Kintinu'd Conversations
You’re listening to Kintinu’d Conversations. We’re healthcare providers working at Kintinu Telerehab out of Omaha, NE. We provide physical, occupational, speech, and psychological therapy to help individuals around our country get back to life. This podcast is designed to engage a variety of listeners on topics that matter to us-- whether at work, in life, or in our relationships.
Kintinu'd Conversations
S3E19 - Reimagining Fitness: Inclusion, Adaptability, and Transformation
Backed by decades of experience producing exceptional clinical outcomes, Kintinu Telerehab connects recovery to everyday life. In this podcast, we explore hot topics in rehabilitation, the keys to personal growth and recovery, and how to apply it all to the real-world.
What if navigating rehabilitation and care after a significant injury could be less daunting? In this episode of Kintinu’d Conversations, Brad Dexter and Steve Kerschke sit down to discus the journey of Steph Roob, a registered dietitian with a deep-rooted passion for fitness and healthy living. With her 18 years at QLI, she spun the idea of GRIT, an adaptive fitness program, which has been making waves in the world of fitness for individuals with adaptive needs.
Designed to push physical boundaries, GRIT encapsulates Guts, Resilience, Intensity, and Tenacity. It’s not just a fitness regime, but a lifestyle that fosters mental well-being and healthy habits. Our conversation dives into the heart of this program, exploring its core ethos and the role of creating a safe inclusive community for athletes of all abilities.
Tune in as we delve into how creativity, repetition, and collaboration played a crucial role in reshaping movement patterns, and how GRIT is changing lives with its specialized approach.
Enjoy!
Listen to the episode on Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, and Buzzsprout, or on your favorite podcast platform.
Welcome to continued conversations where we explore hot topics and rehabilitation, the keys to personal growth and how to apply it all to the real world. Hey, welcome back to the conversation. This is Brad Dexter. I have Steve Kershke in studio with me today too, and today we're welcoming our guest, steph Rowe. So, steph, you have been at QLI for how long now?
Speaker 2:Going on 18 years 18 years.
Speaker 1:And how many different positions have you had? Just one.
Speaker 2:Just one position. There's been a title change, but overall I was hired as a registered dietitian and that's still what I perform as.
Speaker 1:And now you're the queen of nutrition, is that right?
Speaker 2:Yes, I like that title.
Speaker 1:That will work. Hey, before we jump into content, quick question for you what is your favorite Michigan loss to Ohio State?
Speaker 2:Oh no.
Speaker 3:We can do an easier one. Tell us about your love for Costa Rica.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's, but that could go on forever and ever.
Speaker 3:It's like tell us you know like you love Costa Rica, so we'll let her off the hook about Ohio State.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 2:But, any loss to Ohio State is a horrible loss and it went on for a long time.
Speaker 1:Jeff is saying that with with Maison and Blue chairs in the background for video right now. Is this going to turn into like a commercial for Costa Rica right now? Are you going to start?
Speaker 2:talking about it. I'm afraid it might be.
Speaker 3:I don't dare start Top one or two things. Trip advisor Costa Rica Go.
Speaker 2:I love the people and that's the number of microclimates within Costa Rica is fascinating to me how you can, within two, three hours, be a completely different microclimate to get like everything. It's great and it's small.
Speaker 3:Nice. Well, I know that you love that place and I hope to be able to visit it someday too.
Speaker 2:It sounds lovely. It is lovely. It's like a cheaper Hawaii.
Speaker 1:Beaches, mountains, everything jungle mountains, rainforests, how?
Speaker 3:many times have you been?
Speaker 2:Three.
Speaker 3:And then, when was the first time that you went?
Speaker 2:First time I went was actually, what was that? 2011?, 2009? I remember it was the RO Donnelly year.
Speaker 3:Oh, that was your O'Donnell. So, yeah, just for our listeners, the O'Donnell award. Actually this is like a timely reference. The O'Donnell awards are one of our most prestigious awards here at QLI and it's for our top employees or team members each and every year and what's unique about it is the group is very unique and esteemed and chosen by your peers and stuff is one of our award winners. And coming up here and what are we? Two weeks out, now yeah.
Speaker 3:Less than two weeks out, two or three. This happens every two years, and so we have a new group that will be honored, and so I'm really excited to celebrate with that group. So congrats.
Speaker 2:You mentioned me, but you guys are also both O'Donnell award winners.
