Dean Pohlman: Hey guys, it’s Dean. Welcome back to the Better Man podcast. We’re continuing with our member interviews talking about reclaiming your health and reclaiming your fitness. Today I’ve got Cody s here to talk about how he’s been using mental yoga for the last few years on his weight loss and overall health and wellness journey. So Cody, thanks for being here.
Cody S.: Absolutely, Dean, thanks for having me. I’m really excited to do this.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. And, you know, if you guys are already active in the community and you’ve especially if you’ve seen, you know, in the Facebook group, Cody does a lot of sharing his stories. You know, Cody, you’ve talked a lot about you’ve talked a lot about weight loss. You’ve talked about your yo yo that you kind of your yo yoing there.
Dean Pohlman: You’ve talked about, a lot of mental wellness related stuff. You know, your stresses with, with work and making that change. And I think, I think that’s all great stuff that I’d love to get into. In this podcast, as I, as I mentioned to you, but I think a good point to start with was, is is what was kind of your oh shit moment.
Dean Pohlman: What was, when was it that you realized, okay, I gotta make a change in my fitness here.
Cody S.: So, to be honest, I’ve had I’ve had a lot of, oh, shit moments. I’ve basically been obese my entire life. As long as I can remember, since I was maybe 5 or 6 years old. And like you said, I, I’ve been very vocal about how I have yo yo up and down with my weight. When I first graduated in nursing school in 2014, I realized and and there I need to make a change.
Cody S.: And I lost. I lost probably 70 pounds at that point, but I didn’t do it in a way that was sustainable. I was 22, 23 at that time. So I went from, you know, 270 down to 190. I thought I was invincible. And then something happened in my very young adult life that I wasn’t prepared for. I met my wife, I got happy, I got what I call happy.
Cody S.: Thought, like many of us who, in other words, I experience a season of my life that I had never experienced before and I had never been prepared for. So that was that was the first, like, kind of like, that was the first time. But my most recent oh shit moment. And what really brought me back in the Man Flow yoga or brought me in Demand flow yoga, was in 2019, I graduated from nurse practitioner school.
Cody S.: I got my first job, and I remember we had a Christmas party and at work we were all dressed as different Christmas themes. Well, I had a pair of hunter green scrubs. And I had the idea I’m going to dress as a Christmas tree. In other words, just wear these scrubs and literally hot glue ornaments. Garland, stuff like that to it.
Cody S.: And I had a big bushy beard at that time too. And so I had was wearing ornaments in my beard. I remember seeing the pictures from that because you don’t come to work dressed like a Christmas tree and people don’t take pictures. But I remember seeing the picture and then just being so disgusted with myself, I just being like, man, I don’t remember being that big.
Cody S.: I don’t remember being that obese. I remember feeling tired all the time. I remember feeling exhausted and my son was like a year and a half old, so I thought that was it. I was just like, oh, it’s just because I’m still a new dad. And then it really it dawned on me and I realized, oh, this is not normal.
Cody S.: This is not normal for someone under 30 to feel like this. So that was my most recent oh shit moment. I really worked on getting my life situated. Started the journey of getting back into being consistently not just fit, not just exercise, not just trying to look good, but actually trying to improve my health and wellness. Another thing is that as a new nurse practitioner, I was working in primary care.
Cody S.: I worked in a hospital setting up until then. So, you know, I’ve seen patients in emergency rooms, the ICU. But now I was dealing with patients like you and I, men, women who were what in their mind they thought were healthy, which, you know, health is most definitely a spectrum. And a lot of it is subjective. But I’m talking like people who were not incapacitated, people who were not in these acute medical emergencies, people who were just a few years older than me, who were coming in to see me and were taking like 13 plus medications for various chronic medical conditions that could be either prevented or modifiable.
Cody S.: Risk factors reduced. I was seeing people who were maybe five years my senior coming in with severe osteoarthritis of the knees, chronic lower back pain, and, you know, it sucks in the medical community because it’s perceived as gaslighting. And I think that there is a lot of medical gaslighting that happens that really frustrates people and makes people be like, you know, I I’m done with modern medicine, modern healthcare.
Cody S.: The system is failing me. But it did suck. Whenever, you know, we’re trying all these treatments with people and I’m having to look them in the eye. And because it’s evidence based, tell them, hey, you know, and I’m doing it in a compassionate way, like exercise and weight loss will help with your with this pain, chronic pain that you’re having.
