I don't want to assume, to know how you are feeling.
And I come back to this every single time.
It doesn't matter how long I train you.
You are the one who will send something before I can tell.
You know, It's like you're moving and it looks perfect to
me. And then you go, yeah, my knee
really hurt doing that. And I'm like, yeah, why didn't
you stop or tell me? And they're like, oh, I just
pushed through it. I'm like, OK, cool, let's talk
about this. So it's, you know, it's so I
completely agree and understand what you're saying.
I don't want to put my lens on their experience because they
may be similar. But at the end of the day, as I
was saying, we're, we're all different and unique and we have
things that we have in common that we share, but we are still
our own individual, you know, living, breathing bodies.
Hey, I'm Hyper Mobile and if you're listening to this, I'm
guessing you might be too. Hi, my name is Alex and I'm your
Hyper Mobile host. And today we have on the
incredible Karima 80 longevity coach and CrossFit coach.
Karima, I'm so excited to have you on today.
We've known each other for 10 years.
Yeah, about 10 years. I cannot believe how fast time
goes by. We'll get into that in a second,
but tell me, tell me just a bit about yourself to begin with.
What do you help people with? I help people move better
without pain and discomfort and just getting them to believe
that they can do things that maybe they've been told that
they can't anymore because of some health condition or the big
one is their age, but ultimately empowering people to move pain
free. Yeah, no, absolutely that that
speaks to my experience with you because I have to say you have
been my coach as well and you've helped me in how I move and kind
of my fitness journey. But if we take the clock back
ten years or so, I always knew there was something going on
with me. We were talking before we
started recording. You told me you knew there was
something going on with you. We kind of, I didn't see each
other for a few years, came back together and hypermobility has
been a part of both of our stories.
So tell me a little bit about your personal experience with
hypermobility, if you don't mind.
So I didn't actually know that that's what it was called.
I just always knew that I was quite flexible and people were
always commenting on that. And when I first started working
out in a CrossFit gym, I could get into positions that other
newbies couldn't. And it was always like, Oh my
gosh, you are so flexible. It's great.
But then I also had niggles that other people didn't.
So it was really interesting contradiction of terms, because
I'm like, yes, I'm really flexible, but also sometimes I
hurt when other people don't. Can I ask you which positions
you got into easily or which things kind of like Oh my God.
An overhead squad? Never a problem.
Same. Never a problem.
You know, it was literally butt through the floor, great
overhead position. Yeah.
Were you? Yeah, go on.
No, go on. Were you failing left by getting
stuck in the bottom? Initially.
Yeah, yeah. It's like the the bottom of
shame. So what I'm talking about here
is when you do a squat, obviously your hips go down and
then go up. And one of the things they see
classically in people who are doing strength training where
they're doing some squats and we'll talk about barbells and,
you know, dumbbells and things later, but they will often be
the people who will go down and just be stuck there.
It is not glamorous. It does not feel good.
And I hate failing lifts that way.
Yeah. Anyway, so we were, you were
kind of doing some of the the classic hyper mobile person
things in in this situation. And then what happened from
there? Well, I thought I'd figured it
out because I would. Then when I'd get stuck, I'd
just bounce out of those places. But that seemed to cause more of
an issue. So all of a sudden I would have
like a painful hip or my shoulders would feel really bad,
or my neck would get really, really tight.
And I never really quite understood why because other
people didn't seem to be suffering from the same sort of
thing. And it wasn't really until I
started nerding out about movement a little bit more
before I was even coaching, where I started to understand
that it was more about the lack of stability versus mobility.
Because clearly I had the mobility, I just did not have
the stability to be able to perform the movements with
control. And so I would.
There's a bit of wrestling with the ego, really, because I
wanted to lift heavy, but I couldn't stabilize.
So it was this really odd thing of having to understand that my
body just functioned a little bit differently.
And I think it was you coming along with another osteopath who
was like, wow, yes, you're very flexible.
It's because you're hyper mobile.
And that really just lit that bulb up for me.
And I'm like, oh, that's what it's called.
So I could Google something and I could look stuff up and it, it
really explained the things that I was feeling anyway, because
I'm quite intuitive. Sometimes I'll know something
and I just don't know how to describe it.
I don't know what it's about. Yeah, I think a lot of people
who are hyper mobile get that feeling of feeling different but
not knowing what it is, and it's like it's a really confusing
place to be. I have to ask you as well, just
because I'm curious because you've never actually really
talked about this before. Did you get any weird things
like I would have trouble with skipping, getting pain in my
shoulders or running? Was there anything that was
really, really strange or didn't make sense to you at the time
that would bother you? Can be any joint.
I would get just pains in my shoulders a lot and sometimes
from not even shoulder work. So to though that was always a
bit strange because I would complain about my shoulders and
other people just didn't have those issues.
It's like, well, what did you do the last couple of days?
What workouts did you do the last couple of days?
I'm like, there's no reason my shoulders should be hurting, but
somehow they just did a lot. And then it would go up into my
neck and and I would get these headaches that I remember saying
to people, it feels like someone's cramping my brain.
Like someone's like just like digging into my brain because
but it was all from the neck. And it wasn't really until I
think when you started treating me actually that you're like,
this is from this is not in your brain.
This is your neck. And just getting me to
understand that even though it felt like it was in my brain, it
wasn't. Yeah, I think I'm looking at
peripheral nerve anatomy is really important and I forgot to
do this claimer. I have a tendency to do that.
I should be doing it. By the way, this is not medical
advice, OK? So please see your qualified
healthcare provider who knows you and your unique medical
history for that. Also, there could be swearing.
I don't know, I feel like 'cause I've said that, I've now not
gonna swear, 'cause I just like to be opposite and contrary, but
who can? Who can say?
Back to anatomy. So yeah, the dorsal scapular
nerve, I'm just gonna input up for one second, OK?
It is a nerve that runs from C3456, sorry.
And so that's in your neck and it goes down between your
shoulder blade and your spine. And when you start to think
about anatomy and what's happening there and what
instability potentially from that shoulder blade joint or
lack of movement in the right way at the right time, it's
really easy to see how sensitive structures can get stressed.
Yeah, and potentially contribute to pain elsewhere.
I don't know if you could kind of feel those headaches coming
on. Often patients will get a bit of
a prodrome. Yeah, so we had very similar
experience in that. Yeah, I have to say too as well,
going back to what you said about how things just like the
pain kind of didn't make sense. I was visiting my brother in
Canada. You've never met my brother, but
we are extremely close and quite similar in many ways.
