Menopause Rise and Thrive | Helping Women Navigate Midlife and Menopause

123. Awareness, Acceptance, Action: The Midlife Shift You’ve Been Waiting For

• Dr. Sara Poldmae | Healer, Doctor of Acupuncture and Chinese medicine, and Functional Medicine Practitioner

Share episode

Feeling Stuck? Here’s How to Get Moving Again—No Matter Where You Are in Life. Do you ever find yourself saying, “It’s not that bad…”—even when you know deep down something needs to change? Whether it’s your health, your relationships, or the way you’re showing up in your own life, feeling stuck is something we all go through—especially in midlife.

In this powerful and deeply honest episode, I’m joined by Yvette Salva—personal trainer, life coach, and survivor—who shares her inspiring journey from addiction and homelessness to health, recovery, and service. Together, we unpack the emotional roadblocks that keep us from making change, and the three simple (but not always easy) steps to finally get unstuck and move forward.

Yvette’s story is raw, real, and ridiculously empowering—and her wisdom is exactly what you need if you’re feeling overwhelmed, discouraged, or unsure of your next step.

 Yvette Salva is an entrepreneur, keynote speaker, and founder of a private training studio helping women over 40 feel strong and confident. She focuses on mindset, nutrition, and fitness to show that midlife is not a crisis but a new season. Her message is simple: the best is yet to come.

In this episode:

  • Yvette’s candid journey from addiction to long-term sobriety and healing
  • Why the gut whisper never lies—and how to start trusting yours again
  • The 3 essential steps to getting unstuck: Awareness, Acceptance, and Action
  • How “It’s not that bad” thinking can quietly sabotage your goals
  • The power of support, structure, and accountability in midlife transformation
  • Why paying attention often starts with paying for commitment
  • What it really takes to build a life you love—even after hitting rock bottom

 

Resources Mentioned:

Website: https://yvettesalvafitness.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yvettesalvafitness 

 

Connect with me, Dr. Sara Poldmae:

Website: https://risingwomanproject.com

Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/drsarapoldmae

Have a question I can answer? Send me a message! I love to hear from my listeners!

sara poldmae:

Sarah, welcome to menopause. Rise and thrive. I am Dr. Sarah pulled me and this podcast is your go to guide for navigating perimenopause and menopause. If you are feeling a little overwhelmed, trust me, you are in great company. Each week, I'll bring you expert advice, raw, honest conversations and simple tips to help you stay grounded and maybe even find some humor in the process. Let's rise, thrive and tackle this wild ride together. Hello, ladies. I am back today. Super excited. My guest, Yvette salva is a personal trainer. She specifically helps women over 40 to get fit through nutrition, mindset and fitness. She does all the things. She's also a life coach, and she's here to share three steps to get unstuck. Yvette, welcome to the show. I can't wait to learn from you. Oh, my God, I'm so excited to be here, and hopefully we can give the audience some good takeaways. You know? Yeah, absolutely, it'll be great. So tell us a little bit about yourself before we get into the three steps to getting unstuck. What is your story? Well, my story is a hot mess. Express, and I've done a lot of research and development, not like your kind, but the kind where you hit your head against the wall so many times that, uh, that you the pain is a great motivator for change. Yes, absolutely, that's what I know. So I am 56 years old. I moved to America when I was, like, going into seventh grade, and I was in culture shock, like I did not even understand America at all. And I thought like I was the odd man, odd woman out in high school and middle school. I never felt like I fit in, like I wanted to look like you. I thought if I, if I was Heather Locklear, that was the winning lottery ticket. And, you know, and I don't look like that. I don't think I look like Heather Locklear, but thank you.

