Metabolic and Mental Health

Why Women Need Resistance Training and How Can They Achieve It

Hanna transformed her body and mind with weight training and calisthenic workouts.

This is the sad yet inspiring story of a young woman discriminated against by her loved ones. She struggled at first with trauma but achieved her dreams by taking personal responsibility, increasing her adversity quotient, and support from unexpected encounters.

The Beginning and Formation of the Trauma

Hanna grew up in an athletic and caring family who migrated from Asia, but ironically, she felt disadvantaged by detrimental gender discrimination disguised under cultural love and care.

Her father loved going to the gym after work and took his three sons with him. However, he asked Hanna and her sister Isabella to stay at home. Isabella never liked exercise, so it was the skin of her nose. Nevertheless, Hanna was dying to join her brothers and wanted to lift weights like them.

Her father was proud to see his sons to be chosen as bodybuilders. When Hanna begged him, he always said the gym was not for girls. He asked her to do cardio at home, buying a treadmill and an ecliptic machine.

Hanna was happy with the equipment but wanted to try weightlifting. So she asked her dad to buy dumbbells and barbells to train at home. Both her dad and mum strictly opposed it, as weightlifting was not for girls as they might cause excessive muscle gain like bulky men.

This discrimination touched Hanna’s heart and soul deeply. She felt awful and resentful. It was not acceptable to her intellect, but she had no choice as a teenager, depending on her parents.

Finding relief in food, she consumed food mindlessly and gained substantial fat rapidly. She tried too much cardio to lose fat but couldn’t lose weight. Her cortisol skyrocketed, causing insomnia.

So she gave up exercise. Instead, she kept crying in her bedroom secretly every evening when she saw her dad and brothers come from the gym in perspiration and in a good mood.

Hanna’s anxiety increased, and she started feeling depressed. She failed school and did not want to attend. Her parents took her to a psychiatrist who prescribed her antidepressants. She believed that no one understood the fire inside her, not even a psychiatrist.

In her own words, her family doctor referred her to a nutritionist who made her situation even worse. She did not enjoy the food nutritionists planned for her. She felt extra hungry and consumed more refined carbs, especially from leftover desserts and chocolates that she kept under her bed.

Emotional traumas led to addictive behavior like smoking, alcohol, and binge eating secretly. Her body became insulin resistant. She couldn’t feel satiety as she also became leptin resistant. Food cravings drove her crazy.

Due to excessive refined carb consumption, lack of exercise, and chronic stress, her body got inflamed. She felt terrible back and neck pain. She couldn’t even walk properly after a while. Her posture got worse concerning her parents.

But no one, including her family and doctors, addressed the real issue buried in her subconscious mind. Instead, doctors kept prescribing painkillers and suggesting she lose fat by eating healthy food and exercising more.

A Serendipitous Encounter

When I met Hanna at a friend’s house for a barbeque, she was just 18. When she saw my plates, she asked why there was no bread, pasta, veggies, fruits, or desserts on my plates, unlike others. She thought I was on a strict diet and wondered why I would do it, looking at my lean body.

When I explained to her my eating regimen, one meal a day, and keto-carnivore for years, she got interested and wanted to chat with me. We instantly clicked and started a conversation in the backyard. Since I had childhood traumas, it was not difficult for me to tap into her subconscious mind gently with caring words.

The more I listened with care, the more she revealed. Her story was sad. In a nutshell, she always wanted to be a bodybuilder like her brothers, but her family stopped her from doing weight training and killing her dreams.

I told her she should be able to decide about the type of exercise she wanted to do as an 18-year-old adult. She nodded and seemed to love the idea. She asked for my phone number and email address.

After a few days, I introduced her to a female bodybuilder, Heather, and other friends, Eliza and Adrian, whom I mentioned in my previous stories.

The Dream Started Manifesting

Eliza and Heather inspired her to do weight training. Adrian agreed to create a program for her. Unfortunately, she was still afraid of her family. Therefore, Heather and Eliza offered to pick her up and take her to the gym they go to twice to three times a week. Hanna felt euphoric first time in her life with this care and support.

The program was so effective that she started losing weight in a few weeks. Since her mood was boosted by doing what she loved, her food cravings disappeared. Eliza shared her omnivorous diet with Hanna. She loved to eat plant and animal-based whole food.

Shortly after, Hanna’s anxiety and depressive thoughts disappeared. Her parents also couldn’t believe the positive changes in her life, but she still kept it secret until one day, she felt confident.

Adrian couldn’t believe the progress she had made. Hanna completed each program at least three times faster than the other students of Adrian. So, he created new programs for Hanna and got impressed by her progress.