But he's not hyper mobile, which baffle.
I like, I'm always just trying to check about.
He's like, stop assessing me and I'm like, you have to be hyper
mobile. Like we're so close.
So we told him like an hour every day and for you to not be
hyper mobile. It really just confuses me.
But I had a talk with him for the millionth time and I was
like, George, you know, just just checking just to make sure
I understand this, even though we've talked about it before.
And I said, George, like, did you ever have pain Where it
where like you would just have agony and your your knees would
be aching as a child or your neck or your shoulders or stuff
where it didn't make sense like what you and I were talking
about? Yeah.
And he said this and like my jaw hit the floor.
He said, Alex, I have never experienced pain without a
reasonable cause and effect, which is the most mathematician
and he's a mathematician, by the way, but most mathematician
answer ever. But I just like that.
Keeps me up at night. Good for you, George.
Good for you. He.
Is he is definitely, yeah, a very different, different
experience from us, shall we say.
He he just sits at a desk, doesn't get injured and just
lives his best life. And it's good for him.
I know it's incredible. But back to you.
So you were going on your journey, you were doing some
fitness stuff, some strength training and other stuff in
there and you're getting pain. What happened next?
Because you've you told me the story a little bit at the
workshop we did together Cream, I did a workshop with me was
fabulous. We'll do Part 2 eventually, but
what happened from there? Well, in order to go forward, I
actually need to go back a few years because the this whole my
whole story into movement and starting to understand my buddy
more actually started 15 years ago.
So way before I stepped foot into a CrossFit gym at all.
I had weird symptoms like hormonally and stuff and they
didn't really quite make sense. And it took about a year to get
the diagnosis after an MRI, and they found a brain tumor like a
little prolactinoma. And that was ultimately the
culprit of why I was feeling so, so strange and why my hormones
were all over the shop. And they initially they're like,
oh, it might be like pregnancy or PCOS or whatever, and they
were just throwing all these terms at me.
But it eventually turned out to be this prolactinoma, which is
effectively A benign brain tumor and was put on a load of
medication. And normally in the medication
leaflet you have like possible side effects and there's like a
laundry list of things and most people will experience one or
two. And I started the to get the
entire whack of them. And part of that is like that
you're you'll, you'll experience some pain in different parts of
the body. So I was just kind of miserable
all the time, which led me into osteopathy actually, because I'd
gone to various different health professionals and nobody could
quite pinpoint why I was in so much pain then like it has your
product, enoma should have no impact on the rest of your body.
Your medication shouldn't really impact anything.
And but it did, you know, and I used to go to the gym, not sort
of casually, I'd spend time on the treadmill and whatnot, but I
wouldn't go, I wouldn't do any strength training.
I didn't really know that much about strength training just
because you know, you'd look into the strength section of the
gym and it would just all be dudes.
And, and you know, it wasn't really, it didn't feel like I
was welcome there either. And I didn't really know enough.
And it wasn't until my 6th or 7th osteopath session where I'm
like, I can't, I just can't keep doing this.
I think. And not to to scare anybody, but
it's like I never understood the notion of not wanting to live.
And I think in those moments where I was experiencing so much
pain, I kind of understood that sometimes you you're in so much
pain and just not being alive would be better.
Not that I would ever dare to do anything to hurt myself, but it
was just this moment where I'm like, I cannot go on.
And I think that was the pivotal moment when I was crying on the
table with my osteopath and I said, I don't know what to do.
And he said you need to find something to strengthen your
body because right now it's in it's in like panic mode and you
need to find something because he's like, you can keep coming
every week and giving me your money and I will make it a
little bit better. But ultimately it's not going to
go away. So I'm like, OK, and I'm, I'm
very practical. So I'm like, OK, let's just find
a bunch of things. Going to the gym by myself was
boring. So I'm like, I'm going to just
try and do different things. And I tried a bunch of things
and eventually crossword was starting to sort of be around
more. I would hear about it and the
barbell felt really scary to me. So I was like, I don't know.
And then I went to a CrossFit gym and I had a really bad
experience with somebody who just wasn't very personable and
couldn't quite understand that I was coming from a really painful
place. So I was like, why?
I guess this is not for me? And then it took me about 18
months to to feel courageous enough to step foot into another
gym. And it was such a different
experience. The person I spoke to just was,
it was just a soft landing. They were just really reassuring
and they were like, don't worry, our coaches are great.
They're going to take care of you.
And the first foundation class I did, there were seven foundation
classes at the time. I think it was like a deadlift
class. It, it was like the first time
it ever touched a barbell. And it was this pivotal moment
where the coach was like, oh, you're built really well for a
way, way after, you know, 5 foot 2, you know, short limbs, long
torso and like you can get into the positions really well.
And I just, something just clicked in my head.
I'm like, this is it and I just knew it.
And even though it was uncomfortable and I was, I'm
still hurting, I just persisted. And I did the seven intro
classes and the same coaches who do the foundation classes did
the main classes. So by the time I started the
main classes, they already knew me and they already knew that I
was struggling with some other things than the average 30 year
old at the time and it just changed my life.
And it was barbell workouts specifically that I kind of just
took to because I also noticed that if I did a workout that had
keeping pull ups for example, my shoulders didn't like it.
So this is where I started to get an inking of hang on a
second. I did all the strict work first
because there was a rule back in the day at our gym that you had
to have 5 strict pull ups before you were allowed to do any kind
of Kip swings. So my like I had built up the
musculature I needed and to be safe.
But every time I did any kind of keeping movements, it just, it
hurt. So this is where then we, we
start that part of the story where where you started at,
where I just noticed that things were not quite right.
But simultaneously, I had to go for blood tests every three
months to monitor the tumor and my bloods just kept getting
better and better. And they're like, what are you
doing? I'm like, I'm just being active
and I'm working out and, and I'm making sure I know what I'm
putting in my body. So if there's something that has
a label that has eighteen ingredients that I cannot
pronounce, maybe I don't have that, you know?
And yeah, it was, it just kept getting better.
And I said, right, I'm going to dial down the those are the
medication because it, the side effects were still there.
Some of the severe paranoia, you know, thoughts that didn't feel
like my own thoughts. So I'm like, I'm not gonna, I'm
not gonna take as much. And they're like, well, but the
tumor is so bad and I'm like, I don't care.
My bloods are clearly getting better.
You can't make me take the bigger dose.
So I'm just gonna lower the dose.
