcast.
Our guest on this episode is Melissa Turnock. Melissa is a long term Pilates teacher from Sydney’s Northern Beaches. Melissa was originally a speech pathologist, but since discovering Pilates in the mid nineties to overcome a debilitating back injury related to scoliosis, trained to become a teacher, and then co-founded Spring Pilates in North Sydney. Melissa has since trained in a range of other modalities, including yoga, TRE, Hypnotherapy and sound healing, and has been a shining light in the Pilates community as she co-created with industry colleague Fiona Eakin the Strengthen Your Recovery Pilates program DVD to aid with recovery following breast cancer surgery after overcoming the challenges of breast cancer herself. Melissa’s passion now lies in bringing a voice of strength and empowerment to the journey of menopause.
The mission of this podcast is to share the stories of the impact of Pilates to help you live and move with more joy, physical vitality, and renewed vigor.
Pilates was a somewhat unknown word until it started creeping into conversation somewhere around the 2000s- maybe even before then depending on who you asked and amongst which circles, and has largely remained and enigma for many reasons- one of which perhaps is that Pilates really has to be experienced to be understood.
There are now a wide range of Pilates styles available when you attend a Pilates class, perhaps borne from the variation of interpretations of how Pilates was originally taught by its founder, Joseph Pilates.
With The Pilates Diaries Podcast we’re inviting Pilates enthusiasts around the globe to share with us what they’ve noted down in their Pilates Diary. Our hope is that the Pilates Diaries Podcast goes some way to answering the question ” What is it that makes Pilates so special?”
We’ll take a privileged peek into the Pilates Diaries of our guests to gain a greater insight into the impact Pilates can have in all of our lives and contribute to the health and wellbeing of the community at large.
I welcome you along for the journey and welcome your comments and discussions through the links found on your favorite podcast platform. Enjoy.
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Episode Transcript
Bruce Hildebrand: In the spirit of respect, The Pilates Diaries Podcast acknowledges the people and elders of the Bunurong people, members of the Kulin Nation, who have traditional connections and responsibilities for the land on which this podcast is produced.
Hi, I’m Bruce Hildebrand and this is The Pilates Diaries Podcast.
The mission of this podcast is to share the stories of the impact of Pilates. We’re inviting Pilates enthusiasts to share with us the notes they’ve taken down in their Pilates journey as we seek out the answers to the intrigue Pilates has been able to ignite inside millions all over the world. Our hope is that The Pilates Diaries Podcast goes some way to answering the question ” What is it that makes Pilates so special?” Join me for privileged peek into this episodes Pilates Diary.
Our guest on this episode is Melissa Turnock. Melissa is a long term Pilates teacher from Sydney’s Northern Beaches. Melissa was originally a speech pathologist, but since discovering Pilates in the mid nineties to overcome a debilitating back injury related to scoliosis, trained to become a teacher, and then co-founded Spring Pilates in North Sydney. Melissa has since trained in a range of other modalities, including yoga, TRE, Hypnotherapy and sound healing, and has been a shining light in the Pilates community as she co-created with industry colleague Fiona Eakin the Strengthen Your Recovery Pilates program DVD to aid with recovery following breast cancer surgery after overcoming the challenges of breast cancer herself. Melissa’s passion now lies in bringing a voice of strength and empowerment to the journey of menopause. I’m very much looking forward to this discussion. Melissa, welcome to the podcast.
Melissa Turnock: Thank you, Bruce. So nice to talk to you again.
Bruce Hildebrand: Melissa will begin by taking a look back- can you tell me about life before Pilates? What were your pursuits? Where did you see yourself heading at the time and in hindsight, what do you now see were some little threads that might’ve led you to discover Pilates?
Melissa Turnock: I started my work-life as a speech pathologist, which is related to Pilates and almost foundational. I think I desperately wanted to be a Physio and I missed out by five marks- which in the old days, like we had a HSC out of 500 and I just missed out by physio by five marks and had chosen speech pathology. In hindsight that was absolutely perfect for me because my biggest issue in life was I had completely disconnected from my voice and absolutely disconnected from my body. I was not feeling a whole lot and presenting very functionally in the world. I was running a department with staff underneath me with a very bad back. I’m talking so bad that I used to get out of bed and my husband would help me slide my legs up the wall and lay on the floor to relieve the pain- and that started in my twenties! I remember as a ‘speechie’ training sitting on the little kindie chairs- you don’t have tiny those kindergarten chairs are with my knees up around my ear lobes learning to be a speech pathologist, doing my very best in constant pain. In fact, the back pain really kicked off in my twenties and unbeknownst to me, I had a scoliosis which is common, but can also be completely asymptomatic- but for me it was absolutely chronic to the point where I just started searching- I just started looking.
I went to the Physio / whatever hands on modality I could find three times a month, immediate pain relief, walk out the door- miserable cow the next day! Something is really wrong with my body! And I just kept looking and I ended up in front of a rheumatologist and that’s a pretty hardcore professional to go to. And he’s like “I’m not going to do surgery on you”- and I’m super grateful he didn’t do that- he said ” You need to do something like I don’t know- yoga, Pilates.” I was like Pilates? What’s that? And so I literally found my way to one of the first Pilates studios in Sydney I do believe- gosh, what was the name? Sonia Shultz- she had a studio in Neutral Bay in Sydney, and this is 96! I walked in the door and unbeknownst to me I had found the thing that I would become an evangelist about, because that was the only thing after years of all of the treatments where I learned what was going on in my body, I learned what movements made it worse and what movements made it better and I became fascinated because this was the missing piece for me- right? My professional life as a speech pathologist was me learning the skills of helping people of talking out loud of having to explain myself to people who have very impaired, comprehension so it was so foundational- it was the perfect training ground for a Pilates teacher. Next bit was- now you need to start learning about your body and oh, by the way, we’re going to get you into your body by giving you a really bad back in your late twenties, early thirties and we’re going to get you to figure out what’s going on and how to fix it.
Bruce Hildebrand: As simple as that!?
Melissa Turnock: It didn’t feel simple at the time, but I’ll tell you what, when I started doing Pilates, I was like ” This is it- this is the thing!” and I wept, I remember coming home from Pilates and going ” They understand me- I get this!” But I had to go on quite a journey to find it. It’s like Bruce you have to try all the things that don’t suit you, you have to meet all the edges of yourself that aren’t who you really are before you get to the who you really are and what’s right for you- so I was super grateful that I found it and I literally was like ” This is going to save my life!”
Bruce Hildebrand: I say that tongue in cheek of course because I don’t think it’s ever that simple, but the way that you articulate it is so clean and speaks of your experience this far down the track to be able to articulate it so simply that it was those key elements that had it come together for you- the realization that Pilates was going to be so helpful for you.
Melissa Turnock: Exactly! And so I launched myself into learning about it and immersed myself in it absolutely. And that was ’96- so that’s a long time ago and Pilates wasn’t that big back then was it? It used to be the case that people would ring you up and say “Hi, I’ve heard about you- what is Pilates?” And they had no idea- so we have to really explain what Pilates was to people it wasn’t a known thing- so we were quite groundbreaking back in the late nineties, early two thousands I think,
Bruce Hildebrand: We have some parallels there- I also stumbled across Pilates in 96- and like you say, I had to hunt for it- I had the go looking it certainly wasn’t on every corner as it is these days- it was into the mid to late nineties and then early into the two thousands when it started to get a bit of traction here in Australia.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah we were definitely behind the eight ball, but thank goodness for whoever bought it here- I’m very grateful!