Cody S.: But it’s hard to tell people that without feeling hypocritical. When me, myself, I didn’t have my health situated. So not only do I feel guilty, I was also scared. Like is this my future? Is this what I’m looking forward to? And that’s not to say like for for those listening out there, like I’m not trying to, I always would get so irritated when people would have like, say, severe osteoarthritis of the knees.
Cody S.: And your wife is a physical therapist, so she’s probably told you some of these horror stories where like, they’ll go to an orthopedic surgeon. Clearly they probably need some kind of surgical or invasive intervention. And the surgeon just goes, oh, you just need to lose 30 pounds. No, that’s that is not what I would do. But the evidence is there that, that that does a lot of times help.
Cody S.: And that’s a hard pill to swallow for both me and for the patients. So I would say both seeing seeing the that picture of me. And then, just being in the field of primary care for three months was definitely probably my collective, 2019 OSHA moment.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah, yeah. And having, you know, having a son, especially, you know, a baby, is, definitely makes things difficult to take care of yourself. So what did you start doing? And just to speak to Marissa portion. Yeah. I mean, she’s, you know, she she isn’t practicing in the, setting that she was previously. She’s actually working in pelvic floor now, but, when she was working at an outpatient clinic, a lot of her patients had lower back pain.
Dean Pohlman: And. And. Yeah, it was basically, you know, they were 20 or 30 pounds overweight and and she’s like, yeah, you know, you’ve got low back pain and you know, short of just directly saying, yeah, you have lower back pain because you’re overweight. And when you’re over eight you have a low back pain. And she had to, you know, be very careful about how to say that.
Dean Pohlman: So yeah.
Cody S.: Because whenever you say stuff like that, especially in the age of, social media, all over the place, like every time I see, like, a TikTok where, somebody is criticizing their medical provider for gaslighting them, I’m like, I hope I never I inadvertently gaslight somebody. So it is a battle.
Dean Pohlman: So, yes. Like, what do you mean when they when you say gaslighting like, what’s the example of that of getting gaslighted by your health care professional?
Cody S.: So medical gaslighting is it gaslight. Yeah. You either one I’m not sure exactly what the correct passive, verb is, but, basically whenever you go to your health care provider seeking help, For what? For whatever reason. And, very, big thing that I see especially it’s really sad in people of color and in women, you see it a lot where they’ll go to their health care provider to get help for whatever reason, say it’s depression or, in women we see, heavy, painful menstrual periods and they’ll just say, you just need to take some ibuprofen and you’ll be fine.
Cody S.: Or for depression, it’s like, well, you know, are you are you eating right? And, like, they don’t do anything else past that to offer any assistance. So you you unfortunately, you see that, a lot, especially in patients with chronic illnesses that they have no control over, like patients with autoimmune conditions like rheumatoid arthritis or, you know, different or neuromuscular conditions.
Cody S.: They’ll just go like, well, you know, are you getting enough sleep? And it’s like, I’m trying to, but I’m in constant, debilitating pain. It’s kind of hard to get a good eight hours of sleep when you’re in pain. So. And so that’s.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. So the health care professionals are saying like, you’ve got to get your basic lifestyle stuff in order, like you have to eat that or you have to exercise, you have to sleep better, but they’re unable to do that in the current state that they’re in.
Cody S.: Exactly. And then they’re not saying in a way that through what we call therapeutic, motivating or therapeutic, motivational interviewing, which is like basically introducing these concepts in a way that is professional and validates their concerns. So like, I can tell a patient like, hey, you know where this is, okay. So for example, like the patient comes in with acute lower back pain.
Cody S.: And I treat that acutely with, you know, physical therapy. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, muscle relaxers, etc., etc.. All the evidence based stuff, they come back six weeks later and they are still feeling bad. And they’re saying, hey, the pain is actually getting worse. So what I would do is I would say, okay, look, this is what we’re going to do now.
Cody S.: We are going to get some imaging, probably based on my physical examination, probably an MRI, because I’m concerned. Now, why isn’t this getting any better, especially since you’ve been going to physical therapy. We’re going to ramp up some of your, you know, your, your medication regimen to see if we can address this pain better. And then in the meantime, I also want you to start watching what you eat.
Cody S.: I want you to start trying to eat less foods. If you do. If you don’t, that’s fine. But if you eat foods that are, you know, fried foods or foods that are heavily processed, I want you to start counting your calories and looking at those foods because those foods can encourage inflammation. And also, you know, you are a little bit overweight.