And I did. And my bloods kept getting
better. And I'd started with one
CrossFit session a week to 2:00 to 3:00 to 4:00.
But I would be quite selective. I would always want to do the
ones that had a barbell in it. I just.
I'm not surprised. Absolutely loved it.
And they were like, well, you're now on the smallest dose of the
meds, which is like, I have to cut this tablet with like the
sharpest knife because it barely registers otherwise as a tablet
now because it's just powder. And they're like, well, clearly
everything's still OK. So OK.
And then they changed it from seeing them every three months
to every six months. And for the last nine years, I
want to say I have to see them once a year.
I noticed that or I now know that when high stress situations
will prompt things to look worse again because the the body
response accordingly. So managing my my mindset and my
stress levels is really important as well because
otherwise I would just have to increase the meds again.
But having said that, they did an MRI five years ago and they
couldn't even find the tumor anymore.
So that I considering that they started with you're just going
to up the meds over the course of your life and you'll likely
end up in a wheelchair to oh, we can't even find the the the
thing anymore. It's pretty, pretty incredible.
Well, that's, that's absolutely fantastic.
Your story touches on so many things.
So the mental health aspect of fitness, I have to say most of
the patients I see, so the fat like 99% plus probably are
hypermobile these days. I still see people who have
complex chronic or treatment resistant injuries who are not
hypermobile, but the vast majority obviously are.
There is a big overlap. And although this applies to
everyone, I do see a big overlap with people who are
neurodivergent and hypermobile because it's there.
We know from research, especially with ADHD and HDS and
HSD, it's very prevalent. And a lot of people will kind of
manage their mental health or one of the ways that they affect
their mental health positively is through exercise.
And you've seen that be true for me.
I think it's also knowing you've been true for you to me too.
Yeah. And that place of darkness.
And I think you spoke about in such a nuanced and thoughtful
way about, you know, not having active ideation, but just
feeling so broken and so down and so lost and alone.
And just it, the weight gets heavy sometimes.
Like it gets so heavy. And for a lot of people, like
exercise can kind of be that thing that just keeps them
ticking over, you know, gives you a reason to leave the house
or get up out of bed or just do something.
And I think it's just, I think one of the key things that you,
I know have helped some of the the patients I've referred to as
well this way we do work collaboratively.
Sometimes we'll talk to them that later.
And one of the things you helped me with back when I was going
through quite a difficult time, was just having something to do
that gave me a thing, a way that I could feel something in my
body that wasn't pain. Yeah.
Yeah, I'm a guy. Anyways, I'm surprised we got
through recording a few episodes before the 7th.
Anyways, Karima, you also touched on when you first
started CrossFit. And again, you know, for you is
CrossFit, for other people, it'll be something else.
I think it's about finding your thing and we'll talk about that
later. But you were doing these classes
and you felt some things, you know, some pain.
I sometimes say my body's talking to me.
If you're not sure what it is, I have to ask you a question.
Did you have the foresight or knowledge to find ways to kind
of not push through that, or did you kind of just push through it
and then deal with the consequences later and learn
from that? Do you get what I mean?
Yeah, I do. And sadly it's, it's the latter.
I pushed through because I really, really, even though the
reason I started it and got into it was because I was in pain.
The better I felt, the more my unknown, unbeknownst to me,
little competitive part in me was like, Oh, you could like
compete. You know, I like a very low
level, but still like the, the in house competitions or when we
did competitions against other gyms.
And you know, I, I really noticed that I do have that
competitive element within me. And so I would just push through
because I just didn't want to accept that there was, quote UN
quote, yet another thing. Yeah, I just wanted to be
normal. I just wanted to be a normal
Crossfitter that didn't have to monitor things that were just,
you know, it's like, just let me do the thing and do it like
everybody else. But then I just couldn't keep
pushing through. So even though within the first
year my osteopath effectively fired me because he's like you
don't need me anymore. You're not in pain anymore.
I kind of had to go back to him because I was now struggling
with some of the CrossFit induced things where I didn't
listen. So when my body started talking
to me, I would just try and shut it up and be like, I'm just
going to get through this workout versus what I would do
now and what I have done really for the last, I want to say 5-6
years where I even if I do a class, I am almost hyper
vigilant about what my body is telling me.
So if everything feels fine, great.
But that doesn't mean I check out and then I come back into my
body at the end of the workout to see how I'm doing.
I'm there present in my body the whole time.
It's not about letting my mind wander and be distracted.
It's about making sure that each Rep feels as good as it can, and
then if it doesn't, I stop. I analyze.
I am no longer interested in being competitive with anybody.
It's just about can I come in and do this workout?
And yes, I'll be sore tomorrow, but I'm not injuring myself.
I'm not causing any damage that may last because no workout is
worth it. I'm not a competitive athlete.
I'm not, you know, an Olympic at like, I'm not somebody who's
career depends on a performance, a workout.
So for me, it's a love of movement.
That's why I do it and because it makes me feel good
physically, mentally and emotionally.
So it's just about being fully aware, yeah, Of what's.
Happening I call that being kind to your body.
You know, when I talk with my patients and when I talk with
myself, I think like, am I being kind to little Alex?
Is this what she needs to say now there's something else you
touched on as well. Oh, another concept I like to
talk about is being your own coach.
So, you know, I got to work with some quite high level
competitive athletes, professional athletes.
And when you work in that type of environment, their coach is
on them like white on rice. Like there is a they're
supervising. They're like, oh, you looked a
little bit off there. Are you feeling OK?
There's this really nurturing and collaborative relationship
that top coaches and top professional athletes who have a
good coaching relationship will have.
And it really made me think about being my own coach.
And I think that's something which is critical, especially if
your body's a little bit different, because the best
coach in the world or the best PT or whatever, they're not
going to know what you're feeling.
Yeah, but it's such a hard skill.
I have to say I found it hard to develop.
Did you have a hard time learning that?
No, simply because the hyper vigilance has kind of always
been there, but I've ignored it most of the time.
But since not shutting it up, it's actually really easy to
hear. So I just had to allow that
voice to speak versus just telling it to shut up and then
cranking up the music on my headphones to to sort of drown
it out. That's that's been a thing.
And sometimes, I mean, even now, you know, even last week I went
into a workout and my buddy was like, my, my right shoulder was
just like, and I was like, and then I was like, no, no, hang on
a second. If you do this, then it's just
going to make things worse tomorrow.
And I had to stop and I had to modify it.