Yvette Salva:

So I don't know, so I, I I really couldn't. I was like the, you know, the square in the circle thing, and I didn't fit in. And so I turned to food, drugs, alcohol to escape, to numb myself. That was like my buffering, like loading the computer like I never wanted to feel because I didn't like who I was. And so I wrote a book booze blow and pancakes, talking about my addictions, from, you know, cocaine to drinking. And people are like, the pancakes. I'm like, Yeah, I was bulimic for 37 years. Wow. And so here I am in my shiny bra top with a six pack, Miss hypocrite, you know, throwing up. So I, you know, I started to change my life, and that's when I came up with writing my keynote. Because we all get stuck in these situations, and we're like, how can I get unstuck? And you know, you can change in an instant, or it may take 37 years, like it took for me with bulimia, but my the only backup plan you need is to get back up. So I never quit trying, and now I'm sober 22 years. I'm free from cocaine for 30 years, and I'm free from bulimia for eight years. Congratulations. Yeah, thank you. That's huge. So what are your three steps? Tell us. Tell us what we need to know about how to get unstuck. So the first step is awareness. And I think I don't know, like, I asked my son, my son's 11. I said, Steven, what does awareness mean to you? Because I like, I have to dumb it down. And he's like, Yeah, I'm aware that the couch is right there, mom. I'm like, Hmm. I'm like, what about if you lifted up the couch? Do you think there's something underneath there. He's like, Yeah, probably, but I don't want to do that. I'm like, exactly that is awareness. It's like, you know what you know, but you might not be ready to face it. And I think that a lot like, I've been in a marriage for 20 years, and I knew way before I got divorced. I was aware for a lot of years, but I just was, wasn't willing to have the card conversation and and look at it and accept it and take action.

sara poldmae:

Yeah, yeah. 100% so what is the next step?

Yvette Salva:

The next well, I'm gonna ask you a question. Did you ever have that gut whisper, and was it ever wrong?

sara poldmae:

Oh, my God, a million times.

Yvette Salva:

And aren't you? Like, man, it never lies. It's like, even the energy you feel somebody or it's just it never lies.

sara poldmae:

No, it really never is. It's amazing, like, if we could all learn to trust our gut. In fact, I'll tell a quick story that I don't want to take away from you too far into this episode. But today I was driving along, and I cannot remember what prompted me to start having this thought. But I said to myself, I wonder if I just listened to my gut all day long, for like three days, what would happen? Because something had happened, and I cannot remember. What it was. It was while I was driving, and I remember that my first initial thought was, No, I don't want that. But so often we say to ourselves, no, I don't want that. And then our next thought is to convince ourselves of why we should want that. And I just had that thought in my head, like I wonder if I go by my first gut reaction for like, three days straight. What would that feel like? Would it be dangerous? Would it be authentic? Like? What would that mean? And that's the whole story. I don't even know what that story means right now. It's just so interesting that you said that, and I do believe in synchronicity, that I'm having you on the show today. Of all days when I had that experience. So I'm going to leave that there for the listeners, because maybe somebody will choose to do that experiment. Maybe I will choose to do that today and tomorrow, and maybe through the weekend, but so often, and I don't know if this is the male experience, I can only speak to it as a female, and knowing that a lot of my friends do this so often, we try and convince ourselves out of whatever gut feelings we have, yeah, only to share a month down the road, or only to find out a month down the road, we should have listened

Yvette Salva:

so powerful. And for me, my awareness like I was like a stripper at the time. I was in the fitness world, so I was in both and one day I woke up and I was getting ready for work, and I was putting my lashes on, and I just looked at myself in the mirror, and there was blood coming down my nose, and I had burned a hole through my nose. Let me tell you, girl, when I looked in the mirror, I said, Ah, I gotta change sometime, and I die.

sara poldmae:

And did you change that day? Or did it take you a while after that?