Bruce Hildebrand: And Melissa can you tell me of the story when you first arrived at Pilates- take us back to 1996 and when you walked into that studio for the first time?
Melissa Turnock: I remember walking up the stairs being quite scared because any movement experience was not positive in those days for me. And at least the familiarity of it being a Physio practice on that side of the corridor and then there’s Pilates studio on this side- I’ve got goosebumps remembering it- this Pilates studio- and I had this assessment with the Physio and it was like, that was familiar, but then when I walked into the room, the first thing I saw was the spine corrector and I remember thinking if she asks me to lay over that I’m going to hurt my back because extension was my problem. Laying back over anything- it was like “Okay, I’m done for a week now! And during that session I remember feeling like I don’t have to solve this problem anymore because I had searched and searched and had so much treatment. Now it was like someone is going to help me now. I’m getting emotional remembering it’s like this woman knows how to make me not be in pain every day. And I stumbled upon a bloody good Pilates instructor- she was experienced- I ended up going into business with her and opening a studio with her- so thank you to the universe for putting me in her arms because she was really good and I think that’s what gave me such hope. When you find a Pilates instructor that number one can communicate really well and number two clearly knows the methodology in their body then I could just let go and go “Ah, someone’s going to look after me now.” That’s what it felt like!
Bruce Hildebrand: What an amazing experience to have the fortunate opportunity to step into.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, and I needed rehab Pilates big time and so back then, that’s all they really was, wasn’t there, there wasn’t any gym Pilates- Pilates instructors were pretty much tied in with Physio practices- so it really was a modality for people as a bit of a last resort- ” You’ve tried everything else, how about you give Pilates of go”- that was the vibe.
Bruce Hildebrand: It’s funny- I was speaking to someone yesterday they were trying to figure out the scientific part of Pilates and I said ” You know what- there’s been a long history of being very scientifically effective, but largely the artistic side of it and the embodiment side of it, which is in many cases, impossible to track down from a research scientific measurement perspective- what a great marriage between those two things that Pilates has been able to achieve.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, absolutely! To walk out of a session and to feel safe in your own body and this is really what any movement practice that is getting you to go out of your comfort zone into places that you’ve been a bit fearful before- if it can make you feel safe around movement and you walk out the door feeling better than when you came in- I don’t care how many research papers there are on it because we’re humans and we have multi needs, the tone of our muscles and our degree of our back pain is this much, Bruce, the rest of us is infinite. So to have someone walk in the door, unsure uncomfortable, and that smile that you get to see across their face and they’ll suddenly start taking a deeper breath in the session- that is gold! And it’s been so frustrating for me as a Pilates instructor, as the years have gone on to have this You better prove your effectiveness” rammed down my throat- which is very much the medical model- when I know that Pilates took me from being a bitch to live with, to being a very empathic person. So we get to see that real world effect beyond ” Oh, now I can do six planks and it doesn’t hurt my upper traps anymore- that’s fabulous, but it’s the way it makes you feel that I really fell in love with it and the way I can connect with another human and see what embodiment does for them- and embodiment is the word- embodiment is my jam now! People are so dis-embodied people have cut themselves off at their neck and live in the world from their head and I think it’s a really unfortunate place to be and Pilates is a big piece of that puzzle of helping people I think!
Bruce Hildebrand: I think you sum it up so beautifully and to make those reconnections for yourself- I can hear it in your passion in your voice- that it’s an essential component of existing, really.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, we’re not taught how to be embodied- we’re not taught as a child to pay attention to the sensations in our body- we’re taught to ignore discomfort, we’re taught to medicalise pain which to me, Bruce, is all about handing the responsibility for your welfare over to someone else! Going to a Pilates studio is a colaboration with a professional that has hopefully walked the path ahead of you. There is this imprint in our brain that when something doesn’t feel right, we ignore it or we get a pill for it and what that does is it separates us from ourselves and our own inner wisdom. And it is our own inner wisdom and desire to return to feeling good that gets us to find a Pilates studio in the end. When you can face the discomfort going on in your body, and I think tension, joint pain you know a sore lower back- it’s like the doorway into a whole world that exists within you and it’s like the kindergarten entry point into what’s really going on inside your body? Let’s give you a bit of back pain so you start to pay attention to this incredible instrument you have.
Bruce Hildebrand: And you can develop the sensitivity to listen much more acutely.
Melissa Turnock: Exactly and to me that’s what living is- if you can trust and feel safe in your own body you get to connect with something so much bigger than yourself and Pilates has been one of the many pieces of the puzzle for me that has literally opened up my heart to allow myself to really feel stuff. And it’s had to start with my body and my scoliosis and then it moved on to being able to face past traumas, being able to feel my emotions, being able to bring that into a relationship with others and really get my body to be a guidance to me as to what feels good and what doesn’t feel good in life.
Bruce Hildebrand: You speak of it so beautifully, thank you. Melissa, what were some of your first impressions of your teacher, the other people in your class, and what were some of the perceptions of other people in your life when you told them that you’d started this new thing called Pilates?
Melissa Turnock: Well, I was the youngest one in the room probably by about 30 years- I remember that because it was mainly older people, who, were going because they had, their version of bad backs and frozen shoulders and all of the things- so it definitely felt a bit like a care home but that’s the way it was, and I was just a whole lot younger and really open-minded to receive what Pilates had. I remember feeling so grateful that I’d found someone that understood what a scoliosis was and. I just developed such faith in it because every session, like I do remember it made my back worse at the beginning than before- but that’s because we were obviously having to work out what movement patterns I could tolerate- it’s a bit touch and go in the first few sessions, but then I just started to feel better as I walked out the door and then I started to get curious about the equipment and it literally only took three years before I decided I needed to learn how to do this for other people, because I didn’t have daily back pain anymore because I couldn’t say no to playing tennis anymore because I knew I’d be stuffed if I played tennis with my friends!
Nobody had ever heard of Pilates- my husband was just so glad that I wasn’t a miserable wife anymore- he was like “Here go and have as many sessions as you want- Go! Go! It was expensive back in those days. But people could just see the difference in me, and I knew I wanted to have a baby at some point, and I was concerned that pregnancy would be problematic with the scoliosis and I really didn’t want it to be any worse- so it was part of me readying myself to have a baby and hopefully get through that without too much pain, which I did in 2001, he was born. So yeah, nobody had a clue what I was talking about, but they could just say by the look on my face that I was onto a winner. And it’s like anything- you can’t tell anyone how good something is- because I was trumpeting it to the world- you got to feel it in your body before you really going to get it- it was a solitary journey in that way- I definitely was not among lots of people doing it at that stage, it was quite out there and hidden away really.
Bruce Hildebrand: You’re exactly right- it’s hard to describe sometimes and it’s only when you really get the true experience of it.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, you can’t put it into words!
Bruce Hildebrand: You also talk about the trust that you had with your teacher and the initial experience where it wasn’t working for you in the first couple of sessions, but the fact that they held the line and told you that, yes, this is going to take a few steps- I distinctly recount working with the client myself about five or six years ago- she’d been recommended by a well-known sports doctor here in Melbourne, and I said “Look, it could go one of three ways- we’re going to try the most likely way first, then if it doesn’t work, we go to step two, and if it doesn’t work, it goes to step three. And sure enough, after session one, she didn’t like it after session two she didn’t like it, but after session three, when it gave her a little window into the relief that inevitably needed to be that way- and it takes a little bit of time to work through that- even with all my years of experience- she was able to get some success and has been a huge advocate and a success story of Pilates ever since as well- so similar along those lines to your story Mel.