Cody S.: And I really think that losing just 10 pounds could definitely help you. So that’s that’s the very short version. This is what someone in a health care system that promotes gaslighting, they would just say, well, you’re just you’re just overweight. You need to lose 30 pounds and you’ll be good. When we’re talking about people who might not have any experience with health promotion whatsoever, when you take for granted that people might not know what calorie counting is, that’s especially for people who were born before, you know, technological advances.
Cody S.: You know, you telling a 70 year old, oh, you need to download this calorie counter and don’t give them any guidance, any examples? And yeah, they might be a little they might not, but they might be a little bit overwhelmed. The same can go for people who are in a socio economic group that is at a much higher risk.
Cody S.: Another thing is like, it’s hard to lose weight and eat right when you live in a food desert. A food desert is defined as somewhere I don’t remember the exact mileage, but basically somewhere where you don’t have any access to healthy food, which, you know, you’re in Austin. I’m in, I’m in Lubbock. I thankfully I’m not in a food desert, but where my clinic practice was, was a food desert for the entire side of the city my clinic was in.
Cody S.: There was only one grocery store. There was almost no public transportation. A majority of the people got their food literally from convenience stores that were within walking distance because that’s all they could afford to do. Now, I’m not saying that like health care providers need to completely, like, reinvent the wheel and wake up every morning trying to change the world because that is going to lead to some substantial burnout.
Cody S.: But as far as what the health system can do to make patients want to start coming back and start using the health care system, definitely validating what’s going on in their lives and looking beyond just the fact that someone is fat, just looking beyond the fact that someone, just, you know, we can’t assume when someone walks in, they treat their body like crap whenever we see them because everyone has, a very complex story to tell.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. Okay. Well, thanks for, thanks for going into that. So I want to take it back to when you had that oh shit moment and you started looking for things to, and you started looking for a fitness solution. So what made you go looking for something like mindful yoga or how did you how did you come upon that?
Cody S.: Ooh. With, many of my fellow members, brothers in the Facebook community, Covid 19 actually. So, yeah.
Dean Pohlman: And I became everybody’s best friend.
Cody S.: Pretty much pretty much. So, a few things happened. So that was like Christmas of 2019. In January 2020, I, practiced what I preached. I got myself a primary care provider. And I also realized in like that month of in between there that I had severe anxiety and depression, and I’d had it for probably over a decade.
Cody S.: I had never received any kind of treatment for it. And I it finally clicked. That if I did not address my anxiety and my depression, that I would never make any permanent long term success in my weight loss, and that my health and wellness would continue to deteriorate. Like, you know, like I said, I was a new dad at the time.
Cody S.: I thought it was normal to be frustrated 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I thought it was normal to, literally just, like, be so anxious, like, you know, there will be times where I would want to punch a wall. Actually, there were a lot of times I would want to punch a wall. And I was like, oh, that’s just like, that’s just normal.
Cody S.: And then, like, I don’t know. I don’t know exactly when, but sometimes they click like, hey, let’s, if you want to live like a long life and you want to continue to develop your relationship with your wife and your son, you probably need to get that fixed. And if you want to continue to develop a relationship with yourself.
Cody S.: So unfortunately, at that time, I didn’t have any time for any, like, you know, therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy or anything like that. But what I did have time to do was get started on medication. So I actually got started on Zoloft, which is an SSRI, and within a month it was like the clouds had started part.
Cody S.: And I was like, oh, this is this is how people are actually supposed to feel like I’m not supposed to, go to work every day with my heart rate at 120. I’m not supposed to scream at people in any kind of traffic, like, I’m not supposed to stay up until 3:00 in the morning, worrying about things like 20, literally 20 years down the line.
Cody S.: That’s just how my mind work. So getting that situated actually really helped and actually encouraged me to get started on Fitter Means Better. Mean is a, supplement and not a supplement. It’s a stimulant and an appetite suppressant that’s FDA approved. And so I started doing a little bit of cardio, started doing a little bit of weight lifting.
Cody S.: Probably I done about maybe a month consistently going to the gym every single day. And the lockdown happened. So lockdown, okay. You know, lockdown hit with just slammed us. Gyms closed completely shelter in place, all that good stuff. I am so thankful to this day that I started Zoloft when I did, because while everyone else at work was just like, in sheer panic.
Cody S.: I mean, yes, I was worried too, but I was just kind of like, you know, we’ll take it one day at a time. It’ll be okay. But I did also recognize I had started doing a little bit of running. Me and my wife, who was also at that time, pregnant with our second son, and we would go on walks with our son in the, our, my oldest in the afternoons was like, man, I really want to do something more.