Yvette Salva:

I never did cocaine again because I'm so vain that, but then my drinking took off. That's why I say it can happen in an instant like that was enough pain to change me the moment. I could do that in my nose. But, yeah, other things years, you know, right? Other unhealthy, healthy coping mechanisms took place, yeah, yeah. And so the second one is acceptance, and acceptance, I don't know. Like, I was like, always, I don't know if this is you, but I was always the personal development person, Tony Robbins the tapes. Like, I was always at Barnes and Nobles, like, I'm gonna find the answer. And I went to a Tony Robbins thing, and his sentence stuck with me. You cannot change what you do not acknowledge.

sara poldmae:

Yeah, that is so, so profound. Because I think so many times we think we accept things, but we don't, you know, because we don't even we, we push them away. There's so much resistance. So you it is true, you cannot change what you don't acknowledge. If you're not willing to look at yourself, then it's really hard to make any changes, because you're not accepting where you are in the current moment.

Yvette Salva:

And I think with awareness and acceptance, we stay in these stages. Like it might sound like, this might have to change. This definitely has to change. And then the third one, it's not that bad, it's not that bad, will be the killer of all your dreams. And I say right here, the miserable land of maybe, maybe I'll have that conversation. Maybe I'll go to the doctor, maybe I'll talk to that like all of that keeps us stuck. It might sound like it's not that bad, or just have one or start on Monday, but we can accept things, but we're truly not ready to press play. And that's why I say Shift key. Because if you look at the shift key, you look at the app, lowercase f, and I'm like, that's like, fear, frustration, right? Like all of it. And then if you press the shift key and the F, it becomes loud and proud and becomes faith and focus. But you can't change the F unless you press the shift, you know, like we unless you actually press the shift in the F, you will not change that lowercase, Meek f into loud and proud. And I think that's we stay stuck in that maybe, yeah, yeah. That is so true, because you're not looking honestly at things and taking action is, I call it doing shit you don't want to do, like that is the program that 100% guarantees results. When I even with my fitness, with my nutrition, I tell people you're going to have to do things you don't want to do, yeah, and nobody wants to do that, so they'll start, but then it's not that bad.

sara poldmae:

So funny that you say that because I was just having a conversation with my husband a couple weeks ago, and I said, Don't you want to, like, move your body, or, I can't remember what I was just kind of, I was trying not to give him a hard time, but it was perplexing to me that he didn't want to, like, go for a walk or something, and I was just trying to kind of be, you know, picking his brains about things, and he goes, Yeah, but, you know, you exercise for fun. I'm like, sometimes I'm having fun. But I can tell you that when I'm walking into the gym, I'm not always saying this is gonna be fun, yeah. And I can tell you when I'm in the middle of, like, The core class, there is nothing fun about that. You have to do a solid. the hard work now in order to see the results later.

Yvette Salva:

Yeah. I always tell my clients, if you stick to the plan and not your mood, I promise you, you'll get results. Yeah, but we just don't feel like it, or we'll do it tomorrow, or like and then we get inconsistent. But I always say, stick to the plan, not your mood. And with the action step, the action step for me, like, especially with getting sober, was was two things. It was willingness, willingness to do the things I did not want to do, go to recovery, meetings, talk to another person, be accountable. Like, Oh, who wants to do all that? And nobody, nobody. And then desire, willingness and desire, because you have to have the desire to change has to be greater than staying the same. If not, it's not going to work. Yeah, yeah. So yeah. And for me, that action step was, I was homeless. I, you know, I reached the very bottom, and I still was like, it's not that bad. I can take a shower at the gym and go to work, you know, until it was that bad, yeah. And, and when, when I let go of my addictions, I had to let go of people, places and things like every i Everything was that I thought was a good idea. Just, just mix it.

sara poldmae:

So how do you start over from that because I mean homeless addiction, I mean there's not a lot of people that can say they came out from true rock bottom, but I believe that you are one of those people. So how did you come out of that and create such a beautiful life for yourself?