Melissa Turnock: Absolutely- and it’s so much about the relationship with the teacher. You’re the same- we’ve been teaching Pilates so long, that we’ve probably moved from studio to studio and people follow you because it’s so much more than just the Pilates and the repertoire and the music that you play in the background- they feel safe with us and that’s something you can’t put into words. They like being with us, we make them laugh, we remember their kids’ names and we’ll ask them, how did Dave go with his footy match on the weekend? People just want to be listened to and I knew that from the very beginning, that’s going to build good relationships and people can tell when you’re teaching from a place of book learning, not from an embodied place, they feel energetically safe in your presence because you are speaking from a place of having received Pilates- not from a place of, I just learned this in a course, and I’m going to try and help you because there’s this resonance and this connection and that’s why they stick with us and trust us. It’s never failed, right? We’ve never caused more harm than good- we have only empowered so many people and that’s been a pleasure to be able to offer to people.
Bruce Hildebrand: I echo that it is a huge privilege to be a Pilates teacher and like you say, it takes some time to, receive that in your own body and then share it with such clarity. So for those listeners who are perhaps early in their teaching time, and it doesn’t feel as clear as Mel is describing in this conversation, then stick at it and the embodiment will be a game changer for you! Mel, I’m curious to talk about when you first noticed Pilates was having an impact in your life, when was it really getting under your skin- you talked about the pain relief factor so I’m curious, was it immediate for you or did it take a little time when Pilates was really changing what you noticed in your life?
Melissa Turnock: It probably took two years of consistently going- but it’s so many factors- there was a lot of fear in my movements because so many different movements pre-Pilates would cause problems and put me out of action for awhile. So I only went once a week and it was about 18 months to two years when I just suddenly noticed one day that I spent a lot of time in the garden- was either in the garden or riding a bike, one of those two things- and normally that activity would have been a nightmare afterwards. And the next day I felt fine. And it was like this penny dropped- this is a cumulative effect. This has been a slow process for me and now that I feel like I can trust my body again, I trust the Pilates teachers and their expertise but my relationship with my body was so distorted because all I had ever done was really created pain or numbness- I couldn’t feel anything because of other issues that it was like slowly, my body started to trust. My mind was like, aha, this is actually working and it became very clear that this was probably going to be a lifelong pursuit and that was not fraught with “Oh, damn I wanted a quick fix and why couldn’t I just do six sessions and go!? It was like ” This makes me feel so happy as well as pain-free I can’t wait to get in the door because I know when I walk out and all of the cost of all the Physios and all of the acupuncture, I didn’t have to do all that anymore because Pilates had taken the need for all that away.
Bruce Hildebrand: Incredible. I’m curious to ask on the flip side Mel was there any parts of the experience that you didn’t like, or you didn’t want to accept or the parts of Pilates that you found most challenging in your pursuit of wanting to improve?
Melissa Turnock: No, I knew fairly on exactly what sort of client I wanted to teach. Let’s just say I’m never going to be teaching an elite sportsman Pilates- like I knew very quickly who my ideal client was and where I enjoyed teaching Pilates so there was definitely other parts of being a Pilates teacher it was like ” That’s great- you go and teach those kinds of people” and I guess sometimes that might’ve made me feel like, a bit inadequate, like other Pilates teachers that have, these kinds of clients better than me, but you just got to work through all of that ‘comparisonitis’ and especially as more and more Pilates studios came on board it’s like “Oh shoot, there’s another one opening up in the same suburb as me!” You’ve got to work through your stuff about really knowing who you are and what you’re good at and not letting that worry you. So it was two-fold- it was like ” Oh good, there’s more Pilates around now than they was five years ago.” But also ” Oh man, we’re going to have to work twice as hard to keep our clients because they’ve got other options of where to go.” But what happened with that was I literally worked through to the point where I was so grateful that there was be someone for everyone- there would be a Pilates instructor for everyone, and I couldn’t be all things to all people- so I think it ruffled my feathers a little bit in that I was like “Am I good enough? And I’m not quite as slim, I don’t look like a dancer kind of Pilates teacher, like you’ve got to deal with all your stuff that comes up! If you’re going to stand in front of people and appear as the expert, you are bound to compare yourself to other people- so, so natural. But what you get to do is be really strong and rock solid in what lights you up and what kind of client you want to be with because there is so much Pilates available now that we do get to choose that,
Bruce Hildebrand: And it’s a real positive, I agree with you that there’s so much Pilates available we get to pick and choose and a big part of The Pilates Diaries Podcast is about exposing listeners to the array of possibilities that are available with our integrations with Pilates, and I’m curious to expand on that on where you’ve taken your Pilates over the journey Melissa. Along those lines, can you share with us some of the people who you met along the way at this point in your Pilates that helped to shape your Pilates experience?
Melissa Turnock: I was lucky enough to start at a time when Pilates training was finding its feet, the Pilates association was finding its feet I’m a bit of an organizer so I very quickly got involved with the APMA and wanted to take on some roles of helping out, because I was so enamored with Pilates, but I was also interested in the professionalism. Having come from a Speech Pathology background, where you are called a health professional, one of the things I noticed when I came to Pilates was it had a different energy to it and I was like “I really want to help what I believe is a profession of Pilates come to some level of standards and coherence and come under an umbrella where we advocated for each other, where we educated each other to the highest standard and we didn’t let anyone in the Physio / other world tells us that we were less than” because it was a lot of that vibe back then. So I went to all the conferences I went to all the Brent Anderson stuff. I went to Powernouse in Manly- I did all of their trainings. I was very active in helping run conferences. I was the education overseer for the APMA for a long time. So I threw myself into the profession of Pilates at that kind of level. And I trained with Penny Latey- and she was one of the first people to being Pilates into Australia- I did the graduate certificate in Pilates at UTS- University of Technology- it only ran for a short time- where we got a uni qualification and at the same time I was doing the internship with the woman that was my very first teacher. Then I was involved with all the Melbourne people- I met you. there was a lot of us around that time that were like with a wing and a prayer. I want to open a Pilates Studio! We didn’t have a lot of business nouse- we had to learn the hard way. There was not a lot of money in Pilates studios in 2002 but we just had so much passion for it that we just thought, I’m just going to give this a go- nobody’s told me how to be a small business operator. So I had to learn all that stuff too and I went and I learnt about small business management so many learning curves! All you want to do is stand in front of the client and teach them how to extend and rotate safely and feel beautiful- that’s all you really want to do, but there’s all these other aspects to running a Pilates studio.
So that’s what I did and got stopped in my tracks when I got breast cancer! And the rug got pulled out from under me! And so guess what Pilates had done? Pilates had prepped me- Pilates had taught me- and I get emotional remembering this because it’s all dawned upon me. This is the next piece of the Melissa puzzle- Pilates had prepared me for the insult to my body that was a double mastectomy and six months of chemo. So I remember clearly in the one month before my double mastectomy, I knew exactly what exercises to do to get the best range of motion- I was not going to be a lymphedema girl at all. So I had all that knowledge, Bruce, and it was like “Thank you universe- you have prepared me for this! And in the period, after my double mastectomy, I had full range of motion in both my shoulders, six weeks after my surgery. That was because I had all of this Pilates knowledge- so it’s no accident everything’s a stepping stone along the way.
