Come to think of it, he looked an awful lot like Gray’s man, Darius. They could certainly be brothers. Or cousins, maybe. I didn’t have any personal social media accounts, but I could totally use my work account to look him up.
“Before we dig into what approach we’ll use, I just need to confirm a few things,” he said. “You’re thirty-four years old. Laurie logged your work atmosphere as sedentary. You don’t exercise regularly, and you’ve tried at least five different diets in the last three years. How tall are you?”
“Five foot three,” I answered.
He wrote that down. “Are you on any medication?”
“No.”
“Any heart disease in the family? Diabetes? Any joint issues?”
I shook my head. “My back hurts when I walk for longer than a few minutes, but that’s all.”
He inclined his head and kept typing. “That’ll be one of the first things we’ll take care of. From what I can see, give it a couple weeks, and then that pain will be gone.”
That was my experience too. It was just one hell of a climb to get over that first threshold.
“Can you tell me a little about your eating habits?” he requested. “Actually—first, I gotta ask. Can I speak plainly with you?”
I sat straighter, surprised and slightly on edge. “Uh, yeah? I didn’t come here for sugarcoating.”
“You’d be surprised to hear how many do,” he answered. No smirk or grin; if anything, he took this seriously. “When it comes to health, you’ll find me somewhere in the middle of body-positivity and everything we once considered to be facts. That skinny automatically means healthy and so on. We know better today. Men and women come in many natural shapes and forms—and I’ve chosen to draw the line at health risks. So while I have met hundreds of curvy women who are much healthier than some I would call underweight, I want to let medical results and your mental state determine when you’ve reached your goal.” He paused briefly. “Being able to get pregnant and go through a pregnancy is a great start—unless there are any underlying conditions, of course. Not everyone can get pregnant, and it’s not always linked to physical health. Which—” He showed his palms, as if cautioning himself. “I probably don’t need to tell you this. I just want to be as clear as I can be. The day you get pregnant, wonderful—that’s awesome. But if your blood sugars are too high, or you’re not quite happy yet, I’d like for us to continue until you reach that point.”
Hell, he could speak plainly to me any day of the week. It was so refreshing to meet someone who wasn’t either-or. He was somewhere in the middle. I liked the middle. I was in the middle myself.
“This is partly why I don’t care about your weight, Natalie,” he went on. “My personal goal as a client’s PT is to find a balance between managing health risks, happiness, and sustainability. Yo-yo dieting is never good. We want to find the right lifestyle for you.”
Take me. I’m all yours.
“That’s the balance I want,” I admitted. “I’ll be honest too. I was incredibly happy with myself a few years ago—I was still larger, but I had way more energy. I liked going out and doing things, and I didn’t starve myself. If I hear another recommendation to cut all carbs, I will flip my freakin’ lid.”
He let out a warm chuckle and shook his head. “Don’t listen to those people. Complex cards are good for you.”
Tell that to the experts who claimed the opposite.
“A lot of people think you’re wrong,” I had to say.
“A lot of people are making billions selling bullshit,” he replied, not missing a beat. “The problem is, there’s no money in good health. There is, however, a ton of money in medicine and diet food.”
Yeah, Facebook needed a status for “committed to my PT.”
I smiled impishly. “So when do we start?”
He chuckled again and scratched his bicep absently, his stare returning to the laptop screen. “I’m glad you’re motivated. Unfortunately, there’s no one-size-fits-all for getting healthier, so now comes a long and tedious interview. I have approximately sixty questions for you, not counting follow-ups, that will help me map out your diet history, likes, dislikes, and preferences on exercise. Because I don’t think you want to go onmydiet or something created for a former athlete or someone who’s allergic to gluten. This has to fityou.”
Oh, he made my heart happy.
“Is there a diet for chocolate lovers?”
“Do you want to get pregnant?” he shot back with a smirk.
Damn.
I waved a hand. “Proceed with your questionnaire, Coach.”
Maybe this would actually work.
I came back to my apartment an hour later, overwhelmed but hopeful. Laurie had been right so far. Ethan Quinn seemed like the perfect PT for me. He’d given me tons of pamphlets but not without going through them. He wasn’t the type who just said, no, this wouldn’t work; he explained why.
