As part of my series about the “5 Things You Need To Know To Survive And Thrive After A Divorce ” I had the pleasure of interviewing Jennifer Giamo is a NSCA Certified Personal Trainer with a Master’s Degree in Nutrition Education, the founder of Trainers in Transit LLC; a health and wellness company offering in-home & online personal training and nutrition services and creator of Fresh Start Fitness, an online wellness to heal & thrive after divorce.
Jennifer started her company in 2010 after leaving her 12-year career in Corporate Fitness & Wellness where she was a managing director for Johnson & Johnson Healthcare Systems.
She has recently become a Certified Reiki Practitioner, a Corrective Exercise Specialist and is also studying to become a certified Meditation teacher.
Her current passion is helping divorced women to heal and thrive with a program she created in collaboration with Worthy called Fresh Start Fitness. After going through her own traumatic experience, she realized that women need to know they can get through it too.
Additionally, Jenn has on-camera, television experience (Live with Kelly & Ryan and Rachael Ray) and currently teaches classes for the producers of ABC-TV. Jenn’s passion for writing has also earned her 4 published articles on ThriveGlobal as well as several other online publications and blogs.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
When I got divorced, I thought my life was over. I was so overwhelmed, I didn’t know how I was going to survive. I spent a lot of time alone, isolated and embarrassed. As a health and fitness professional, I was in the worst shape of my life. I stopped eating, exercising and sleeping. I was a walking zombie most of the time. I knew something had to change. I knew if I didn’t pull myself together, the downward spiral would continue. I decided to start slowly…just going outside for a walk; then to yoga; then to a spin class. I started to eat healthy food and I felt better and better everyday. The advantage I had as a trainer and nutritionist was that I knew how to make myself feel physically better. And with that, came the emotional healing. Once I was active and moving and interacting with people again, I felt more empowered. I wondered about women who were going through the same thing but ended up curled up in a ball, paralyzed with fear or sadness, unable to pull themselves out. Where could they turn for help? How could I help them? Fresh Start Fitness Fresh is a way for women to start slowly, with meditation, yoga, strength and conditioning and nutrition. To put the pieces together (or use them separately) to find their strength, confidence and power to heal themselves.
Can you explain to our readers why you are an authority about “divorce”?
After going through a (somewhat) unique experience in my own divorce (where my husband left out of the blue one day and I later learned about his affair on Access Hollywood); I started to read anything and everything about abandonment, divorce and mid-life crises. I started seeing a therapist, a shaman and going on “healing” retreats; meditating, self-helping and connecting with other professionals like divorce attorneys and financial planners to help navigate the “business” side of divorce.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started this career?
Meeting amazing new people and working with Worthy to create a program that helps other women and encourages them to thrive. It is gratifying to speak to the women who are doing Fresh Start Fitness and for them to tell us that this is so perfect for them and helps them find peace of mind and strengthens them to move forward with their new lives.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
When I was first meeting with the Worthy team, I didn’t realize their offices where on a secured floor, I ran up the 12 flights of stairs because when I took the elevator the doors didn’t open! I didn’t want to be late and ran up the stairs and knocked on the door! Crazy I know but in the end, I wasn’t out of breath and just added to my step count for the day! Lesson learned, never give up! Keep on going and you find your own way!
If you had a close friend come to you for advice after a divorce, what are 5 things you would advise in order to survive and thrive after the divorce? Can you please give a story or example for each?
The 5 things are all about fitness and the reason why I created Fresh Start. The steps are ideal to healing & thriving after divorce: Meditation, Yoga, Healthy Eating, Cardio & Strength
https://www.worthy.com/blog/worthy-living/stay-healthy-during-holiday-season/
https://www.worthy.com/blog/worthy-living/coming-soon-fresh-start-fitness/
https://www.worthy.com/blog/worthy-living/what-is-clean-eating-anyway/
What are the most common mistakes people make after they go through a divorce? What can be done to avoid that?
Like with me, not taking care of yourself and giving yourself the love you need. Find your new peace, like I did with meditation and yoga and just taking care of yourself first. The rest will come and be better when you feel better first.
Do you have any favorite books, podcasts, or resources related to this topic that you would recommend to our readers? Check out my guest appearance on Divorce & Other things you can handle
https://www.worthy.com/blog/podcast/episodes/8-heal-and-thrive-after-divorce
https://www.worthy.com/blog/podcast
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote” that helped you in this work? Can you share how that was relevant in your real life?
“It may be stormy now, but it never rains forever”
“It’s a new chapter, you can rewrite your story now.” And just to remember that you won’t feel this way forever and these are some of the things that’ll get you to that next stage, meditation was a big one for me. I still do my meditations every night, talked about yoga and then the nutrition piece, we give everyone some tips to healthy eating and how to eat when you’re really not feeling like you want to eat or how to stop eating when you’re sitting with your pint of Ben and Jerry’s or whatever.
Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?
Working on building out Fresh Start Fitness with partners across the country to share with as many women as possible. I love this program and it is free and online so super convenient.
Because of the position that you are in, you are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
Moving the divorce conversation to one of positivity and happiness that is the new movement that I am hoping to inspire — the positive side of divorce and what you do to move forward and celebrate your new life.