Bruce Hildebrand: That’s a beautiful story- thanks for sharing! That information regarding returning your shoulder range of motion, it isn’t a common story I’m hearing?- it’s not advice that you would get from the medical fraternity- it’s not to be expected to achieve that sort of range of motion for the vast majority of breast cancer survivors?
Melissa Turnock: No, and I knew it was possible and I was actually quite heartbroken and I still get really upset because I know what would be possible for so many women post breast cancer- and I fought tooth and nail Fiona and I- Fiona Eakin- was another Pilates instructor long-term- we actually worked with The Breast Cancer Network of Australia- we created a DVD and we filmed it properly and it was all done at Spring Pilates in North Sydney when I owned that studio to show women what was possible for them post breast cancer surgery. And it was like having to fight our way into the system and it was so wrong because we knew what the trajectory was for so many women that didn’t get directed towards a Pilates studio post-surgery. I met many along the way and they were like “Why didn’t someone tell me about this after my surgery? Why have I had to wait five years and stumble upon Pilates?! But we tried- believe me, Bruce- Fiona and I gave it a red hot go and what happened for a long time was they distributed the DVD that we made in the aftercare packs that went to women, who’d had surgery. That happened for a while, but trying to get any air time around speaking as part of the wellbeing team that a woman post breast cancer should address trying to get in to that- it was just ” We weren’t nurses, we weren’t Physios!” It was very frustrating because I knew how like Pilates might recovering from a mastectomy a dream Bruce- it was like nothing had happened really. So I wish that for every woman that goes through any sort of surgery- they deserve it- you’ve got enough crap going on without then having months and years of shoulder problems- so that was a really hard time actually.
Bruce Hildebrand: I’m sure. And there’s a rich history with mastectomies to do with Pilates- historical videos of Joseph Pilates working with Eve Gentry one of his students who had I think one breast removed, is that right?
Melissa Turnock: Exactly, very tied in the early days. And you know, there was some humor to it- I do remember when my surgeon was like so Mel, are we going to reconstruct your breasts? Or are you just going to have them off and wear a prosthesis? And you know what my first thought was Bruce? If I reach up the trap table to adjust the springs and my prosthesis pops out of my bra, it’s going to ruin my day! That was my first thought- it’s like “You better reconstruct my breast because I’m a Pilates teacher and I need good mobility! So these things cross your mind and so yeah, I chose to have the reconstruction to save my career- shall we say!
Bruce Hildebrand: That’s also along the lines of having full intention to regain full control in your shoulders- a prosthesis I’m sure would even contribute to your lack of mobility and your lack of freedom to move through your spine, through your neck, through your shoulders so you made the right choice.
Melissa Turnock: Oh, absolutely I did!
Bruce Hildebrand: And could you sum up the limitation that you found despite yours and Fiona Eakin’s best efforts to build the messaging and the promotion of such a powerful education for post-surgery women in the breast cancer setting- what was the breakdown? Do you feel like it was Pilates needs to be more professional across the board, more understood, more recognized?
Melissa Turnock: Lots of reasons- I think it’s misunderstood, it’s misinterpreted because there’s so many versions of Pilates- there’s the Pilates in the gym and then there’s the Pilates that someone who has motor neuron disease can go to and receive, and they’re worlds apart from each other. And I was always frustrated that the Pilates profession couldn’t come together and that there was this association and this association because it was weakening our argument for want of a better word- it was making it harder for us to be in the level playing field with other bodywork modalities and so they didn’t really understand the full impact because Pilates wasn’t really understood- so that was our fault- that was our profession’s fault and I’ve always found that frustrating. In the medical world of The Breast Cancer Network of Australia and other medical bodies they go straight to the doctors and ask them what they think. They talk to the dieticians about their diet after breast cancer, they get the psychologists in. Pilates always just seemed to come like a distant second, third, and fourth, when in fact for me, it was a skill for life that you could equip a woman with after breast cancer- because once she’s recovered from all of the mobility issues and the lack of body confidence, the shame and the awkwardness around losing your breasts and be supported long-term through that- then they can get stronger, they can be fitter and healthier than they ever have before. So it’s a lifelong relationship, whereas when you’ve had breast cancer, the story ends when the surgeon and the oncologist say “You’re done, go back out into the world, go home and get on with life!” As far as breast cancer goes, that’s when the shit hits the fan because all of the emotional fallout of breast cancer comes then- because you’ve survived it physically. And that’s the world of the Breast Cancer Networks- it’s like, let’s just get you alive, let’s just make you live through this- here’s the drugs, here’s the treatment- it’s wonderful, you’re well held- but when it’s all over, it’s like off you go, go and make the best of your life, and that is when people need Pilates particularly. And it was like, we didn’t fit into that medical world, Bruce- they didn’t get it and we didn’t have a research paper to put onto their nose. What I actually even did when I was well enough, when my hair had grown back, when I was ready for life, I tried desperately to speak to the organizations that supported women in the afterlife after breast cancer- the support groups, And what they kept saying to me was show us the research, show us the evidence that people need- because as you know I’m a Trauma Therapist as well- show us the evidence that what you’re going to do. ” Are you a counselor Melissa?” they kept saying! ” No, I’m a woman who has survived breast cancer, come out the other end and has a whole wealth of knowledge and empathy for these women!” and that kind of vibe just doesn’t exist with those organizations as you probably come up against many times.
Bruce Hildebrand: And I think the biggest part of what you’re expressing so beautifully is at the end of the day the consumer misses out! This confusion- it results in people, not having access to this wonderful tool of Pilates.
Melissa Turnock: Exactly. I thought I’m going to have an endless supply of clients forever after this breast cancer experience, they’re going to find me, I’m going to be able to help hundreds of women- and it just didn’t happen because people weren’t sending people to Pilates, unless they’d come across a decent Pilates instructor in their personal world, they just didn’t know how impactful it could be- there’s probably thousands of people that have missed out on Pilates Bruce because of that.
Bruce Hildebrand: I often find Pilates tends to attract doctors and medical and health practitioners who absolutely love it in their own body and they’re the first people to say, by the way, kind of off the record, but you definitely need to do Pilates! It’s often, like you just said in their personal experience, because they’ve gained so much from it!
Melissa Turnock: Yeah. That gets them talking about it.
Bruce Hildebrand: What a great mission to clean up that workflow so there’s much more broadcast of Pilates- hopefully we can all contribute to that happening more and more.
Melissa Turnock: And how much money can we save the health system? If we can get these people using Pilates as a way to cope, it’s going to help with depression rates, it’s going to help with relationships that are often fragmented after breast cancer, because they’re going to get so much sense of learning to trust and love their body again and feel good in their body that has a ripple effect out, to everyone in the inner circle.
Bruce Hildebrand: And you mentioned earlier about the impact that it had with the joy that your husband’s saw in your face when you are simply relieved from back pain and how crippling that chronic pain scenario can be let alone the experience of making your way through breast cancer as well.
And along those lines, surgery-wise breast cancer is one of many layers of surgery that happens. I worked with a client many years ago, who was an avid motorcyclist in his sixties however, he was never given any post rehabilitation exercises for his hip replacement and therefore couldn’t go riding on his motorbike because he couldn’t lift his leg over the seat! As soon as we got into Pilates, he was in love with me because he made a massive shift in being able to do number one thing that he enjoyed again.
Melissa Turnock: Quality of life stuff- being able to pick up your grandkids as a woman, who’s had a double mascectomy- then being able to pick up your grandchildren, simple things like hanging washing up on the line- that is independence and freedom to so many people to be able to do that stuff again, you’re right!
