Today we’d like to introduce you to Taylor Whetsel.
Taylor, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
How I got here today…sheesh! What a question that is. But honestly, the answer is pretty simple: I’ve lived it and I’ve learned from it, and now I get to support others through it. Health and wellness is a messy field to get into. More often than not, one individual’s focus for a better life is much more than just choosing to eat more vegetables and incorporating a daily walk. It’s about shifting your mindset, becoming aware of past patterns, and having the courage to relearn new behaviors that benefit and prioritize you.
I’ve always been an overachiever; at age 5, I was re-writing my name at the top of my “homework” assignments until it looked absolutely perfect. Through junior and senior high school, I played varsity sports and took as many advanced placement courses as possible. This same mentality took me all the way through graduating magna cum laude and receiving honors in my major and minor degree and eventually completing a master’s degree. So naturally, when I dove into the world of nutrition and fitness (specifically, CrossFit), I went ALL IN. All into me meant you train like the best and you strive to “look” like the best. I quickly gravitated towards pursuing a nutrition certification to help myself and others better understand what it meant to “be your best” on all aspects of life, including how you nourish yourself. But to be honest, it nearly crushed me.
Truly, through overtraining, under-eating (despite my knowledge, I believed that “a six-pack” meant you were healthy), and several back injuries – eventually I had to ask myself, “for who am I doing this for?” Cue several breakdowns, hiring two different therapists and changing up my coaching approach as I learned from my own experiences, I am now confident in knowing my role with others’ health and wellness journeys. I’m here as a guide, as a facilitator, and when asked for advice, also as a trusted person to recommend some ideas for my clients to choose what works best for them. The thing is I got into coaching to help others avoid health issues and injuries – both physically and mentally, but what I’m learning is that my clients’ journeys will be filled with ups and downs, just like mine was (okay, still is.) And who am I to take that away from them, to take away all those learning opportunities? I may not tell you exactly what you need to do, but I’ve learned that you need to reclaim that power in yourself and that’s what I try to strive for in all my coaching-client relationships: helping them realize their own power that’s been with them this entire time.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I think that there’s a lot of pressure for health and fitness professionals to look and play a very specific, very cliche role. When I first started nutrition coaching, I relied almost entirely on my physical fitness and aesthetics to prove my “worth” as a coach. You know how that goes, “choose me because I’m lean, I have muscles, and I can lift weights” instead of trusting in my empathy, my compassion, and my knowledge of the subject. And lemme tell ya, keeping up an appearance like that is no. joke. In fact, it was absolutely miserable and felt…wrong. Here I was trying to coach others on the importance of fueling enough for yourself, for respecting your body in all that it does, and I was trying to survive on bare-minimal calorie intake just to make sure that I would come off as a fitness professional.
It’s taken time to lean into my worth not only as a coach, but also just as a 29-year-old woman in a world that tells you to look, be, and act in a very certain way. I’m not extremely feminine, I curse like a sailor (yes, censored myself for this article!), and I like to have an old-fashioned nightcap every now and then. Aligning my coaching style and business principles with who I am as a person has been absolutely terrifying because it’s made me vulnerable. However, taking that leap into being entirely me, and showing up entirely as me through my coaching, has made this work much more rewarding.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
I offer one-on-one health and wellness coaching with a specialization in women’s health as well as small-group 6-week coaching cohorts that have been dubbed as “Not Another F*cking Challenge.” Like I mentioned before, as women, I feel that we are often put into very small, very narrow boxes. And to survive, let alone even thinking about being able to thrive in those boxes, you’re expected to play by the rules – those rules often look like subscribing to certain diets, overworking to prove yourself worthy, giving more than receiving, and putting others first. What’s unique about my one-on-one and small group coaching services is that I’m here to not just have the women climb outta that box but to tear and burn that box down.
As I’ve started to learn my voice in this world, I know that I want to talk about the taboo topics. I’m asking my clients everything from when was their last menstruation, what their sex drive is, and how often are they orgasming when they do engage in any type of sexual activity. I want to know what your childhood experience was around eating at the dinner table, what role models you had, and what was their language around food and exercise. I want to know it all because food is a relationship you cannot quit. It’s not like a bad habit you can eventually ditch; it’s a lifetime relationship. So, like any relationship, you need to really uncover all the different areas that feed into that a relationship to see where you can understand better: family, culture, significant others, mental health, etc. Because our relationship with food is so intertwined with the rest of our life, I find that providing individualized journal prompts for my clients each week is an opportunity for them to start exploring these interconnections on their own.
When clients first sign up with me, they’re asked to list some of their goals. Without fail, those goals almost always include to lose weight. And without fail, the first four to six weeks are hardly ever about the food. It’s about their lack of energy because they’re stressed out at a job they hate. It’s about their frustration with their romantic relationship because they’re not having any type of libido and sex has become a chore. It’s about their distrust in knowing what to decide for themselves. It’s almost always about all these other aspects of life that get boiled down into one easy thing to pick apart: their bodies. To me, what sets my services apart is that I will not just be giving you a workout and meal plan and saying good luck. We’re diving in, we’re exploring other options, and we’re learning what it’s like to give yourself permission to do what makes you feel best. With each client, I let them know that my priority for them is to make sure they are happy, hungry, and horny.
As I continue to educate myself, a new service I am offering is what I’ve lovingly named as MILF Training (Moms in Love with Fitness.) This past year, I became the only certified BirthFit Leader and Coach in the Fort Worth area. This specific service is an individualized fitness program that focuses on a holistic approach for pre-conception, pregnancy, and post-partum training. Through movement, breath, and intention, MILF Training trains the birthing person in their specific season of life. Whether you’re preparing to give birth or rehabbing and rebuilding from labor, MILF Training ties together the breath and fundamental movements to ensure that the birthing person is creating the mind-body connection that will then translate into whatever form of movement they love to do. There’s no need to avoid exercise for birth or post-partum, but instead, purposefully train for it. Again, even though it is a bit different than my traditional one-on-one nutrition services, it still is an opportunity for women to realize and reclaim their power – especially in such a transitional time of their lives.
It’s been an exciting new venture for me, and I’m looking forward to continue to working with women as well as those who are trying to conceive, preparing for birth, or recovering from postpartum. As of now, I offer both personal training and small group coaching for women in the motherhood transition. I have been growing my referral network, and anticipate some workshops here with Pelvic Floor Physical Therapists, Doulas, and Midwives here in the near future!
Do you have any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
Ah, I’d have to say one of my favorite childhood memories is exploring in the woods with my neighbors. The “woods” was a pretty dense backyard of trees, streams, and all other natural dangers that a 7-year-old could dream of. Each area of the woods had its own territory name i.e., Skunk Island which was a small piece land surrounded by the stream that was home to Skunk cabbage (if you don’t know what that is, then consider yourself lucky because peeee-eeeww it smelled HORRIBLE.)
Being connected to nature has always been something that brings me a sense of joy. There’s something about looking up at trees and feeling so little, yet knowing that we are made of the same things as these huge, towering trees.
Contact Info:
- Email: info@taylorwhetselwellness.com
- Website: www.taylorwhetselwellness.com
- Instagram: @taytaywhets