And that was, you know, I was a bit like, but it was fine.
And because I knew it was the right decision in the moment.
No, absolutely. I think if you see someone
talking to their joint in a class, there's like a 99% chance
it's me. No, I like the question too.
Like, is it worth it? That's what I I'll be like, you
know, I'll feel something in a class that I'm going to a
session I'm doing and I'm like, is it worth it?
Like is this the workout I really want to get this injury
on? Yeah, Most of the time it's no.
Yeah, I would say should be all the time, but sometimes I
sometimes I do things. Anyways, in terms of your
journey, so you fell in love with the barbell.
I did. I was thinking of calling this
episode Saved by the Barbell, but we'll see.
Maybe that episode naming it takes time and, you know,
artistry. But you were saved by the
barbell and then you've kind of grown from there further.
Like, you know, you helped me. Tell me a little bit about what
you you know, how that has experienced, how that has
affected your journey and how you've kind of grown from that.
Well, the, it's been interesting because when I got diagnosed and
when I started CrossFit, I wasn't working as a coach.
Umm, I had a very different career.
I was, I had a desk job in publishing and this whole foray
into coaching and into especially the competitive
element of CrossFit made me realize that while whilst I was
working out and trying to get as many reps in a workout or
whatever to beat the person next to me.
I was watching everyone else in the workout and noticing little
things that they could have been doing better.
So where they could be more efficient or where they, you
know, where they were catching a weight in a certain way that was
going to impact their joints in a negative way.
And I would just see that and it would slow me down.
And over time, I realized I didn't care so much about my
performance anymore. And that was a really gradual
process. And I started volunteering to
judge other people in competitions.
And I don't know, for most of you, you might not know this,
but when you're judging somebody in a competition, you're not
coaching them. You're supposed to just count
their reps and tell them when they're not doing a legitimate
repetition. And I would start coaching them
and telling them what they could be doing better in a in a very
nice way. And I realized that I got so
much enjoyment from that, from helping someone else do better,
and that wasn't a competitive environment.
Competitive environment. He's tired, thanks Suck.
We need to get him a couch one day.
So are you still talking about coaching?
No, but that gave me an in playing into what I might be
good at. So this, the whole experience
that led me into it that at the time I thought was the worst
thing in the world. My diagnosis in fact, led me
into what I now consider to be my major purpose.
And that is helping other people understand the capacity of their
own bodies through not just their physical self, but also
through their mindset. So the way that they approach
their workouts, the way that they, what they say to
themselves, like you're saying, you know, talking to your joint,
I think that's all that is fair because what you are saying to
yourself is really important. If you go into a workout and you
are constantly putting yourself down and people joke when I say
this, but your body hears you. It's all it's like a like a self
fulfilling prophecy. You keep telling yourself your
crap or your body doesn't work or whatever.
It will respond accordingly. So I can't raise my
hypermobility and I wouldn't want to at this point, but
telling myself I'm terrible because I'm hypermobile really
doesn't help me. So it's meeting yourself where
you're at, understanding that focusing on all the things that
you don't like or you'd rather have isn't going to be useful,
and then focusing on the things that you can control and can do
which really matters. No, absolutely.
I've always found to someone who you know, has no new and a
coaching capacity that you have really helped me just like see
what am I bringing to the table today and just being OK with
that. I think there's this, I think
for people who are hypermobile, often there's this idea of
feeling like you're too weak or too sensitive.
And again, some of it, yes, is self-inflicted, but it's also
inflicted sometimes by maybe coaches or personal trainers or
people who are in that environment, like you said,
maybe even early on with people who don't understand what you're
going through. And it makes you so small.
And for me, I have to say, when it came to being exposed to
crossing, and to be clear, I'm not telling everyone to do
CrossFit. There are different ways to
train. I call it Alex Fit because I
just do what makes me happy at this point.
Yeah. But I was able to find little
things and little movements that gave me this huge feeling of
success. Like, I was like, Oh my gosh, I
just did my first front squat or something new when it comes to
novelty, because I know you work with people in, in different age
demographics. So I, I do, you know, you have
seen patients of mine in their 30s or 20s or whatever, but I
know you also work with patients, especially those kind
of 60 + 75 plus maybe 90 plus. You're doing all those ages.
How important to you is novelty and that idea of kind of
constantly learning and I, I call it playing with movement.
I'm never not reading something about movement.
I my husband jokes that like I have more books than I have time
to read. Everyone of those, Dave and I
have a rule he cannot buy a new book till he's a red one and.
Yeah, that rule wouldn't wouldn't work in in my house.
But I just, I mean, I also used to work in publishing.
So I value the written, the written word.
I'm not a Kindle person. I have to have the physical
thing in my hand. I'm also a fan of a highlighter.
And I'm sorry to those people who don't like the idea of
highlighting things in books, but I'm, you know, when I'm
keeping a book, I'm not gonna, you know, it's my book.
For you right now, it's gonna. Yeah.
I do too. I feel like, you know the people
who I don't know ancient Egypt, who would write stuff like on
the pace of little little notes and stuff we see in archaeology.
Someone might see one of your books one day and be touched by
the notes you've read in there. It creates a memento of the
person you were at the moment in time, and you're at it.
I think it's beautiful, adding art to art.
Yeah, absolutely. And also like you, I'll read
something and it'll link to something else and, but it's not
in that book that it links to that that other thing.
So I'll make a little note on the side that it links to XY and
Z or whatever. And that's helpful for me
because ultimately it it's good to connect the dots.
There's a lot of practitioners in various different disciplines
who think their way is the only way.
And ultimately that cannot be the case because our bodies are
not all the same. So things that one person can be
really good at, I can't be really good at just because of
my Physiology and just because I'm built differently.
And that's perfectly fine. So there, that can't just be 1
correct way to move. So I think it's really valuable
to continue learning and learning from different
disciplines. My husband is a Brazilian Jiu
Jitsu black belt. So you know, movement has been a
huge part of his life as well in a training capacity and he
teaches a little bit as well. So it's we're always nerding out
over different movement, movement disciplines and
patterns and how they kind of intersect as well.
And it's just, it's so fascinating and interesting.
One of my clients, she's in her late 70s, said to me the other
day, I know I say I hate it when we make, when you make me go
down to the floor and get back up.
But the other day I dropped something under the sideboard
and I needed to get to the floor and get it out from under the
sideboard. And I live by myself, so I have
to be able to do this by myself. I cannot rely on somebody else
to come over and help me get whatever fell under the
sideboard, you know. And we when we can do certain
things, we don't think about those things.