Bruce Hildebrand: And it goes into the mental health conversation as well so I think that’s an exciting area for Pilates to continue expanding into. Mel, you talked about opening, your business with Spring Pilates and. Northern Sydney- Neutral Bay- Can you reflect on what it was that really had you get so hooked on Pilates that you wanted to venture further with it and contribute from a business perspective, but also contribute with your time and effort into the Pilates industry, Pilates associations, I guess you could call it the wounded healer Pilates had saved my bacon so much that it was like the least I can do now is help other people feel like this. And what happened with my speech pathology career was I reached a glass ceiling where as a speech pathologist, there’s no way you’re going to get into management in the health sector and go beyond head of speech department because you’re not a nurse or a doctor- so you learn very quickly that there is a glass ceiling and I will never get into management in a hospital so that career is going to go by the by. Then I left that- I went into private practice and private practice did not suit because I was by myself driving to clients’ houses and I didn’t have the team anymore- I need to be in community- that is where I come alive! So I dabbled in that but I’m by myself all the time, I need to be in the energy of other people and I need to be able to debrief and read people and come in with my skillset in the right way with the right people in the community setting.
Melissa Turnock: So when the opportunity to open the Pilates studio, which was the second Pilates studio in North Sydney- the other one was very different- I’d come into some money and I had this teacher that I adored that I was like ” You should go out on your own!” And we naively took this leap of faith to open this gorgeous studio in North Sydney, which had beautiful fairy lights, and these lovely timber columns, it felt like a warehouse- super funky- reminded me of Melbourne a lot. And we just went for it. Now we both had 18 month old babies- which bonded us very nicely, because we were both at the same stage of life, but we were like, okay, so you’ve got your kid in daycare now I’ve got my kid in daycare now- this Pilates thing- we need to get this out there so we opened this studio and we just thought everyone would come rushing in and say ” Oh, so glad you guys opened a studio right next to the building that I work in in North Sydney, because you’re so convenient!” it doesn’t work like that! We knew we were good- she was really good, she’d been doing it for a long time- I was the front of the business- she was the clever one working out the staff training- we both had our skillsets and we just thought it would work and they’d be knocking the doors down! We had to work really hard- nobody knew what Pilates was- it was like “What are you guys do in here? You know when they used to walk up the stairs and pop their head in and go “Ahh, what do you do with all this equipment?”- It was assumed to be nefarious and quite hardcore- that’s what they used to think of Pilates studios- so there was a lot of education and a lot of explaining what Pilates was. And then they’d look at the price and they’d go ” Oh, that’s expensive” because you had to meet you’re overheads- you had to pay yourself some money. But to be honest with you, I don’t think we paid ourselves a lot of money in the first few years! I hope it’s improved now. I hope to all the Pilates studio owners out there that you’re actually earning at least 30 grand a year in your pocket owning a Pilates studio because we did not pay ourselves for ages! We had husbands who had jobs, who put food on the table while we dabbled around in this world of Pilates that we knew was impactful, but we didn’t really know what we were doing- we were just passionate and that’s what gets you started. And so we gave it a red hot go and we did get clients and we did make some money, but let’s just say we were never going to retire on it.
Bruce Hildebrand: I think there’s many Pilates teachers in Sydney and across Australia who are benefiting from your hard yards in the early days building the name and answering all the questions “What even is Pilates!?”
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, exactly.
Bruce Hildebrand: It’s fun to hear your firsthand experience of that- trying to create the business and build some sort of revenue which many Pilates studio owners know it takes some time to build that following Yeah, it does- and what ends up working for you is word of mouth- because you create great experiences for your clients and the way you grow a Pilates studio is they tell people. So the most important thing to do is to nurture the relationships of the people that are already coming in your door and incentivize them to get other people to come in the door, because they’re already your warm leads, Putting leaflets in mailboxes that, just irritates people cause they don’t want junk mail! But when you’ve got people that are already happy in your studio, the more you can do for them to encourage them, to bring their friends in- that is how you grow your business!
Pilates may go beyond the word of mouth model at some stage or other.
Melissa Turnock: Fingers crossed.
Bruce Hildebrand: Mel, can you tell us about some of the challenges you had at this stage of your Pilates progress- was there some factors that had you fall more deeply in love with Pilates at this point? Maybe some elements that you were finding were rubbing you up the wrong way, some hidden conversations in the studios where you were attending or the industry at large, that you didn’t feel aligned with?
Melissa Turnock: I very quickly knew that we were going to make a big difference because this was the place where people came as a last resort in those days, they all came in with issues- there was no such thing as just coming into a Pilates studio for fitness or to tone up back then- these people had neck issues, had back issues- it was all about the ‘rehaby’ stuff back then- so it got very serious very quickly because you are really looking after people who are in quite a vulnerable state. So it made me extremely diligent about owning what I knew and owning what I didn’t know and I had a business partner who’d had more experience in terms of conditions and anatomy and physiology- I’d done all of that training, but I was extremely humble about what was too much for me and used the resources around me, absolutely! I wanted to get into the professional association because of the misunderstanding of Pilates back then and like any professional association you often find, there are people in there that have agendas and are doing it for their own name and their own profile- and that was another life lesson- it’s ” Oh, hang on a minute, so you’re more interested about this aspect of yourself, then the betterment of the Pilates profession?!” so I was learning a lot about agendas and people’s egos! But I’m an Aquarian- I am all about humanity and unity, and I seriously don’t enter into anything unless I think I can help people- I don’t have that bone in my body, which is what can I get out of this? And so I kept at it because I desperately wanted people to respect Pilates instructors for what they could do and to elevate us so that other allied health professionals, because I’d come from an allied health professional background, it’s like, we need to hold ourselves to the same standards that a Physio does! And so this weekend course thing- if you’ve just done a weekend course in Pilates- you’re letting Pilates down. So it was like let’s build up the education standards so that we know everyone’s got the same degree of quality of training, different avenues show, but let’s make sure that they’ve all got the anatomy and physiology- and I do not think a Pilates instructors should touch a human being until they’ve had really good anatomy and physiology training, or that they’ve done Pilates in their own body for at least two to three years- and I’m really glad those standards are in stone. They weren’t back then when I was learning, but I met them because I wasn’t mucking around with this stuff.
So it was frustrating that we did have two different Pilates associations and that the two didn’t really talk, and that just disappointed me because I couldn’t see the point of that. And there’s all this history that was entered into that- I didn’t want a bar of it- I just wanted to make sure that when people wanted to talk to a Pilates professional- like for an interview for a media story- that they would know where to go- and the problem was they didn’t know where to go because the profile wasn’t high enough, the level of professionalism wasn’t high enough. I would hope that’s improved by now. So yeah, they were my experiences in those days and you don’t know until you try. You do the trial and error- you see what works, you see what you enjoy, and then you gradually refine your career to just do the things that really light you up. And that’s the great thing about it is your Pilates career can really diversify and change over time- you’re your own boss, nobody’s telling you what to do when you own a studio- so you get to choose how it works- so it gives quite a bit of flexibility in that way too.
Bruce Hildebrand: I’m curious to chat further about what those different avenues you explored were along the way Melissa- it’s often at this stage that you’ve been in the game for long enough to be getting a really good feel for what Pilates entails and getting a sense of which direction you want to go with it all. Of course, I’m assuming that you continue to stick at it- your passion speaks volumes for that- can you tell us about some of the key influences about the directions that you’ve gone with your Pilates over the years and what some of those pathways have been?