Speaker 3:Well, thanks. This isn't about us, this is about you.
Speaker 1:This is all about you. Don't even bring us up. I'm not even paying attention on myself, so this is very difficult, all right, so we're not talking about Michigan or Ohio State today. We're not actually talking about Costa Rica. We have Steph on to talk about our GRIT adaptive fitness program, which has been going on for five years now. Steph is that right?
Speaker 2:Yes, I know, addy, and I have talked about this. I think we're past the five year mark. Five and a half six yeah probably somewhere, you're no longer a startup. No, I know right. I know it's so bad, though, like these are dates I should keep, but I'm really bad with dates.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you could have had a celebration of some kind, but you know, let that pass. Yeah, ship is sailed on that one. So GRIT, adaptive fitness, I really want to take some time to dig into. Hey, why are we doing that in the first place and where in the world did it come from? You've put a lot of time and energy, among others. You've put a lot of time and energy and thought into getting this thing going and keeping it going in the last five or six years here. Can you walk us through the story of how did it get started in the first place?
Speaker 2:Well, it got started kind of based off of information we were getting post discharge from QLI, so individuals who left QLI with a pretty bright outcome of level of independence and what you would hope for them as far as a successful future after QLI. And sometimes it happens and sometimes it doesn't. There's several factors why that may kind of unravel once they leave QLI. But we were just kind of seeing some folks who, you know, maybe didn't have the best support systems, didn't have transportation or kind of secluding themselves to their living space, Mental health issues. I mean there was just all kinds of like little things that were popping up post discharge after kind of that tight knit QLI community. I don't want to say dissipated, because we still stay involved, but not to the level of when they're on campus and participating in our active rehab program.
Speaker 2:So I was just thinking of a way to get people re-engaged with QLI, even if they were here before or if they weren't here before and just have always lived in the community with adaptive needs. So I started thinking about what thing would be great to get them back for, and so of course physical activity is kind of what popped in the mind of a healthy outlet, getting people engaged in something with their peers that would bring other benefits than just spending time back on QLI's campus. So that's kind of how it all came to be. I don't remember the details of the process. I think it started out maybe on a kind of brainstorming this grander scale of an ultimate like what would you love to see? And then it had to kind of pare it back a little bit to what is feasible to accomplish right now with the ability to grow in the future.
Speaker 3:You know. So just to make sure our listeners are clear. So it's called grit, so I'd love maybe tell us what grit is. And listening to this makes me think back, brad. When you and I were treating together, we had this concept where we would try to treat the folks that we were working with like athletes, and we didn't do a very good job of it. But I feel like, steph, you and your team have really gotten to the point where we do treat them like athletes, and I think it's been so cool to see. But so tell us about grit. And then, when you treat someone like an athlete, what have you seen in terms of the progress and the mindset Like what's been the result?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So grit kind of came from. So it's guts, resilience, intensity, and the intensity is what it stands for. So that's where it came from. So you break all those parts down and obviously that is kind of what you think of when you think of an elite athlete. But the word it, grit itself obviously also represents Words that you would describe an athlete. So our program is adaptive functional fitness. So we started out that was kind of our name because we weren't affiliated anywhere. We're now an official CrossFit program. But I think CrossFit is, when you think of the world of CrossFit, whether you like it or you don't like it.
Speaker 2:A lot of the people that participate in CrossFit at a higher level are pretty extreme athletes. The things their bodies are able to do it's pretty impressive and for a prolonged period of time. So they're able to sustain that level for quite a while, especially when it comes to things like the games. So Thought that that would be a good fit for what we were trying to accomplish. So there is a lot of gyms. I don't say a lot. There are gyms in Omaha that cater towards an adaptive population, but when you look at their program it's still pretty sedentary. So if someone's in a chair. They're gonna stay, probably stay in their chair through the workout, probably doing more of like hand weights and such you know maybe five, ten pounds, and there's nothing wrong with that, because that anytime you can get somebody active. Obviously that is what we're looking for, but wanted to take it to a different level of Pushing their body past the point of what they thought they were capable of. So that was kind of our goal.
Speaker 2:And when you think of functional fitness, the way I describe it is really Using your body to the best of its ability in the space that it's given. So whatever space you may be in, whatever Challenge you might be facing, your Apped to be able to handle that better than you were before. So that's kind of where Got linked into kind of that functional fitness or CrossFit mentality. So that's kind of where it all stemmed from. As far as what we see with that type of activity, it's really variable depending on the athlete and what the athlete brings to the gym that day.