Cody S.: And I had your book. I forgot which one it was. Whichever one of the OG mantle yoga books it is. And, I had done a little bit of of the workouts in that, but I just, I didn’t really understand the concepts in it. You know, I was really bad about, like when I was doing like some of the workouts myself, you know, you’d be like, hold plank for 30s.
Cody S.: I’m pretty sure I’d be like, 10s is long enough, like. But I realized then I was like, I need to do something else. So I talked to my wife one night. I remember saying, like, hey, like, there’s this program, it’s manual yoga. Like, I’ve seen, like, guys talk about how there’s great results with it. I think that actually been in your community for a little bit, just not really doing much of anything.
Cody S.: I said, you know, I want to give it a try. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. My wife was incredibly encouraging and said, yeah, give it a try. And so that I started the Strength Foundation Challenge and, and within a month, it, it took off.
Dean Pohlman: Cool. So you did it. So you started with strength foundations. And were you consistent that first month or what do you know, did you, were you doing the workouts. You know, three times a week, five times a week. How was that?
Cody S.: I was incredibly consistent. That first month. I mean, so pretty much throughout. But I after that first workout, I felt stronger. I remember feeling sore, like, in a good way, you know, I got to a good pump. I felt sore afterwards. I was like, this is what I’ve been looking for. And I that first month, Covid, like I said, you know, it was awful.
Cody S.: But at the same time it’s like I had nothing to do whenever I wasn’t at work besides workout. So I had plenty of time to, to do the workouts and everything. And, within that first month, I actually lost, about 20 pounds. I went from, I’d went from no running it now and that is with, with defender.
Cody S.: I mean also don’t know him wrong and I went from not running at all because I realized I want to also start doing some cardio. I went from no running to running like basically a mile, mile and a half every day. Within that first month there. And then I want to say that my, my second son was born like right after I finished the Strength Foundation challenge.
Dean Pohlman: Okay. Cool. So what do you think enabled you to be consistent during that time. Was it that you just you felt good after doing the workouts or what, what do you think helped with that?
Cody S.: I felt good after the workouts and I realized that it wasn’t a matter of if I could get healthier and lose weight. It was a matter of when I will lose weight. And basically just consistency was that, you know, kind of waking up and seeing like a pound or so gone. And every few days I was like, oh, I can do this.
Cody S.: I can actually do this. I think before, before Covid, before my, my moment of clarity. I remember telling myself like, oh, I guess I’ll just be the fat dad. Like, you know, I had been told when my wife was pregnant with our oldest, like, you don’t have a life anymore. Like by so many people. You don’t have a life anymore.
Cody S.: Everyone, you come, come second, third, fourth to everyone else. Your children, your wife, they will always come first. I think, unfortunately, that a lot of that sunk into my health awareness. Like it’s. I don’t need to go to the gym today. Like I need to do this, like I need to, I remember there was one day, and this is completely absurd, but I remember when my wife was very early on in the days when she was pregnant with my my firstborn.
Cody S.: I remember being like, oh, I’m going to go to the gym today. I can’t because I’ve got to mow the lawn because she can’t mow the lawn because she’s pregnant, which, looking back, my wife was like, I love mom. My wife loves doing lawn work. That’s like her, like, how do you. But she’s like, I would have loved to have mowed the lawn.
Cody S.: Like, what are you talking about? So I think realizing that I do need to put myself first, so that I can take care of my family and, and just being present, honestly, you know what we know about kids who grow up with, you know, without dads or with their dads. Not as much in the picture, for whatever reason.
Cody S.: For me, that would have been because of health problems that would have happened at some point down the line. I just wanted to be present because we know that just the presence of a father is, I don’t know if it’s half a battle, but it’s it’s a lot of the battle. And I just wanted to be able to show up for my kids when they were older, when they were adults, for my grandkids.
Cody S.: So a lot of that was what kept me going was realizing that not only could I do it, but also that I would do it. I think as far as like motivation goes, we hear it’s kind of cliche whenever you see, like people who say, oh, I’m doing it for my kids, that’s my wife, which is great.
Cody S.: Like, that part’s not cliche. It’s cliche. When you ask some of these people like, okay, well, what do you mean? Like for your kids? And they can’t really expound on, like, why? I mean, definitely like if you if your why is so that I can, be able to play with my kids more and have the energy to be with them more, that’s, that’s awesome.
Cody S.: But for me, like I said, my, my second child was a newborn at that time. My oldest was two years old. So I was thinking more like, okay, I just want to be able to see them grow up into young men who are able to look at their dad and not say, I’ve got the fat dad. I did not want that, and I wanted to be able to be present for their entire, you know, for their entire lives through all the stages.