But when I was at the height of my pain party, there are.
So there were so many basic things I struggled with.
Just getting off the floor I was was really painful because my
joints were were inflamed and everything was aching and even
just getting out of bed was really hard.
So I have a huge appreciation for anyone who finds themselves
in a quote UN quote deconditioned state because
maybe they never went to the gym ever.
Or or maybe they used to go to the gym, but then, you know,
work or family life or whatever took over and all of a sudden
they're finding themselves stuck in different positions or really
struggling. And you, you kind of chuckled a
little bit when you said 90 plus.
But genuinely, I have coached people in their 90s who fell and
couldn't get up again. And if you are 90 something and
you live by yourself and you fall and nobody's coming over,
you might. And I'm not being harsh here.
You might die there. It's true.
You know, and unfortunately there's way too many cases of
that. So it's a simple case of making
sure that I help as many people restore movement, whether it's
because they haven't moved for a while or they've never really
thought about movement until it was gone, or because they've
discovered they're hypermobile and they can't do certain things
anymore because it causes too much pain.
Like for me, it's. Yeah.
Have you ever just in, in your experience working with clients,
have you ever found someone where you felt like, oh, it's
too late for them to start or they're too down?
Yeah, no, People think they're like 9095 out of 80, whatever.
It's the musculoskeletal system. People think it shuts off.
Like when you turn 30, there's this whole idea that like, oh,
everything's done now. It's like, are you kidding me?
It's it's like saying the, I don't know, the sun stop shining
or whatever. It's just they are cells and
they respond to certain stimuli. Yes, it becomes harder as we age
or harder as we have certain health conditions, but they
don't tend to become like wholly unresponsive.
I think it's this big misconception, something that I
think you're a bit of a specialist in, if I could say
so, is helping people find a place to start because I think
that's the single most important thing.
And I think a lot of people listening to this will have have
concerns about, you know, like, what can I do or can't I do if
I'm hyper mobile? And again, that comes down
ultimately to your medical doctor and the advice they've
given you. But I do think there's a bit of
a problem sometimes because sometimes people in certain
healthcare professions, my own included, they don't appreciate
how many different ways there are to move.
And like I have referred patients, do you know where
they're starting from a very low level and they've been nervous,
literally nervous to come to just even to walk into a gym
space. And and I find that just knowing
that there's someone who. Will.
Get like, I tell them like, you know, Karima will get you.
Yeah, like she she will get you. And you know what I tell them
to? I say, like, you can tell her
whatever you want and she's fine with it.
And then I tell them one other thing, which is I have shown up
to Karima's classes. You know what I'm going to say?
I have shown up and Karim's like, Alex, how are you doing
today? I'm just like bad, you'll just
tell me that's OK babe. Can you help me figure it out
and go from there? Is there any like advice you
have to people where they feel like they just don't know how to
start or they're nervous about taking that that first step?
Well, the first thing I'll say is just talk to the person
you're working with. I think way too many people
think that there's some kind of hierarchy here.
Just because I'm a coach means I'm somehow above you somehow.
But at the end of the day, the way I work with people is that
we are a team and we're going to figure this out together.
And whenever people ask me what I do for a living, you know, I,
yeah, sure, I'll say like, I'm a longevity coach and a CrossFit
coach, but ultimately I am. I create a safe space for people
so that they can come in and feel safe to tell me when
something hurts, tell me when they're not comfortable with
something, tell me that they're scared to start again because
the last time they started, they ended up in a bad place.
So we, I have a every single person I start with, they come
in initially for a movement assessment, but the movement
assessment is so much more than that.
It gives them an idea of who I am as well.
Yeah. And there is such a thing as
compatibility. Like I have had an instance or
two where I knew that somebody would be more compatible with
someone else where I just knew I wasn't the right fit for them.
It's like speaking the same language, but one person speaks
with a really thick accent and you kind of you can't quite
understand each other properly. That's such a good description
of it. I get it sometimes with
patients. I'm not the perfect person for
everybody. Nobody is.
And in that instance, I have referred people to someone where
I'm like, I know exactly who you need to work with and I've
referred them. And the, the instances where
that has happened, it's been correct.
And so I don't, I also think it's important to acknowledge
that that first, like I don't, I don't sell anyone a package.
I don't, I don't go, you have to come in for 10 sessions.
I just get them to come in once and meet me and talk to me.
And through that movement assessment, I get an
understanding of what it is that they've been struggling with and
they get an idea of who I am and how I work Because, and quite a
few of my clients will will be able to tell you this.
We'll do something like like a movement or a little breath work
exercise or whatever. And then I go, OK, let that
download, let your body tell you how it has received that thing.
And they're like what you're talking about.
OK, how do you feel now? Like a bit light headed?
I'm like, OK, let's breathe. So it's it's getting them to
understand that they are their own best expert because no
matter how long I trained somebody for, I will never be
able to hear that inner voice. And when people start working
with me initially, sometimes they haven't paid attention to
that voice in years. They don't even realize it's
still there. So it's about, it's just about
create, helping them create that awareness and then teaching them
how to move and still pay attention at the same time, then
allowing something to to sort of, I like the word download.
I don't know why. It makes sense to me.
Yeah. Like feeling things is hard to,
I'm going to say. And I find it's just an
observation I'm going to make based off my patients.
Maybe it'll resonate with you or not.
I find there are two types of patients I see.
The 1st I'm going to talk about. They're the ones who like, feel
everything. They have a very good, they have
a natural skill when it comes to listening to their bodies.
I would describe you as that way.
You're very, very sensitive to. I, I think what you, you know,
experience around you, I'm sure you experience within yourself.
There's the other group, which definitely is me.
I've had to go on a big growing a big dirty to get to Maria Bull
in a China shop like Labrador puppy.
Just carrying on with things have pushed down those thoughts
and feelings so much because they they just like just are
ball of whatever they are, you know.
And it's really hard to find that type of balanced listening,
which is I think where growth comes from.
So I compare it to parenting. Not that I know anything about
parenting, but I do have two cats.
And it's really easy to be a kind of helicopter parent to
your body where you're almost doing that anxiety listening.
And it's also easy to be neglectful.
Yeah. And it's really hard to be in
the middle. Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, I, I sometimes the hyper vigilance serves me, but
sometimes doesn't as well because I'm like is that am I
feeling? Is it or is it?
