A little bit about me
Hello and welcome to Studio Formah! An online Pilates platform dedicated to finding your form, at home (or anywhere in the world)! If you’ve followed my Instagram for a while, you may know that Pilates is more than just exercise for me. It is my happy place and a real lifeline for me. I have struggled with body-image issues, anxiety and periods of disordered eating for as long as I can remember. Just over four years ago, when the world was locked down, I had just gone through one of the worst periods of anxiety I’ve ever experienced. For nearly four months, I had almost daily panic attacks, I cancelled holidays, missed special occasions and couldn’t leave my house other than to go to work. I spent my lunchtimes wandering around, close to tears, trying to get my heart rate up to ‘match’ my anxious heart rate and hopefully, avoid a panic attack. Going into lockdown, in some ways, helped.. I no longer had any social pressures because I couldn’t go out.
I was put on furlough after a month. In my boredom, I began to bake brownies and cookie bars for a friend that worked as a nurse. I made an Instagram account and it went mad. Three weeks later, the right thing to do seemed to be to take it full time. It wasn’t. One week into running my little bakery full time from my parents’ garage, I realised I had made quite possibly the biggest mistake of my life. I hated every second of it. I didn’t want to get out of bed in the morning. I binge ate and then punished myself for it. I punished myself by binge eating more. I hated myself. I liked being self-employed but I knew I had to do something I loved. Pilates.
Fast forward two years, I had been working in property as a desperate measure to stop baking. I left for a new job in the city and quit after my first day because it was completely different to what I was told. I went on holiday to New York and attended Melissa Wood’s in-person event, which was also on my 27th birthday. It felt like a sign. During the Q&A, I was able to speak to Melissa (after she had led the entire room in singing me Happy Birthday) about building confidence when filming, believing in yourself and falling in love with your practice. In what feels like a bit of a full-circle moment, here I am, another two years later, on my 29th birthday, launching my very own Pilates platform.