Cody S.: You know, just again, working in primary care in medicine, just because I’ve seen, like, some of the worst things that can happen to people, you know, I don’t want to be like, say, 20 years down the line, like, oh, I can’t go visit my kids out of state because I need, hemodialysis. I can’t leave the state or, sorry, like, I missed, my son’s graduation because I had a hypoglycemic episode.
Cody S.: Because I took too much insulin. Something like that. Again. So it was a little bit of the spirit of fear of that. I’m not just being the fat dad, but being the fat, unhealthy dad. That really led to a lot of my motivation.
Dean Pohlman: Good. I mean, it’s good that you had that clarity in your motivation and in many ways, being around all of those examples of here’s what happens if you don’t take care of yourself. I’m sure that was I’m sure that was extremely, you know, motivating. So, you know, I like asking questions about that first month because I feel like that’s the hardest time to get started.
Dean Pohlman: And so was there, you know, when you did experience, you know, resistance to doing the workouts or you woke up one day and maybe your son woke up the night before and you were up with him in the middle of the night or something. How did you deal with discouragement, or a low energy, or just a lack of desire to exercise?
Dean Pohlman: How did you motivate yourself when that happened?
Cody S.: Sure, because I mean, that absolutely did happen. It still does happen. But I will say I agree with you that first month, is that month that like if you fall off the horse, you’re more likely to stay off the horse. And so the biggest thing that I could do was I remember at some point you talked about, you know, you can’t rely on motivation alone.
Cody S.: Basically just kind of gritting my teeth and, you know, if my son woke up an hour early to be fed and I woke up at three, well, I was going to wake up. And for any of that anyways, we’re just going to do the workout. If my something was going on with my oldest son, if I was, you know, fighting with him to get his clothes on for daycare, I didn’t have enough time to do my all of my workout in the morning.
Cody S.: I would do whatever I could in the morning, and then I would do the rest of it whenever I got home from work. If you know. So basically, lots of adaptation. I also realized that doing anything was better than doing nothing. So if I was scheduled during my like when I was training to run a ten K, if I was supposed to run, three miles in the morning, but I didn’t have time or weather was bad, or toddler sick, or my wife just needed to sleep in.
Cody S.: That’s fine. I’ll just run one mile instead. Like we will adapt and tomorrow’s a brand new day. Just having that mindset of anything is better than nothing was was really helpful. Sticking with that and that first month, especially because again, it was right there. The worst part of Covid when there were a lot of unknown variables. So I did have stressors like Am is am I going to have a job?
Cody S.: Like is how long is this pandemic going to last? Am I going to are they going to end up.
Dean Pohlman: Surely it won’t be more than three weeks.
Cody S.: Right I will. We even had fears of like, oh, are they going to set up a field hospital? And am I going to be required to work in the field hospital, like, I mean, so there were a lot of that just kind of but just focusing on one day at a time. And if today wasn’t a great workout, just realizing, okay, I’m going to have bed workouts, I’m going to have crappy days in my fitness, in my eating.
Cody S.: But tomorrow’s a new day. We’re not going to let that stop us.
Dean Pohlman: Yes. That’s great. I think those are really good examples. I love the, you know, adapting to the day and just doing what you can, recognizing that something’s better than nothing. I think that’s really important. I know a lot of people in our community really suffer from this all or nothing mentality where they’re like, oh, I got to do perfectly or not at all.
Dean Pohlman: And that’s not true. So yeah, exactly. So my next question here is what what kind of improvements did you notice in your life as a result of being consistent with exercise? I mean, obviously you got better at the workouts. You got that good feeling of muscle soreness. But what else did you notice, like in day to day life?
Dean Pohlman: How did it get better.
Cody S.: So, you know, definitely way more energy. Just so much more energy. Like I said, I would workout in the morning and then I’d get home from work. I would go with my wife and oldest and then both my kids after she had, quitting. But I would go on walks in the afternoon, and I just remember being able to walk further, faster.
Cody S.: And my poor wife, like, you know, she’s nine months pregnant. And I’d been, like, up to running, like, basically like A5K every morning. So I’d be, like, walking and she’d be just, you know, nine months of pregnant body. She’d be like, please slow down. I’m so tired right now. I’m like, I’m so I’m so sorry. Like, I just I just didn’t realize it.