Speaker 2:So we've had anywhere from Amazing continued progress and working with someone who is also in an outpatient physical therapy program, so working and adjunct with them, just kind of pushing them beyond by getting those extra repetitions Outside of the PT gym, we've seen improve mental health and you know, I think a big part of that. Well, it's two parts it's the sense of community that they have with their fellow athletes in the gym, but also, I think it's that whole again pushing your physical Boundaries, what you perceived as your physical boundaries. So when people Achieve more than what they thought they were going to be able to do, there's a real sense of accomplishment that they maybe haven't felt for quite a while. And I think with that comes an improved mood, you know, decrease in things like depression and anxiety, which are pretty prevalent within the adaptive population, unfortunately.
Speaker 1:Hey, one of the things we were just talking about on a previous podcast was like developing healthy lifestyle habits in the long run, right? So yeah, it's not uncommon to you know, first couple of years after an injury, to be getting rehab therapy pretty frequently, but then after that there's like a drop-off, right, and you mentioned you know, go into local gyms and maybe just doing some lighter, lighter weights, things like that. I love the intensity that you guys use within grit, but I also love that concept of kind of developing these healthy lifestyle habits. Can you talk at all about, I mean, anyone that you've seen that Maybe it's been five years after injury, 10 years, 20 years that have just developed these new habits that have really changed kind of their lifestyle or their mindset around just their day to day?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, I feel like for a lot of our athletes Because they have that supportive community that's pushing them and encouraging them, whether that be their fellow athletes or our coaches, who when they're in our gym space, we're not just there throwing weights around. There's also a lot of discussion happening while they're in that gym. So Addy, who is our head coach, she's a level three crossfit coach and with that comes some nutritional knowledge, so things that come up just in the situation, like in the moment during a workout she's able to kind of provide a little bit of guidance and encouragement to make better nutritional choices as well. Just because they trust her, they know that they're going to be able to do that, they know the work that she has done with them and so she's just a real natural way to just kind of get it in there. You know we have athletes who are really all about the workouts and then that's kind of where it ends. I'll still take it because that's still fantastic and we're seeing great physical changes with them doing that. But we have a couple athletes who what I'm finding more is people who were never really into fitness and never really into nutrition before, and then when they get engaged with the fitness side of things, they're starting to get more engaged with nutrition side of it. So I feel like that's the ones that I really enjoy watching evolve, because none of this was their lifestyle before but because they've got it, introduced this program, and have gained friends.
Speaker 2:Friends in misery During those gym times. You see just overall lifestyle changes, which would be our ultimate goal. Sometimes it's harder to reach nutrition side of things. People are very, very particular about their food choices, but we would like to eventually grow on that a little bit more. Right now we're kind of locked into doing what we're doing, but I think eventually we would like to grow that side of the program too. So we do have a lot of nutrition and having that. We do have an app that has that information on there so we put healthy recipes on their healthy, simple recipes. So if anyone is a great athlete, they can go into the app and they can kind of scroll through for some healthy recipes. So we do have that available to them as well.
Speaker 3:So I love how you've all just continued to build on what you started. First it was this group that got together and now you've layered on the nutrition you've laid on the app. So it's just been really cool to see your mindset around growing it and the ownership around that. You've talked a little bit about who's the right athlete or the right person, and I think what I've noticed is it can be really for everyone. So talk a little bit about maybe some of our listeners are, you know, fall in the category of I've never worked out before. I'm not really into fitness and that's intimidating to me. All the way to. I love fitness and I'm really looking for something that's intense. I feel like what I've seen is you cater to both, but maybe talk a little bit more about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we've always said that the ideal athlete for our gym is simply an adaptive athlete. So if you have any adaptive needs at all, you likely are a good fit for our gym. We kind of vet through applications that come in, but honestly, we have not turned down anyone at this point, as long as they have an adaptive need. And what adaptive needs can mean is, if it's physical, so just going to the gym and figuring out how to utilize the equipment, how to utilize the free weights and get the most bang for their buck, whether that's hard, whether it's a, you know, cognitive barrier for them, so just even having the support they need in a general gym would be very difficult for them, whether it be, you know, keeping track of reps or pushing them again to go to the next level of fitness. So it really any of those types of individuals will qualify.