Yvette Salva:

Well, first of all, God put an angel in my life. They say, Don't do any major changes. The first year in sobriety, I got married. I've had a guy got married, but he said he would stop drinking, and we, we were married 20 years together, and he didn't drink with me. And I don't know, but if you don't have support, it's really hard, like, if you still have one foot in, like, going out with friends and drinking and hanging out in bars and one foot in, like, trying to get sober, it's really hard. Like, yeah, I and after three years sober, I drank and I was pregnant and, like, that is the best insurance policy ever, right? But this disease, it does push ups while you sleep, waiting for that moment. And I had gone to a liquor store because we were going to a graduation party. And I said, I never went to a liquor store before. I said, You know what? I'm going to get Patty, a bottle of wine, you know, just for the host, you know, that was the beginning. And then I saw the Solo cups, and I'm like, no one's going to know. And then I drank. And the next day, I told my sponsor, and she says, You have to tell your husband, you have to go back to a meeting you watched the Three years say you're coming back and get back to the basics that you used to do, yeah, because there's a lot of shame in raising your hand in a recovery meeting when you've been sober three years and say, I'm coming. Oh, I'm sure, I'm sure, but I'm sure it happens all the time. I mean, this isn't something, it's a day by day thing, absolutely. And you know what? There's a bit, there's there's studies done that people who go back out with time don't come back because of the shame. And that's not bad, because people who come back give me the message, there's nothing better out there. I will just change my life, you know? And so I just feel like, I think a lot of women, we want to especially midlife, like, there's so many changes, empty nest, aging parents, you know, divorce, grief, you know, how do we, how do we get all into, how do we, how do we get here? You know, big changes. And I just my, my message is that, if there's breath, there's hope, I really should not be here. I should be dead 1000 times over, but God chose to keep me, you know, to make my mess the message so that maybe you can help one person

sara poldmae:

I love that making the mess, the message that is beautiful. Thank you for sharing your story so openly. Yeah, midlife does come with a lot of change, and it is easy to get to real derailed. And you had mentioned earlier in the conversation that if you stick to the plan rather than the mood, you'll succeed. And I'm going to use that line in clinic, because we have a special, specialized clinic. We deal exclusively with women in midlife, and we have a concierge program. And in that concierge program, you know, you're paying out of pocket, and that can be a lot to stomach. There's women out there that are very sick of the Western medical system, dismissing them, not spending time with them. But there's another side to that. So in our concierge clinic, we definitely hold women's hands. We do coaching sessions. We weekly coaching. You're we're available by text and email, and we do this because of exactly what you said, the mood versus the plan, right? So if you're alone in your struggles, in any struggles, whether it's addiction or. Or being in midlife that comes with mood disturbance, hot flash, lack of support, loneliness, all the things that come with being a human can really flare up. During midlife, you can feel very alone, and that's why we decided to offer this program, because it's really hard when you're in a bad mood or feeling vulnerable or feeling sad or angry or what have you to stick to the plan, but long term health, fitness, weight management, all of those things require long term commitment. And if you say, Oh, I'll get back on track, if you go out every weekend and, you know, treat your body in ways that that don't serve your body and then say, Oh, I'll be better, you know, next week, like, that's not going to get you the results you need. So a lot of us need community in order to get support through these changes and through changes. Like, you know, maybe you were in AA or another alcohol support group, that's what breeds success, right? Is standing in community with people getting the support that you need. And we all need that, especially women. I think, I mean, men probably need it as much, but don't always confront that, or don't feel comfortable asking for that. But as a woman like it's so hard to do things alone. It can be so isolating. I know that. You know coming through sobriety must be incredibly difficult, even with community, but could you have done it without?

Yvette Salva:

Never, never right? But like, recovery isn't about getting sober, it's about figuring out what's deep in that hole that has kept you stuck for so long, and right key to staying sober is giving it away. So I want to help the next person, and that's why I'm not anonymous, because if people don't know they, they won't even ask me, like, oh my. Like, I train women right in a safe space, one on one, and they'll be like, my son's on heroin. He's and they because they know my story. So I tell women, like, if you have a story, share it, yeah, because when you share it, that's how you get better, right? It's a crazy thing. Like, how is that possible? But it's like, what you do with the concierge? Like, women need to feel seen and heard, and they feel dismissed, like they don't even matter anymore, like the guy's looking at the iPad sending a prescription, like, I'm over here buddy, like,