Cody S.: Like, I just hadn’t realized, how much my stamina had had improved and increased. And then I just, I remember feeling just so much stronger, like the first time. Like I said, after I graduated nursing school, yeah, I lost 7 pounds, but I don’t think I really built that much muscle. Like looking back at pictures. I have these skinny arms, of course, a lot of extra skin just hanging off of me, just not exactly that, you know, attractive, honestly.
Cody S.: But then after, actually building some muscle, even without doing any weights, like you know, my shoulders were a lot bigger. I remember I looked in the mirror and be like, oh, look at that. Like I’ve got traps. Like, that was an awesome, awesome thing to think. Like, I just remember, like one day I was just like, doing this little number.
Cody S.: My wife goes, what are you doing? I go, look, I’ve got traps, which my wife is actually, she does a lot of she. My wife does a lot of bodybuilding, actually. And so she’s like, oh, these are cute little baby traps. Oh my gosh. Like yeah thank you. Appreciate that.
Dean Pohlman: But thank you. That’s not escalating right.
Cody S.: She she meant it. She meant to appear love I promise. So that was that was really cool to actually see that.
Dean Pohlman: So yeah. So how did that lead into you making other improvements in your overall health and wellness?
Cody S.: So.
Dean Pohlman: And when when did that happen?
Cody S.: I would say created it basically created a snowball effect. Honestly. It was like, okay, I finish String Foundation’s challenge and I’m running A5K, what’s next? And then it was kind of like, okay, let’s move into Beyond Strength Foundations. Let’s run a ten K, and so on and so forth. And it really progressed. I stayed very consistent and continually was advancing what I was doing with my workouts for probably about two years, up until I did get Covid, inevitably.
Cody S.: And I actually got long Covid, so I was probably I lost, vast majority of like my, respiratory, my VO2, I lost all of that. I mean, I was sick for like two months. So unfortunately that happened. And that was definitely a big setback. But again, because unlike before in my life, when, you know, whenever I was, something would happen in life and I would just give up and be like, oh, well, back to being the fat guy now as like, I’m still fat, but I’m not giving up.
Cody S.: I’m going to continuously, keep trying. And so, you know, the gyms open back up, started getting back into the weight room. I never forget the first time I did a bench press after doing man flow yoga. How much more muscle activation and just how much cognizance of my muscle ability. I remember, like, you know, bringing the bar down and me like, okay, retracting my shoulder blades when that wasn’t something that was there before.
Cody S.: Yeah. And so then I started somewhat consistently, weightlifting and doing yoga as well. And then something else in life happened. I went back to school for grad school, so I started my doctorate, and unfortunately, again, back to that adaptation. It went from being able to work out, you know, as much as I wanted whenever I wasn’t spending time with my family.
Cody S.: To all of a sudden like, nope. Now you have, along with your work deadlines, you have school deadlines, you’ve got to meet. So again, I had to meet that adaptation. I know I gained quite a bit of weight during my doctorate, unfortunately, but I think it could have been so, so much worse because no matter what, like I remember I had like an eight hour lecture one day, and I remember I finish lecture and my wife was like, so, you know, she’s like, what are you going to go do now?
Cody S.: And I was like, I’m actually going to go for a run. I was like, I need to go for a run to clear my head. And so I remember doing like a ten minute warmup session and then going for a ride. And so that’s kind of it’s just kind of little things up and down ever since then.
Cody S.: But no, yoga is like I had been experiencing.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. And I, you know, I’m maybe putting words into your mouth here, but it sounds like, you know, you’re you’re you’re like like you’re Covid, like you’re long Covid experience. You were going through that, but you also weren’t thinking, oh, this is it. I’m you know, I’m not going to be able to get back into it. But you you had a new identity at that point and you’re like, I know that I’ll get back into it.
Dean Pohlman: It’s just, you know, it’s just it sucks right now, but I’ll get back in that I’m not going to, you know, it wasn’t like you were going to give up. So.
Cody S.: That was like.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. And I think, like, you know, just my own experience, like, you know, I have those periods where I’m like, where I feel like, oh, man, this is like just this sucks right now. You know, I was I’ve been sick for the last three weeks. I finally got on a second. I got on the second round of antibiotics recently, and, you know, the first couple days without a headache, like, over the weekend since, like, September, or.
Dean Pohlman: I don’t like for dates in this because who knows when this podcast is coming up. Basically three weeks of, you know, have. Yikes. And finally, first weekend of not having a headache. But, but, you know, I never go through that thinking like, oh, I’m this, fitness is done. I’m never going to get back into it. You’re like, oh, I just can’t do what I want to do right now.