I don't know. But like a recent case about 6-7
months ago, I could just tell something was off and I, but I
couldn't tell what it was because it was a new experience
And I just kept, I just kept going.
It's, it's, it's next to my ear. I can, there's no pain, but
something's there. And I'm like, is this my
imagination? Am I actually feeling something?
And am I thinking about it so much that made myself feel
something because that's another thing.
So it was like, is this like, am I being like hypervigilant?
Is this or is this a thing? But it didn't go away.
And I'm like, OK, well, what can I do?
So I ended up making an appointment with an ENT and she
did a test and she was like, well, I don't know how you've
been functioning. And I'm like, what are you
talking about? She was like, your vestibular
nerve is so inflamed that I'm surprised you can walk in a
straight line. Oh my.
Gosh. And I'm like, and it's the one
on the right. And I kept going.
I something is happening here, but I'd been to the GP and she
looked in my ear and she was like, I mean, we can't really
see an inner ear infection and it doesn't really look like
there is. And it wasn't really until I
went to a private ENT and she confirmed she was like, it is
really bad. And I'm like, OK, so there is a
bit of wrestling with that every now and again.
But then if the feeling doesn't pass, getting a, getting a
professional medical opinion is the next step.
Absolutely. And at least for me, and I think
it should be versus the other side, if you're more on the
hypochondriac spectrum and you're like running to the GP
for every single teeny tiny thing, obviously that can be an
issue as well. But I think it's just about
learning to trust yourself. And in that instance, I'm glad I
did because otherwise I wouldn't have been able to deal with it.
And yeah, it just makes you feel a bit crazy otherwise.
It's really hard. Like you talked about being that
person, that special percentage of a percentage who has every
single side effect from medication.
And the reality is that is a lot of my patients, I have been that
like one in two million person. Yeah.
And it's so hard because like there's almost an in a way good
reason to get medical, you know, the last thing to do.
If in doubt, please get a medical opinion, OK.
If you're worried, if I think please do that, yeah.
But it can help sometimes to be able to take a breath or to have
a healthcare professional you can talk with about that.
So sometimes my patients will come to me, we'll talk about
things, and I'll say, look, give it two days or give it one day
because I can kind of give that type of perspective on certain
issues within the scope of my professional capacity.
But it's really hard to have to kind of triage your own
feelings. Yeah.
When you get weird feelings sometimes, like I am, I
sometimes get peripheral nerve issues, like small fiber.
Neuropathy is a technical term for it.
But I'll feel like I've poured acid on my arm.
So I was in my early 20s. Like, why do I have a patch of
skin that's burning? This makes no sense.
There's nothing there. You know, I'm looking at it
thinking I'm losing my mind. And I was, you know, I'd be very
careful with what chemicals I used in the house and
everything. And it would just go away as
soon as it came. It would be there for a day and
then go away. And I'll never forget.
There was one time I was walking with my mom before she passed
away in a mall. And it was one of the last times
I ever got to go shopping with her.
But there was this, it felt like this burning patch of skin on my
thigh. And I would go to the loo, you
know, the bathroom toilet and be looking for something on my
skin. And there was nothing there.
But it was so bad that I bought a new pair of jeans and had a
borderline meltdown because it just felt like something was
burrowing into my skin. And it was, it was nothing.
Yeah. So it's it wasn't nothing.
It was the way. It wasn't.
It's not nothing. See, that's an example where
like this is hard and I still have ongoing and.
No, like you, you, we've become a bit dismissive.
I think as well. We're like, oh, well, that I did
go to a health professional and they said it was nothing.
And I'm like, OK, I'm a huge fan of getting a second opinion as
well. Yeah, we're third.
I was third ABS No absolutely because like the even with my
diagnosis, even though he gave me the fact as they were, he
also I I realize now and I realized then low level, but I
am it's much clearer now that he gave me all the preconception he
had about the condition. So like all the things that
could potentially happen, all the worst case scenarios, he put
them on the table. And it wasn't really until I
got, I went to see a different endocrinologist and I showed him
my paperwork and stuff. And then I started talking about
what that first doctor told me that would happen to me.
And he's like, no, no, no, no, no, no that that is like in some
rare cases this could happen. But I made that part of the
diagnosis and part of the truth. Whereas essentially the guy's
bedside manner just wasn't sensitive to my to the fact that
this was quite stressful for me and he just put all the worst
case scenarios on the table and made them my new truth.
And it wasn't really until I went and saw somebody else who
was like, no, no, no, no, that's a, that's a worst case scenario.
And that doesn't happen to most people.
Yes, sure it can happen, but you're already managing your
situation really well so it's unlikely to happen.
Yeah, I have to say I find healthcare weird in the sense
that we have an expert on one side of the table, the
healthcare provider, the medical doctor, whatever we have the
patient on the other. And you know, Dave is a lawyer.
So I've gone and had some exposure to the legal industry
and how it works spit through that.
And like if I was dealing with a legal issue, I would never not
have representation from an expert to communicate with the
other, you know, person about the issue.
But in healthcare settings, we have one expert, one non expert,
and we're relying on the expert to say things in a way which is,
you know, clear and correct and you know which the patient
understands. And so many things like your
experience happen because of that power imbalance, I I think.
Yeah, I mean, my, my, my younger sister is at Med school and she
does various internships and she's starting to notice that
she's also very sensitive and very empathetic to people.
And she's noticing where health care providers aren't noting the
patient's emotional state of mind before giving them a quote
UN quote bit of bad news or a diagnosis that that may be a
little bit of a struggle. And she was saying she's like,
well, how, how am I going to deal with this?
And I'm like, you are noticing it.
That's amazing. And you're going to be a doctor.
So you could, you will be that Doctor Who will have that level
of empathy. And she hasn't had like loads of
experience, as I make it sound really terrible.
But she has had one or two experiences where she's just
noticed that they just delivered the news without first kind of
sort of sensing the, you know, the, the patient's state of
mind. I mean, it was in one case, she
said they didn't ask the patient to sit down first before they
told them that there was a bad diagnosis.
So it's just little things like that where you're like, if
you're going to get a get some bad news, which I mean, you
might faint, who knows, you know, these things happen.
But if you're sat down, that's just a better space to be if
you're going to be given that kind of information.
And I think I get it as well because my dad was a surgeon.
You're, you are talking, you're going through so many people on
a daily, weekly and monthly basis.
And it can be such a tough job that you do have to
compartmentalize some of your own feelings very often.