sara poldmae:

you know, yeah, and you know, it's so sad, because sometimes I feel, you know, we'll do discovery calls with women, and they really are struggling. They're in pain. I had one yesterday where the woman was 100% an absolute perfect fit for this program. She needed community. She had a lot of complex health concerns going on. She was really struggling. Her work was struggling. She was having hot flashes where she wasn't leaving her house to go out to social engagements because she was embarrassed. I mean, the perfect fit for this program, and sick of the Western medicine dismissing her, but she didn't want to join the program because it was expensive and I felt terrible, but I can tell you that the value that we're bringing to this community is it's so needed. I mean, people, it's just so hard to make change when you're feeling isolated. And so you know, all of the support groups out there are there for a reason, so whatever anybody that's listening to is struggling with, whether it's midlife health concerns that might not be your thing right now, but if you're struggling with something, best thing is to share it and to find a group that's willing to welcome you in to work through those things. Say it out loud, because what you're struggling with someone else is too, and you might actually help someone else forget about helping yourself, right?

Yvette Salva:

Yeah, and I think what you like when I'm training a woman, it's private, and it's like, it's amazing what comes out through training, but it's about a relationship, like women need to be with other women, and they need to feel like they matter. And that's my whole goal. You know, that's what you do on this podcast. That's what I do, because I feel like our purpose is to let other women know that there's hope and there's change. And you know what, that woman who didn't join because she doesn't have the contrast of what, how great she would feel in a year by doing the concierge but, and that's kind of sad, but I always tell people, when you pay you pay attention, yeah, like all the workouts, they're on YouTube, all the stuff you can get, chat, GBT and get every diet you want. But are you going to follow through? Right? Because if you haven't for the last 50 years, it's doubtful you will today.

sara poldmae:

Yeah, yeah, I know that it's and it's funny that you say, if you pay you pay attention, I only do group fitness, and the reason why is because they'll charge me if I don't show up and I don't like so good, right? Like orange theory, you don't show up, pilates, you don't show up. That's a form of accountability, and most people are like, dog got it if you take my 20 bucks? Well, I'm self employed, I'm busy, I'm all over the map. I'm scatterbrained. If I don't have an appointment on my books, or if no one's gonna be on the other end saying, Sarah, why didn't you show up? I'm not showing up because there's a million other things that I could be doing, right? So, yeah, I've always done group fitness because if, if I don't show up, they're gonna charge me 10 or 20 or $30 and I don't, I don't have that kind of money.

Yvette Salva:

I actually taught group fitness for 30 years. That was my jam. But I started getting older, my clients started getting older, and they couldn't do the same things with injuries and stuff, and so that's why I decide. But I'm like, I've had clients for the 20 years, like, it's not the squat, they're coming because they have the point. Yeah, 100%

sara poldmae:

you know, oh my gosh. Well, it's so fun talking to you. It's been so nice getting to know you that tell the audience more about how they can find you, how they can get in touch, and what kind of work you offer.

Yvette Salva:

Though, I am on Instagram. Abby Beth salva fitness, Facebook, you bet salva fitness website, Yvette Saba fitness, my branding is raw, real and ridiculous, like my I'm always about the funny on Instagram, and I just try to make it light hearted. But the services that I offer are personal training, online training, or life coaching.

sara poldmae:

I love that. I love that. Well, we'll share all of your links in the show notes for sure, and hopefully some of the audience will reach out and get in touch. It's been such a pleasure. I love your smile. You made me laugh first thing this morning, when you sent me that email of the chat GPT introduction that I have on Instagram, which described me so well that I'm firm believer that chat GPT is my new best friend. But it's been a pleasure, and I look forward to staying in touch.

Yvette Salva:

Definitely. Thank you so much, and I appreciate everything you do for the women out there.

sara poldmae:

Same girl, take care. Bye. You.

Head Shot

Dr. Sara Poldmae

Host