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, because of the back pain and because of entering Pilates via a rehab studio that has always been my direction. I have struggled a lot with group exercise of Pilates- especially in the early days when it started coming out, because the model for us was either one-on-one privates or the semi-private with the three people at once. So I gave both of those a go and then the group stuff started to come in and I’m not the kind of person that looks at something and goes, no, that doesn’t work. I’d go and try it. So I got really worried about Pilates when it started becoming group sessions in gyms, but I went to the classes- I very clearly remember going to St. Leonard’s Fitness First to a Saturday morning Pilates class with 30 people in the room and freaking out because all of a sudden my beloved Pilates was about 30 people who we have no idea what’s going on their body copying a fit and healthy 30 year old woman on the stage that did not leave the stage the whole time! I was devastated it was like this is not going to help Pilates- this is not! But I understood that Pilates to the masses was going to at least get it out there that people had heard of it- but I knew that people were going to get injured through that approach! So I’ve always been an evangelist about coming back to you need to have private- and I still believe this- you may have a couple of privates before you start going into the groups before you start semi-private- because we don’t want to do you an injustice. How do I know what is right or wrong for you if I haven’t spent some time getting to know you and how your body moves. So it was always like “Aggh! Group classes” and I was really ‘anti’ it, but I went to them just to check out for myself. And then what started to happen was the group stuff popped up more and more- so on one hand, I was glad there was more Pilates but I knew it was going to water down- for want of a better word- our intention about making Pilates specific. But that was a very privileged position to be in because at $110 a private session that can’t be for everyone. So what I did then was when I moved from North Sydney up to the Northern Beaches of Sydney, I opened my own private Pilates studio, which still operates where I only teach one-on-ones, but I went into the community and I started to teach Group Pilates in the local studio. Now that was back in the days where it was just a whole lot of mats and a whole lot of magic circles, if you were lucky. I thought if you can’t beat them just join them- so I started doing privates at home and the group stuff, and then at least I could teach people what I felt was really good, quality Pilates and make it safe for them and I could individualize. I kept the classes small enough that I could go to this dude over here who’s 75 and got no hamstring length and modify the exercise for him- go over here and sort out Jill’s bad neck because I had enough experience that I could juggle all of that at once. So I diversified into doing that and that was fun! It was like, actually I really enjoy groups- we have a laugh and people start talking to each other people that never would have met each other in my hometown of Newport now know each other because I started a Pilates class in the front room of the Naturopath clinic. And then what came along was the Reformer Pilates wave- Reformer, Reformer, Reformer! And then I knew we were going to struggle a little bit because some people would just go into a Reformer class and learn the repertoire- and so then I diversified into that and I went into a studio where they had 17 Reformers, and I wanted to make sure that 17 people at once- on a Reformer- didn’t come in for a Bootcamp Pilates! I’m not a fan of Bootcamp Pilates where you walk out the door and everything hurts- I hate that sort of Pilates! And there is a lot of it! My partner hurt his knee, going to a Pilates studio where the instructor went “Oh good, we’ve got a bloke in the class! You put on three springs mate- all you lot, you all have one, you have three! People hurt themselves when this approach happens. So I was determined- I’m going to get over to that studio and I’m going to get these people- and my classes filled up instantly. And then one class became three back to back I was teaching three Reformer classes in a row on a Wednesday morning. And people would say “Oh Mel, I learned so much from your class- the way you talk about foot work. ” No one’s ever said that before”, but the only reason Bruce is that we have this vast amount of experience and then they do Pilates safely and they get a lot out of it. And I don’t want you to be in pain the next day- that’s not my kind of Pilates- go to someone else’s class. There is such a thing as working way too hard in Pilates- recruiting every muscle that you own- and then dissing Pilates, that was never going to be me. So I dabble- I do the group stuff and I do the one-on-one at home and earn good money with no one else to worry about, it’s a separate room in my house and I only say yes to the people that I want to work with- how good is that!?
Bruce Hildebrand: Sounds like the dream situation and you’ve worked hard over the years to be at a narrow it down to that- well done. Tell me about the historical nature of this- do you think part of Joseph Pilates’ wrestles is he wanted to stick to the integrity of what he knew was so important for people to learn, but he also was facing the battle of wanting to broadcast the benefit to more and more people- and so this real conundrum of reaching the masses with the level of quality that he was striving for, there’s- like you say- this juxtaposition between reaching loads of people and upholding the standards- I think that probably remains as a challenge these days for the Pilates industry.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, absolutely! And it’s great that there are other economic options to get into Pilates- I am a big believer in the universe steering you in the direction of the right experience and I trust that people will find Pilates in a way that is right for them and start to discern- it becomes up to the individual to discern- ” Is this doing me more harm than good?” So I think there’s always going to be a balance- an uncomfortable balance perhaps- between studio Pilates and one-on-one that some people really need, but there are also plenty of people that will get loads out of going to a group Reformer class- and that’s awesome and it’s great to see how many more Reformers there are around that makes me happy because it’s an incredible piece of equipment. And if that’s the only piece of equipment you’re ever going to own- that would be what I would get in a studio if I didn’t have a lot of room- it’s really good! And it might be a doorway into them going for more specific, personal Pilates as well. And what started to happen at the studio where I was teaching the groups where every now and again, someone would say ” Do you do one-on-ones?” And I’d have to like work around professionally- I approached the owner of the studio and I said “There’s people asking for one-on-ones because they’ve got a problem with their knee- can I do it in here with the Reformer with them? And so I set up an arrangement where they took some of the money and I did a one-on-one when the studio wasn’t being used- because it’s the Reformers you can stack- so we just put one Reformer down on the floor, I’d come in at three in the afternoon and gives them a one-on-one. I actually thought there’d be a lot more of that, but I’ve learned there’s a real mentality of a lot of people that go into a studio and buy a 10 pack of classes that they want to get their value for their 10 pack of classes, and that’s enough. They’re often not the kind of person that’s going to spend $1,100 on 10 one-on-one sessions. I thought there’d be a really big take-up, but a lot of people are just really happy doing group classes and that’s awesome- as long as they don’t hurt themselves! Hopefully as more and more Pilates teachers get experience they will take very seriously the group setting and make sure that it’s as much about education as it is a good workout.
Bruce Hildebrand: Mel If you reflect on the time, when you first dipped your toe in the water with Pilates and discovered it- if your teacher had only presented a group class setting to you, would that have still worked for you, do you think, or do you think it was only because it was that individualized care that was the difference. And did you know that there was an option or wasn’t there an option to do group sessions at that time?
Melissa Turnock: You couldn’t do a group, as in you couldn’t be in the studio with other people being taught without doing the privates back then- that was the way I entered it and that was the way it made me feel safe. I needed that one-on-one attention because I was terrified of hurting my back even more, because it was really easy for me to hurt my back- like it took nothing to be in a lot of pain, so I wasn’t going to do it any other way than the one on one. And then the reward came when you were doing well enough when your body wasn’t in so much pain that you could move into the semi-private setting, which is three students in the room at the time and the teacher’s teaching- that was an accomplishment! But there was no way I would have walked in the door if I’d seen 10 people there and everybody being treated the same, it’s like saying everybody should eat peanut butter because it’s good for you. Not everybody needs Pilates in the same style, especially if you’ve got any sort of injuries- you need it to be specific until you can graduate into the general and you’re so armed with knowledge that you don’t hurt yourself and that you do your own private modifications on the Reformer because you’ve been so well taught- that’s a beautiful entry point into the group settings for people that have got issues I believe.
