Meet Cindy McDonald of MotherFitness in Santa Clarita

Today we’d like to introduce you to Cindy McDonald.

Cindy, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I’ve always known I wanted to help the world. I remember I was 13 years old the first time I realized I wanted to do something that mattered to the world, something that would change people’s lives. I came from a home with three siblings and a single full-time working mother. Our father was a drunk, violent, drug addict that was a complete danger and nightmare to live with. These were the real things that propelled me to want to help others. I understood that I was not the only one going through a difficult childhood and I believed that if I could grow up and become successful that, that would be my ultimate revenge on a bad childhood. I wanted to show the world that no matter what cards life has dealt us from the beginning; ultimately, we choose how we end up.

Growing up, I felt like I had no control over many things, which is why I fell in love with fitness. Fitness was the one thing I felt I could control. I could control how hard I worked, how long I worked at it and once I started, I never looked back. While in college studying for my psychology major, I did personal training and I ended up falling in love with helping others feel empowered and happy with creating a healthy change. Unfortunately, as I was a couple of semesters away from finishing my BA in Psychology my uncle, who I was very close to, fell into a coma and school took a back seat. I was with him every day, writing down all the medications, reading up on them, monitoring his care closely, and talking to doctors and nurses daily. This is when I decided I wanted to go into nursing. So I went back to school and started all over again! It felt a little bit like I was taking a step back but it also felt like the right move. Then, as I was applying for nursing school, my grandmother got sick. I remember going to visit her in the hospital. In the last conversation I had with my grandmother she said to me “life is short, stop working so hard and enjoy it,” I grabbed her hand, looked into her eyes and said “If it weren’t for you I would have been born in a third world country, the opportunity and privilege that I have in this country cannot go to waste. I owe it to you to become successful”, she looked at me, smiled and nodded her head in approval. Two weeks before my grandma passed, I was accepted into nursing school. I was happy she was able to see me get accepted into a program that was so competitive. Just when I thought this is my time to cruise and things would get easier, I thought, “I’m going to do school and part-time work and life will settle down” well, life had different plans and threw another curveball at me. A month into nursing school, I found out I was pregnant, everyone asked me, “what are you going to do now?” My answer was “nothing. I’m just going to keep going”, however, there was one more bump (no pun intended) added to the road, I needed to work six days a week now to qualify for my bonding time with my baby when the baby arrived. So I did just that, I worked six days per week and I did nursing school five days per week. I did this until seven days before the baby came. I was lucky enough to have the baby during winter break, so I had time off work and school when my baby arrived. To me, that was a huge win! When the baby was born, I discovered a whole new mission, which led to my business being born, I wanted to prove to all moms out there that they could still look like bombshells and feel attractive. A year after graduating from nursing school, I decided I wanted to be in the best shape I had ever been and wanted to step on stage for a fitness competition. I felt that was the best way I could show moms that it could be done despite working full-time and being a mom. In 2018 I did just that! I stepped on stage and on my second competition, I won my pro card as a fitness competitor. This led to me starting MotherFitness. I get to help people in a hospital setting and I get to help people achieve their dream bodies, the biggest win in all of this is that I get to use my psychology background in both careers. For me this is just the beginning, I want to continue to tell others of my story and I want to continue to inspire and encourage others, we all have greatness within us, no matter how our story has begun we can decide how we want it to end.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Not at all! When building MotherFitness, I had to learn to do many new things. I figured I already knew the core stuff like creating detailed workouts and meal plans but then the hard and fun stuff came. Creating content, doing photoshoots, learning to market and advertise my product and the most significant thing of it all was rolling it all into MY brand. I had to ask myself hard questions like what is my niche, what is the content people want to see that is valuable as well as aesthetically pleasing. I’ve never been good with technology, so learning how to edit and upload videos, use social media, etc. those things were very difficult for me. It led me to read more, listening to more educational podcasts and forced me outside my comfort zone. I made more connections with people that could teach me about business and becoming more confident. Some months business was great and other months were dry spells. What I learned is that I had to stay consistent and persistent. I don’t think I’ll ever stop learning, every day I spend time learning at least one new thing that will help me in business.

Please tell us about MotherFitness.
MotherFitness focuses on creating customized workout and meal plans. Every person is different. Not only is everyone different because of their physical body type or because of their fitness level but most importantly, because everyone has a different fitness history. The history people have with food is the most crucial part of it all. My biggest percentage of clients are women and women tend to yo-yo diet and under eat for periods followed by binging tendencies. This all leads to many metabolic problems, so resetting the body can take anywhere from one to two years, depending on the extent of abuse on the body. My background in nursing and psychology gives me a different edge as a personal trainer. I firmly believe that many issues with bad eating habits and fitness stem from issues around other areas of our lives. They may not always stem from big issues but more common issues like feeling unsatisfied in a relationship or career or lack of confidence. So for me, hearing women tell me that they’re grateful that I’ve been able to help them transform not only their bodies but also the way they see themselves, that is what makes me so very proud of building MotherFitness.

If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
I don’t think I would have done anything differently. I believe that all things, whether they are “failures” or not, teach us so much! I’ve learned so much on this journey and I am so grateful to God for every stepping stone, even the tough ones.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.motherfitness.org
• Instagram: @motherfitnessrn_wbffpro
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/mother-fitness-santa-clarita-2

Image Credit:
David Avalos, Dan Galic, Kristin Rae

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