But I think This is why when you're saying getting a third
opinion as well, you know, it's just like just finding the right
health professional for you that can give you the, the, the care
that you need is important. No, absolutely your your story
where you tried the CrossFit classes didn't have that good
experience. Then I can't remember why you
tried again or how you actually why did you go back and try.
Again, I just had a feeling. I just had a feeling because the
first time I tried, it was like an intro session with somebody
and he was just, I don't know, terrible bedside manner.
And it, he made me feel very uncomfortable.
And I just felt really off about the whole thing.
And then I within the 18 months, I kind of thought about it more
and more and I thought it's a him thing, not a CrossFit thing.
So it was just like, he just made me feel really
uncomfortable. It wasn't that CrossFit made me
feel really uncomfortable, which is why I sought at a different
gym and then and obviously different people and different
coaches. And I was really, really
fortunate. But yeah, it's it's, I just knew
that I wanted to try again. Had some reflection.
I don't really tease that out. No, I am.
I have told the story before. When I was 17 I saw a
physiotherapist and they told me I'd have to live with wrist pain
that I'd had since I was 11. For the rest of my life, I was
sleeping in a brace at night. So I fractured my wrist and then
had pain and they were just like, here's your brace, get
out, live your life. Then they just left me to deal
with arthritis from the tender age of 11.
And I saw a physiotherapist, did nothing, ended up seeing another
healthcare provider. The person happened to be an
osteopath, but they did improve my symptoms and it was only
through pure like serendipity, just by chance because I had
been so let down and I I'd done the thing.
I had done the patient thing you're supposed to do when you
have muscle and joint pain, which is I saw the appropriate
healthcare professional and then it didn't go well and I was just
like, this is stupid. I'd rather just be in pain and
spend my money on like chocolate or shoes or anything.
Chocolate or. Shoes, any?
Yeah, you know what to get me for Christmas.
But for me, you know, as a person who's God had some years
now and some life like when we redid our kitchen recently and
we got like 5 opinions before doing the kitchen.
And for me, I love my body more than I love my kitchen.
So I think that for me is just really highlighted the kind of
lack of sense, I guess you would say, towards how people treat
their health, which is often people will do what I did, just
get one opinion and understandably give us gospel.
Yeah, versus like, oh, you're looking for a kitchen or you're
looking for an accountant. Did you get 3 opinions?
Did you get 5 opinions? Like we need to normalize
getting more opinions about healthcare.
And I know it's hard. I know in public healthcare
systems it's not possible. And I get that always, but it's
something that I hope people can just take away from this because
you wouldn't be here as well as you are today if I can say that,
if you didn't go back. No, I mean, I always think maybe
I would have found it a different way, but ultimately we
we will never know because it's we can't.
But the journey has definitely been the thing that may like
caused all the positive changes in the end.
Like I would not wish for a different body.
I would not wish not to be hyper mobile.
I would not wish not to have had the diagnosis because it taught
me so much not just about myself and my body, but also how other
people might feel within themselves.
And when they when somebody comes to me and says I'm in a
lot of pain, I am there. I get it like, and that is why
I'm so passionate about what I do as well, because I'm not
coming at this from a Oh yeah, I can kind of imagine it's a I've
been there. Yeah, I've, I've absolutely been
there. And you know, I when I'm being a
bit stupid and I'm not paying attention to to my stress levels
or I just load myself with too many things or I'm not paying
attention to the voice. Oh no, I.
Find I find myself in a bad place and I think no, no, we do
not want to be here. But I think context is
important. So it is.
It is with the. I suppose it's the same thing as
when you think about what you needed when you're a child,
finding ways to give yourself a thing that you didn't get as a
child. It's the same sort of thing
where when people come to me, I'm like, what is it that I
didn't get from the people that I sought out for help that I can
now give people that are in a similar position or that are
also in a state of discomfort and pain?
How can I create the thing that I need it?
And I think therein lies the unique position in having gone
through these awful experiences, quote UN quote awful, because
ultimately they led me to changing careers and, you know,
going in a very different direction and just working with
so many wonderful people like you and you know, all my
clients. And it's just, you know, when
you, when you, when I talk to somebody who says I was finally
able to pick up my, my granddaughter, there was no way
I could have done that before. I mean, that's just, you know,
it's just like. Do you cry happy too?
Sometimes. I'm gonna be honest.
I'm O2 in my clinic office. Every day one person is crying.
Sometimes it's me. Sometimes it's a patient being
sad. Sometimes it's a patient being
happy. Yeah, To be clear, they're
usually not sad with me. They're sad about when.
They've come here before. But no, that like the happy
tears feeling of like you've helped someone do something
which is just so integral to their like existence.
You know what what matters most to them, what's nearest and
dearest to them. I have to say as well, because
you talked about kind of being in that space and getting what
it's like to be at the bottom. I think, you know, there are a
lot of people in this field who are hyper mobile and who maybe
get it from their perspective. But I think what makes a true
expert, and I would call you that, I think you're amazing.
But it's your ability to to get where people are at, but also
allow them to have their own experience without imposing your
experience on them. Have I said that clearly?
Yeah, because it's a hard skill to do because I'm tempted.
When I see patients sometimes I'm like, I'm like, they should
be feeling this in a way. Like I'll almost have that
little voice where I'm expecting something to happen and they
tell me something completely different.
To this day, I'm still surprised by what I see in clinic.
And I'm just like, Alex, We shall not impose our experience
on others. We must receive what they are
bringing to the. Table.
Well my I asked so many questions in my sessions.
How did this feel? Did it feel like this?
No, OK, how did it feel? I'm constantly asking how
people, what people are feeling and they're like, look at me.
I'm like, yes, I'm OK. And I'm like, OK, listen, this
isn't for you. This is for me.
So I can under so I don't make assumptions about what you may
be feeling based on my experience when I learned how to
do this movement or when I learned how to, you know,
understand how important breathing is in, in movement and
that kind of thing. So it's it's, I don't want to
assume to know how you are feeling.
And I come back to this every single time.
It doesn't matter how long I train you.
You are the one who will send something before I can tell.
You know, it's like you're moving and it looks perfect to
me. And then you go, oh, yeah, my
knee really hurt doing that. And I'm like, yeah, why didn't
you stop or tell me? And that I, oh, I just pushed
through it. I'm like, OK, cool.
Let's talk about this. So it's, you know, it's so I
completely agree and understand what you're saying.
I don't want to put my lens on their experience because they
may be similar. But at the end of the day, as I
was saying, we're, we're all different and unique and we have
things that we have in common that we share, but we are still
our own individual, you know, living.