Bruce Hildebrand: So your teacher would have been doing you a disservice if she’d permitted you to join those larger groups before she knew that you had a grasp of the key principles.
Melissa Turnock: Definitely because I didn’t know what positive movement was! I needed to feel and I needed to go through movement patterns to learn to trust my body and to know that this was doing me good before I would’ve been happy to do what everyone else was doing because this has gone on for years- there was 10 years of this nonsense! She would have lost me if she hadn’t shown an interest in my particular needs- everybody likes to be listened to and I felt cared for and then I started to trust her and I would have followed her direction.
Bruce Hildebrand: Mel, can you share with us some of the changes in both your body mind, and even in your spirit as Joseph Pilates liked to put it that are now second nature to you in the way that you do Pilates, you’ve managed to carry into your day-to-day life that you couldn’t have imagined were possible when you’re wrestling with some of the things you did in the early days.
Melissa Turnock: I know very keenly now what condition my body’s in and whether I should exercise or I shouldn’t- so it’s not an enforced regime! I can listen to my body and I can feel is there freedom of movement in me right now? Yep, I’m fine. I don’t need to get down on the mat and do anything. Obviously having my own studio in my own home makes it very convenient. I know now that I don’t need to do a whole hour worth of exercise, that I can spend 15, 10, 5 minutes on one particular thing- I still do have occasional back pain- I had quite a lot of back pain with lockdown and not being so active- I started to have quite a few niggles- so what I now know is I can do this stretch this movement, roll on the roller this way, and I’m going to be okay. So it’s been this constant remedy available to me. I am aware of my breathing now and sometimes all I need to do is three minutes of deep breathing- I don’t even need to go into the Pilates studio because what Pilates has given me is it has calmed my nervous system to the point where I actually feel good and I feel content. So becoming familiar with what that feels like means you get courageous to explore other things that have you feel like that- and it doesn’t always need to be a Reformer workout for me. I’m a big fan of the yoga tuneup balls- sometimes all I need to do is go and grab them and lay on my mat and watch YouTube on the tele with the yoga tuneup balls and just do some knee sides- and then suddenly my body will take this big breath and it’s like, I just know exactly where to go and what needs to happen. And. I guess it’s mostly about trust as well I’ve got two cats, I’ve got to lean over and put cat food into the bowl- when my back’s a little niggly I know how to stand up safely from that. So much knowledge is about prevention- we know exactly what we shouldn’t be doing and what we should do more of when we’re in preventative “Oops, feeling a bit vulnerable” mode. And that’s enormous piece of mind as well.
Bruce Hildebrand: An incredible thing to share with all your clients as well, that inner knowledge and receptiveness to how your body’s feeling on any given day, to be able to move with confidence and ease.
Melissa Turnock: I’m always saying to my clients, tell me where you feel that, what do you notice now? Like, we’ll do a routine on the mat and I’ll say stand up for me, how do you feel now compared to when you were walking around your house this morning?- – I’m constantly wanting them to feel what is the net effect of what I’ve just done. And if I just go from exercise to exercise repertoire, to repertoire, there’s no integration there. So I will get them to stand up- if we do some footwork, I’ll say, go for a walk I want you to feel how you feet land on the ground. I’m constantly getting people to come back to ” How do I feel different now than I normally do” so that there is this constant reinforcement “Oh, I need to do more Pilates, oh yeah. I remember how that feels!”- that’s a really big part of the way I teach- you’ve got to integrate everything, you’ve got to feel the goodness of it, and then you’ll come back for more and then you’ll trust your body more- so, I use that strategy a lot with my clients.
Bruce Hildebrand: That makes me recount a very memorable card that I was given for Christmas in 2002, when I was living in the UK, one fortuitous situation was I was working with members of the rock band Radiohead and the producers and a few of the wives as well and they gave me a Christmas card emblazoned across the middle that said, Bruce, how do you feel? It was tongue in cheek feedback to me that I obviously asked them that question time and time again, during classes that it’s really important- like, how do you respond to, how do you receive, how do you feel and exercise in Pilates, it’s really the key piece of information that makes it very individualized for you when you participate and how much you connect with which way to go forward with your Pilates exercise selection.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, absolutely! And the spark in their eyes when I look at you and their hope they’re answering the right way. And it’s like “Yes, exactly- that’s perfect!”- they feel like they’ve achieved something because they got their glute to work in just the way that you hoped they would. So it’s like this feedback loop between me and them that the teacher’s happy with you- you know- well done you!
Bruce Hildebrand: Mel, where do you now sit with your Pilates? What does the future hold for you with Pilates in your life and what plans have you got in-store with your Pilates involvement? I’m curious to expand a little on some of the directions you’ve gone with your Pilates and how you’ve incorporated in a range of different ways over the years?
Melissa Turnock: I’ve always been in the fortunate position where Pilates has been something I’ve not needed to rely on financially to survive. But last year I separated from my husband of 20 years, so I’m now in a position where for the first time really ever, I’m a single woman with no dependent children cause he’s 20 and he’s moved out of home where I get to call the shots, Bruce! So what do I want to do? I’m going to keep that Pilates studio and there is going to be a trickle of private clients coming my way. I don’t do any advertising- I don’t need to. What I am most passionate about now is I am working with women in sexuality and intimacy post-menopause because a big part of my breast cancer journey was I got thrown into menopause at 41- headlong into it- so that’s been a pretty big journey. So now what I’m doing is using Pilates as a movement modality with the women that want to reclaim connection to their sexuality and particularly their intimacy- and I think Pilates is a really safe, empowering way for people like we’ve been saying to return, to feeling the sensations of their body, because very commonly after menopause women disconnect from the discomfort, they don’t want to feel the stuff, it’s the elephant in the room, they’re too awkward to talk about it.
So by including Pilates in the treatment process, they get to dabble in feeling like “Oh, it’s nice to feel my body a little bit freer. Ooh, I can see I’m building muscle and therefore I have a little more confidence in my body.” For me it’s all about embodiment! If you disconnect from your emotions, you are screwed! If you cannot feel that you are going to keep living a lie and ignoring the stuff that could be bringing you joy, you’re suppressing the stuff that doesn’t feel good but you’re also denying yourself the capacity to feel joy. So if someone can come and do some Pilates or some yoga or some tremoring with me and feel a little bit happier afterwards, then they start to get curious about how much more they can feel, how much better they can feel and gain courage in aspects of their life that previously were unconsidered.
And the biggest comment I get from people is ” I’m too scared to talk about this stuff with my partner.” The only reason they feel scared is that there’s so much fear building up in them and their body holds onto that fear. If they can start doing something like Pilates or tremoring, then the body can start to feel freedom of movement and empowerment, and that ripples out into all aspects of their life.
So it’s part of my arsenal- it’s definitely not the biggest part anymore- very much more about the trauma release, the embodiment, the emotional healing, the screaming, it out, the crying it out and using their energetic skills, their feminine wild! All of that together is now my skillset in relation to helping women face in to themselves post-menopause
Bruce Hildebrand: That’s so beautiful, and so powerful for many women to build that skillset.