Dean Pohlman: But I know that I’ll get back into it and I’ll come back with a vengeance. You know, I’m going to.
Cody S.: So yeah, yeah, yeah.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. So, another question I’d like to ask. And, you know, I think this is especially relevant for you because you’re so active in our communities. And how have communities been helpful for you with your fitness journey?
Cody S.: Man, the communities have been amazing. So being a nurse, I work in a woman and female dominated field and pretty much always have my entire professional career. I remember when I first started getting a first started on my fitness journey. I joined a few men’s like weight lifting and weight loss Facebook groups and and they were good. They were really good.
Cody S.: But I remember when I joined the man for yoga community, I’ve never experienced an outpouring of support and, guidance and, you know, just just being there. I mean, one thing that I found with all these communities, though, is that, again, being in a female dominated field, I thought I was kind of a unique situation because I didn’t really have any male friends.
Cody S.: I didn’t really have any male bonding, anything like that. And then I joined these communities and I’m like, oh, crap, this is like a pandemic for men. There is a lack of community. There is a lack of, high quality male friendship and relationships. And, you know, as we’ve talked, as you’ve talked about before on this podcast and into the community group like that is a a huge issue that is plaguing, men these days, that lack of, of community.
Cody S.: And so I remember being so young at the Manolo Yoga community group has probably been the best group. And I’ve said it multiple times on there, just because, I mean, there’s guys from every walk of life on there. I’ve never felt like, It’s not so serious where the, like, if somebody does a pose wrong or something, or they post an update like they don’t just immediately get trashed.
Cody S.: I mean, there might be a little bit of humorous ball busting, but I don’t feel like it’s like, it’s not like in other groups where it’s just like, I you just basically get bullied for lack of a better term. So, yeah. And then like.
Dean Pohlman: In our, in our, our group is like, you know, it’s we only let people in who are part of mental yoga. Right. So the people coming in, it’s not just like an open weight loss Facebook group where the person who started it is also trying to sell you supplements and get them into your own program. It’s just like a generic weight loss for men.
Dean Pohlman: 40 plus. But at the same.
Cody S.: Time, it’s actually.
Dean Pohlman: It’s it’s actually like there’s a guy behind it who’s trying to, like, sell you into his program at the same time, whereas where, you know, you get it and you’re just like, hey, you’re here, you’re committed. Let’s let’s chat, let’s support one another. And we do have a really cool culture of that.
Cody S.: So yeah, that’s exactly right. And for anyone out there listening who you if you don’t do mental yoga, just know the groups are amazing. The Facebook, any Facebook or social media group, online community or even in-person community. I know that that’s that’s something that’s happening. You know, you’ve you’ve, had the plug for like, fit fathers. That’s a great group too, but definitely just find a group, find your community.
Cody S.: Because the more support you have, for that fits you and the fits your lifestyle is, you’re going to be a lot more successful.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah, it’s just easier.
Cody S.: It is. It’s just a lot easier.
Dean Pohlman: So what’s the what’s the next thing you want to work on in your fitness?
Cody S.: The next thing that I want to work on is, number one, continuing to lose weight while I’m in the process of moving. So about to be moving across the country. And I’m very thankful that I have not gained any weight from stress related to that. That’s that’s the so the next the immediate next thing in my fitness journey is actually just being able to move my family, across the country with no injuries or whatnot.
Cody S.: But my, where I’m moving to, actually, we’re moving to Virginia and my sister in law who lives up there, she just did what’s called the Virginia ten miler, which is a huge, huge race up there. She’s a she’s a very avid runner. And she texted me, she goes, hey, do we want to do the Turkey Trot since y’all will be up here?
Dean Pohlman: Oh God, I.
Cody S.: Said, yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Dean Pohlman: I know there are two types of people in this world. People who run turkey trots and people who do not run turkey.
Cody S.: That’s what my wife said. She goes, great. She goes, we’re that family now. We And so, you know, I as my I, I was like, hey, do you, do you want to do the Turkey trot with us? And she goes, yeah, I mean the boys, we’re going gonna watch and support y’all. And my sister and my sister in law’s husband.
Cody S.: He was probably the same way. He’s like, yeah, we’ll just we’re gonna watch on the sideline, we’re gonna support y’all and cheer you on. So that’s my next like a media, fitness thing. My I guess like fitness, like marker. My, that was a milestone because it’s just A5K and I haven’t ran five K in probably 2 or 3 years.