Breathing bodies. Absolutely.
No. The question, I was gonna
mention that at some point, but you ask so many questions and
initially it did bother me because I'm like, Karima, just
tell me what to do. I do not want to have to think.
I do not have to have to answer your questions, but I have to
say it helps. It is the I always grow.
I'm. I'm still growing.
I'm still learning. Karima, you've told me that
you're doing a Move Along with Me program for 75 to +5 plus.
Can people do it if they're under 75?
Oh, yeah. Sweet.
Because I tell I have a lot of patients in their 20s and 30s
and some of them have different health issues and don't know
where to start. And a lot of times the best
fitness stuff out there is the stuff that's targeted, you know,
60 plus. Focus on listening to your body.
Yeah. Well, my programs are generally
called armored. So you armor yourself for life.
My, my main program is called Armored for aging.
And that can be for anybody. I mean, it doesn't have, you
don't have to be 65. I won't show you the door.
And I initially started it as a just an online program.
And then I realized, actually, I don't want to be removed from
people, but I can't be coaching everybody who wants to to coach,
especially since a lot of my clients don't live in the same
country. So I do work with people online
and they, a lot of people who've worked with me for a while, they
do a program for them and we check in once a week and I make
sure that they get what they need.
But I have noticed in some of my clients who used to do Zoom
sessions with me in lockdown, because of the time difference,
is that there's just no way that we can zoom all the time or at a
time that is appropriate for them and for me because it might
be in the middle of the night for me.
So I'm launching a follow along program.
So it's videos of me doing the workout and you're just
following along and you can pause it if you need to.
And we're just in the creation process at the moment.
But you it's, it's minimal clickage as well.
You click on the link, you answer 4 questions about pain
and energy levels, and then you get guided to the appropriate
selection of videos so that, for example, sitting and standing.
Do you feel like you can sit and stand without assistance today?
No. OK, then you're guided to an
assisted video so that it has sitting and standing in it, but
I'm using something to support myself and I'm showing you how
to support yourself. And I talk about breathing and
it is completely guided by me so that you feel like I'm there
with you. I love that and I love how picks
up on the dynamic aspect too, because a lot of people who are
hyper mobile and you see me be this way, I'll come to the gym,
be able to do lots of sporty things and be pretty fed.
And then another day I will come in and say Creamer, I'm not
feeling it today. And so that dynamic aspect, even
though again, I know you're doing that for people in that
specific age demographic, it's so applicable to being hyper
mobile because people will have almost like chaotic bodies where
you don't know what you're going to get on a given day and it can
be hard to predict. Yeah.
So I love that. I've got to ask one more
question, then we'll wrap up because I know we've kept you
here and I know you're busy, but do you coach in different
languages? Because I feel like you speak 5
languages for some reason. I've.
I speak three. OK, it's two more of them. 2
Fluently. 1 I'm a little bit broken because I am Syrian so I
do speak Arabic. I just don't speak Arabic often
enough that it's still fluent. So it can be a little bit broken
by but yeah, I do speak Arabic, but even my dad used to speak to
us in German. So it's like this is not
helpful, but yeah, I could, I, I do coach in German a little bit
as well. And like I coach my mother and
she, she speaks Spanish, English and I speak to her in German.
So it's, it's, and I have a couple of clients I coach in
German as well. So it's, it's just weird when
I'm like looking for the word in German that I have never had to
use because I left Germany when I was 10.
And, and then I'm like fishing for the, the, the movement
pattern word in German. And I'm like, I just can't say
it in English because I don't know what it is.
Oh man, that's too funny. No, I love that.
Thank you so much for your time, Karima today.
I really, really appreciate it. And it's just been so healing in
a sense, you know, to be able to just connect on all these things
that we've kind of gone through together and in our own ways.
And you know, I'm so grateful that you are here and I know
thank you so much. And I know my my patients who
I've referred to are happy and grateful as well.
And I have to say that continuity of care, last thing
I'm going to touch on continuity of care is critical.
The fact that I they can refer to someone who can talk to me
and the patient, you mentioned teamwork earlier.
It is, I think, the single most important thing in making a
treatment plan or strategy work, so I will.
Always say to my clients, if you're being seen by a physio or
an osteo or any other kind of health professional, give them
my details. Ultimately, we are your team to
make sure that you can do the things that you want to do.
It's all well and good if they they go and have a good
experience with them at you or and then have a good experience
with me. But there's if there's something
that you notice about somebody that I need to know, but the
patient might not know to share, then and then I won't know.
So I have had contact with lots of other health professionals
where it's like, Oh yeah, I saw so and so and and they really
need to pay attention not to do this because also sometimes they
don't want to tell me because they just want to do the
workout. They just want to get on.
And and I get that, but ultimately that's the thing to
make sure that they can still do the thing in two years time and
five years time, in 10 years time because the average 30
something doesn't think about their 65 year old self, but I
do. We're 50 years time, you know.
Listen, I just, I just pulled that number out of the air so.
You know, and, and good personal trainers, good coaches, good
osteos, physios, chiropractors, whatever, healthcare providers
of various kinds, they will make the time to connect to people.
I am deeply invested in my patients outcomes.
You're deeply invested in your clients outcomes.
They will connect because patients are always surprised
that I do this. And they're like, oh, you know,
like, are you OK with this? Do you have time?
And I'm like, yes, because I care deeply about your clinical
home. So again, it's always wonderful
to be able to work with you in that way.
My love, Kareema, last question. If you could turn back time or,
you know, teleport to the past and tell yourself something when
you were at your lowest, what would you want yourself to know?
Just trust yourself because like, I knew there was a way
out. I just couldn't see it, but I
could. Like I knew it wasn't like that
wasn't the end, you know, the, the pain bubble wasn't where it
was going to end because I'd read lots of very, I mean, I
read a lot, but I'd read about, you know, when people experience
a quote, UN quote rupture in their life, oftentimes that is
going. That is one of the most
significant periods of gross. And at the time.
And if anybody, even myself from the future had said that to me,
I would have thrown them out the window.
But it's true. It it often is.
So just I wouldn't say anything more than just just trust
yourself. It's it's going to be OK.
So yeah. No, I love that.
I feel like you'd say trust yourself and maybe give yourself
a hug. Yeah, be kind to yourself for
sure. Karima, thank you again for your
time today. I hope to be able to have you
back in future and I'm sure I'll see you sometime soon.
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much.