Melissa Turnock: Yeah, it’s a very unspoken topic- it’s another topic that’s been incredibly medicalised- go to the GP get yourself some antidepressants pop onto HRT, go down the Naturopath, get lots of supplements- totally bypassing the inner journey and the inner experience of the power of being post-menopausal! A woman post menopause- she is a powerhouse waiting to happen! She has all of these Shakti energy that is no longer in fertility and child-rearing that she can bring to the world and fulfill her legacy. And to me that’s exactly what is possible- moving your body, exercising, looking after yourself and getting rid of all the obstacles that are making you feel unworthy and small because society tells the post-menopausal woman she’s on the scrap heap! You don’t look as good as you used to, you’ve probably got a shit relationship because you’ve been together for 20 years and the sex probably wasn’t good before anyway- all of this stuff that nobody talks about and we miss out on this section of community and right now we need mature, confident women to lead because we’re a very divisive society right now.
So I am on a mission to bring women who have gone through enormous life experience and buried it down, thinking it didn’t matter to rise up and be emboldened to be seen in the world and to bring their medicine into the world- and that has to come through the body! That has to feel safe and powerful through the body, by letting go of all the things that are in opposition to that, which are entrained in us from day one as a woman! You know- deny your sexuality, pretend that you don’t have periods, get embarrassed about breastfeeding- it is indoctrinated into us.
And I know from personal experience, because I’ve done a 10 year journey of facing into the loss of sexuality and intimacy in my marriage, which ended up in my marriage ending. And I waited 10 years to do anything about that, and I’m going to get emotional about it because it’s devastating to me that women hide and men too, the partners too- but they hide the shame and the awkwardness around what goes on in a menopausal woman’s body and the impact that has on their dynamic. It’s heartbreaking to me because we should be thriving in our 50’s- we’ve given so much it’s time to receive, but women don’t know how to receive, they don’t know how to let help him and their poor men suffer- and I really feel for the men too because they’re not particularly resourced either. There’s a lot of problems in society and my mission, my legacy is to help women to trust their wisdom, to break away the barriers, to speaking their truth and helping others, because they’ve all gone into hiding. I’ll get off my soapbox now!
Bruce Hildebrand: I feel proud to play a very small role Melissa in broadcasting, your incredibly powerful message. On a personal note I’m one of eight children and I have five sisters, and my mother bearing eight children is an incredibly powerful thing- as if that doesn’t come from life energy and a commitment to amazing vision that she had. A fascinating story was my sister went through training as a midwife and stumbled across a conversation with a lady who knew my mother as a child and from a very young age from when she first met my dad, she already knew that she wanted to marry dad and have 12 kids! Isn’t that an incredible vision for a 14 or 15 year old young girl to really bring forth that life energy that you’re talking about and to give freedom and empowerment around that conversation I hope this podcast episode goes some way to broadcasting that beautiful, powerful message that you’ve got to share.
Melissa Turnock: Wow. Thank you so much. And it is men like you, Bruce. I do have to say something about the men of the world right now- a lot of men have gone very silent and don’t feel the conviction of telling their truth as well. And I’m looking around me right now, seeing a lot of divine masculine energy come to the fore- a lot of men speaking out for the devastation and the families and the mental health issues and so men like you actually want to shout that out because we need you just as much as you need us to pull our society back together. So we each have our own little piece to play in speaking about this and building community and broadening the understanding of Pilates and how impactful it is through many people’s experiences, I think that’s really very important- so thank you to you!
Bruce Hildebrand: It’s my absolute pleasure- it was brought to my attention a number of years ago that the yin yang symbol has a little bit of darkness in the white and a little bit of lightness in the dark and that the coexistence of those two together is such a beautiful universal symbol of course.
Melissa Turnock: Unfortunately there’s, a bit of separation of the energies and also a lot of separation from our own magnificence. We are taught to look outside of ourselves for solutions, we are taught to be validated by the world out there, and so things like Pilates gives us a tunnel back into ourselves to remember how much capacity we have to feel well, how much capacity we have to return to wholeness- like Joseph Pilates said- and when you start to realize the power and the capacity of your body to regenerate post-injury to make you feel good that’s a high, that you just want more and more of coming into the body and helping people find ways to feel good in their body- I think that is medicinal in the current age!
Bruce Hildebrand: Absolutely. Advice time, Melissa, what do you wish you knew at the start of your journey that would have made the biggest difference to someone who might be considering either starting Pilates or facing some of the struggles you did along the journey that you’ve shared with us so generously today?
Melissa Turnock: Definitely get someone on board with you that knows about running a business! Really fully understand the numbers, how many clients it’s going to take you to get through the door because it’s devastating when they economic impact and the lack of knowledge around how to successfully run a small business is what has you come undone- when you’re mission simply was to help people feel good- knowing how good they could feel. So I would not ever enter into owning a Pilates studio having staff going on that trajectory unless I had a rock solid accountant, and I had someone who could be like a middle ground person as a mentor for business that could show me what could go wrong, where we might fall down as a small business and what it was going to take to actually even earn any money. That is an absolute essential, I don’t think you can afford to go and just open a shop front and start paying rent and assume that they will come knocking the door down because there’s a lot of Pilates out there now.
Make sure you’ve got a lot of Pilates in your body. I would never think it’s okay for someone to learn Pilates last week and then open a studio the week after- you owe it to your clients to have walked the Pilates journey a long way and been around a lot of different teachers so that you can fine tune what does, and doesn’t work for you. Your paying clients shouldn’t be your testing ground- you should have tested on yourself and lots of different teachers beforehand- I feel that’s imperative.
Don’t go it alone necessarily try and set yourself up- if you’re really keen to give it a go set yourself up in a premises where there are other practitioners, because foot traffic’s a big one- you want people walking past your door and seeing that you are doing Pilates. You cannot afford to tuck yourself away where people don’t literally happen to stumble upon you because I remember with Spring Pilates that was- apart from word of mouth- the second biggest thing was walking past our door on the way down to the office. So if you’re going to start out, maybe rent a room in a Naturopathic clinic where you do Pilates and there are people going “Oh, what’s she doing there?” That’s a really good way to get started as well, I think.
Bruce Hildebrand: Such wonderful advice- thank you so much for sharing! Mel, it’s been an absolute pleasure chatting with you today, thank you so much for your time on the call. What’s the best way for podcast listeners to reach out and get in touch with you?
Melissa Turnock: The best way at the moment is my email mel@bodywisdom.com.au to start up a conversation. But also my YouTube channel is full of videos about embodiment, intimacy, sexuality, getting in touch with your emotions, lots of video content there so check that out Melissa Turnock on YouTube.
Bruce Hildebrand: Excellent, and if anything that we’ve talked through today on the podcast has touched you then feel free to reach out to Mel- I couldn’t recommend Mel’s approach and expertise highly enough so thank you for being a part of The Pilates Diaries Podcast Melissa!
Melissa Turnock: Thank you, it’s been great!
Bruce Hildebrand: We hope you enjoyed this episode of The Pilates Diaries Podcast. Drop us a comment online at the links in the show notes, and be sure to subscribe and rate the podcast to keep updated with episode releases and hear more stories from our guests’ Pilates Diaries. This podcast is made possible by the following sponsors- keep an ear out for exclusive Pilates Diaries Podcast listener discount codes. Thanks for listening. The Pilates Diaries Podcast is a proud partner with TRIMIO. TRIMIO is a much needed space and time utilization booking system for the Pilates industry. With TRIMIO you can return your focus to delivering the highest value to your customers. No longer be lost to the encumbrances of inefficient interactions and experience a new level of working freedom with the power of technology automation doing what it should. Maximize your profitability by optimizing the utilization of your time and physical space with TRIMIO. Find out more at www.TRIMIO.app.
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