Within a year, Hanna lost significant visceral fat and gained lean muscles giving her a trimmed and defined body. At another dinner in Eliza’s home, she mentioned she had substantial loose skin.

I shared my decades of experience in eliminating loose skin. She started time-restricted eating and joined our health club at weekends for dry sauna sessions.

These practices worked for her to lose unwanted skin in less than two years. Mine took much longer, but she was much younger than me, having better genetic and hormonal profiles.

Gaining a defined body inspired Hanna to make more progress in her fitness. Finally, on her 21st birthday, she confidently explained to her parents and siblings what had been going on for the last three years. She said coming out of the closet was the best decision she had made for her mental health.

The Dream Got Intensified as a Gamechanger

Her dad and mum felt guilty and apologized for their wrong behavior. Her brothers showed their pride after seeing such significant progress in her physical and mental health. Her young brother offered Hanna to join his gym as he worked as a trainer for bodybuilders.

After completing basic training with Adrian, Hanna started bodybuilding training free of charge in her brother’s gym. Her brother was so proud of her as she made the fastest progress among his 15 elite athletic students.

A year later, Hanna decided to join the bodybuilding competition. Her brother and Adrian gave her private lessons for the race. She continued weight training and calisthenics with a bit of cardio only for warmup.

Contrary to her father’s and mother’s beliefs, she did not gain bulky muscles like men on steroids. She developed lean muscles, just ideal for women’s posture. But Hanna was as strong as a man. She smashed her father and brothers in arm wrestling when she was 23.

She joined the national competition and took second place in 23. Her parents couldn’t hold back their tears when a standing ovation occurred in the ceremony. They apologized once more deeply, even publicly.

The Enlightenment Period Emerged

Hanna became a champion several times until she was 25. But then she did not want to do bodybuilding for competition but for enjoyment and other purposes.

After completing a six-month course, she became a personal trainer to serve disadvantaged women. As a result of her achievements, Hannah offered free training to those who could not afford it.

She focussed on migrant women as many of them in her circles were disadvantaged. In addition, she helped many Aboriginal women give up smoking and drinking alcohol and helped them find their better versions through resistance training.

Hanna found her sweetheart and married when she was 30. Last time, I came across Hanna in a laughter yoga event organized by Gloria. She was laughing stronger than anyone else and inspiring many women to be healthy and happy.

I also couldn’t hold my tears of joy when I was laughing during the yoga session. People thought I was sad. It might sound unusual, but my brain gives me glee and tears whenever I feel euphoric with inspiring news from the success of disadvantaged people in my circles.

Takeaways from Hanna’s Story

Life is full of setbacks and roadblocks. But we always have options if we learn how to solve problems and how to walk around roadblocks.

Hanna recognized that weight training was helpful for her and made it her passion. She made commitments and overcame challenges with effort.

When Hanna became a trainer, she approached the overweight woman with empathy and compassion. She tried to understand the real pains buried in their subconscious mind like hers.

Many women she trained had childhood traumas. Some faced severe life issues like being raped, hardly judged, and punished by their loved ones. When those women accepted their pain, understood the root causes, and took affirmative action, they shined.

Hanna always personalized training for each individual for their levels, considering multiple factors. She never compared her trainees and always celebrated even small gains.

She started some women with only one-kilogram weights and some with 50 kilograms. Some women couldn’t even do one push-up, but after a year, they did 100 pushups with her care and support.

Some women decided to become a champion as she did. And others wanted to use fitness as a lifestyle or a tool to help others. All of them enjoyed resistance training and benefited from individual and group workouts.

Hanna and all the other women she trained were particularly satisfied with weightlifting and calisthenics. No woman has ever had an issue with resistance training in her circles. Therefore, she always encouraged women to try resistance training as it was not exclusive to men.

Weightlifting and resistance training using body weight, like calisthenics and isometric workouts, were beneficial for women with support from professionals. Hanna always asked her clients to get a medical checkup before starting her program and obtain the approval of their family doctors for resistance training.

To Hanna’s surprise, every medical doctor recommended female patients undertake some sort of resistance training within their capacity and capability and encouraged them to grow gradually.

Many women Hanna trained lost visceral fat, gained lean muscles, lowered anxiety, eliminated depression, defeated their metabolic syndrome, gained better hormonal balance, lowered accumulated stress, melted chronic inflammation, stopped back pain, solved sarcopenia, and some even reversed their diabetes.

If you enjoyed this story, I encourage you to check out a short yet informative and inspiring story from an exercise physiologist and fitness expert, Dr Michael R Esco, PhD, CSCS, CEP titled “Strength Training for Women: Debunking 6 Common Myths in Less than 350 Words.”

Thank you for reading my perspectives. I wish you a healthy and happy life.

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