Cody S.: So I’m doing a lot of work for that right now. And then also I’m looking forward to right now I live in West Texas, which, as you know, is a flat, barren landscape, basically. And so I’m looking forward to actually being somewhere where I can hike and actually rock climb, actually want to really get my family into doing, like hikes and different things like that.
Cody S.: My boys are phenomenal when it comes to anything climbing, so I’m actually going to work on getting them into, rock climbing gym to do like kids competitive rock climbing. And I’m, I’m for I’m looking forward as a, as a dad to doing that with them as well. So I’d say that’s my next immediate fitness journey.
Dean Pohlman: Cool. All right. Let’s get into our rapid fire questions. So, just a couple sentences answering these next few questions. What’s the one habit, belief or mindset that’s helped you the most with your overall health and wellness?
Cody S.: It was walking every day, even if it’s just for fit ten, 15, 20 minutes, especially working night shift. I don’t get, you know, that way I can get some sunlight. I can actually wake my body up before I go into work. If I’m having a really heavy weight lifting day, then that can be my cardio.
Cody S.: So, yeah, walking.
Dean Pohlman: All right. Cool. What’s one thing that you do for your health that is often overlooked or undervalued by others?
Cody S.: Take my antidepressant. Take my myself. Okay. Like, honestly, basically taking care of my mental health. I, you know.
Cody S.: And antidepressants are not for everybody. I know the especially like, on social media news, different things like that. You’ll always hear about people who are like, I just my mind, you know, like antidepressants. Zoloft has been literally a lifesaver for me. And so, yeah, basically treating your mental health if you’re not feeling like you’re in a good mental headspace, get treatment, whether that be therapy, seeing a doctor, or seeing a psychiatrist reaching out to somebody treating mental health well.
Dean Pohlman: What’s the most stressful part of your day to day life?
Cody S.: Right now I’m working night shift, so definitely the most stressful part of my day to day life is. And I work seven nights on seven nights off. So for seven nights on, I, you know, stay up from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., get home, try to sleep as much as I can. It’s it’s a challenge if you do night shift, no matter what.
Cody S.: I always I’m not going to lie. I kind of roll my eyes when I hear people talk about like, oh, you know, like sleep is a big thing, like in the man for yoga group. And, like, I don’t roll my eyes at that. I roll my eyes more at me, like, okay, I’ll. I’ll sleep when I can.
Cody S.: You know, try to sleep five hours, a day when there’s construction on side, when you’ve got to go pick kids up in the afternoon, all that good stuff. That’s for the most stressful part of my. I guess the most stressful part of my day is basically waking up and trying to figure out, am I supposed to be up at night?
Cody S.: Or am I supposed to be up during the day?
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. That’s rough. And, yeah, yeah, I’ve had some people ask that question. I’m like, I don’t really have good advice. I mean, other than, you know, basically practices, but yeah.
Cody S.: The best thing, the best thing I could say for people who work night shift is get a good, high quality sleep mask. I mean.
Dean Pohlman: You know, yeah.
Cody S.: 30, $40. It makes a huge difference.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah, that’s definitely good advice. Speaking of advice, what’s your best piece of advice for men who want to be healthier?
Cody S.: I would say definitely pick up a program, whatever it is, be that something with yoga, weights, walking, cardio and literally just try to stick with it. If you fall back off the horse, get right back on.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah.
Cody S.: But every every day.
Dean Pohlman: People are going to fall off the horse and that’s okay.
Cody S.: It will. It is not a matter of, it’s not a matter of if it is a matter of when.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah. Cool. Well Corey I want to thank you. Sorry I said Cody. Cody, I want to say thank you for being the inspiration that you are in the mental yoga community. I know that, I hope you know this, but, I am certain that you have inspired hundreds, if not thousands of people in our community with what you share on a regular basis.
Dean Pohlman: And, you know, not just physical, but also, you know, talking about your struggles with mental health and, and yeah, like showing yourself some grace in the process and doing that publicly, I think, I think that’s helped a lot of people. So I just want to say thank you for your contributions. And you being part of a man for yoga and, you know, giving it a shot when you got started with the Strength Foundations course a few years ago.
Cody S.: And I appreciate it. Know thank thank you all. You all make it like you said, the group makes it so incredibly easy to to be there for one another. So thank you.
Dean Pohlman: Yeah you’re welcome. All right. Well guys listening in I hope you enjoyed this. Cody, once again, thank you so much.
Cody S.: Of course, this year.
Dean Pohlman: And, I hope this inspires you to be a better man. I will see you on the next episode.
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