Speaker 2:And we've had everything. We've had traumatic brain injury, we've had spinal cord injury, we've had amputee, we've had stroke, we've had Parkinson's, so it's kind of all over the board as far as trying to go this. What was the second part of your question? And then it was.
Speaker 3:It was mostly just you know who's who's it, who's it for, and and maybe it's around like the safety in terms of if you're not familiar, it's still safe space to come and and there's just so many other benefits to around the community and just feeling welcome and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2:So and so also with the. As far as who's the ideal candidate, I think we see some folks who are intimidated by the CrossFit terminology so they'll say, like I don't think I can do that. I can't imagine what I'll be able to get out of coming to this gym because I'm not going to be able to participate. We really encourage people to come and spend some time down in the gym before they commit so they can see what other athletes are doing and maybe even do a little trial so we can show them what they are capable of doing. Addie is really skilled at figuring out how to adapt a workout for that particular person. We have one script workout, so we have the wad of the day, we have the workout of the day, but then she takes that and for every athlete that's in the class she does it for adaptation.
Speaker 2:If you have four people in that class at the same time, nobody's workouts are going to look the same. Every athlete you jump to you're going to be noticing that it's a little bit different of a workout Same premise, same demands on the body, but it's going to look different for every athlete. It's another crossfit mentality of your only competition is with yourself. We try really hard not to compare athlete to athlete, but really getting the athlete to look at what their numbers were two months ago and what they are now and using that to motivate you to continue to do more. Yes, I do think it's a real safe space. There's a lot of cheerleaders, a lot of encouragement, maybe a little ribbing here and there, but it's a really good group where you can feel comfortable in knowing that a lot of people in that space have had a different story but can still relate to the situation that you're going through and push you.
Speaker 1:I love it's not like, hey, I'm Jim and I have Parkinson's, or I'm Bill and I have Guillain-Barre, or I'm Barb and I have MS. When you walk into the gym, I'm an athlete and you start approaching it like an athlete. I love that concept of identity when you walk into the gym because I think a lot of time after these types of neurological disease processes or injuries that happen, you start to wrap up who you are and what your identity is and some of those things. So starting to approach it with that different mindset and then if you're new and you walk into that community of people, to recognize that from them too, I think is really cool and unique in the way that you guys have helped develop that. I'm curious stuff Can you talk about? This is maybe jumping back to how you originally started it a bit, but how many gyms like this are there? How many adaptive CrossFit gyms are there? Did you see that modeled by someone else somewhere else? Talk us through some of that, because this is unique.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there isn't a lot of adaptive. So there are quite a few gyms that will take adaptive athletes. That's mostly on a personal training perspective. So I'm sure you guys know that you're going to your community gym and a personal trainer is not cheap, right it's. It's pretty expensive to hire a personal trainer and so there that exists. But to go into a gym and be like, nope, we only serve us adaptive athletes, that's, that's a rare experience and a big reason for that is it's not. It's not very income producing, right, and so for a gym to be all adaptive would be really hard. It wouldn't be very feasible to be able to pay your staff and have a brick and mortar building and all that. There are a few exceptions out there.
Speaker 2:So my kind of first model, more or less, was a place in Dallas, texas. I had followed them on social media and they show clips. Like you learn about the athletes, you kind of see what they're doing in the gym space. But I was really curious. I wanted to go see it for myself so I could get a better idea of what was happening in that gym. So before grit opened, I flew down to Dallas and spent three days in the gym.
Speaker 2:So before grit opened, I flew down to Dallas and spent three days at that adaptive gym just to kind of learn about their program, like what athletes they were taking, how they paid the bills and just how they ran their program. So that was the only like I have my eyes on it example that I had. There were things that I took from it that were incredibly helpful, and then there were things that I took from it that I'm like I mean that's great, but that's not quite what we're trying to accomplish. There's was more of a short term. You come in kind of for a boot camp and then you're out and I wanted something that was a little bit more about longevity, so having somebody engaged and staying in the program for the long term. So that was kind of the key differences. But the intensity of their program was fantastic, the involvement from their community was fantastic. So, yeah, it was good to go somewhere and kind of have an idea of where to start.
Speaker 3:And on those lines, one of the things, as I spent more time with you, been really envious and impressed of around just your curiosity and this entrepreneurial mindset that you have. So I'm curious as you've built this, or you and your team have built this over the last several years, can you like draw upon maybe a lesson or two that you've learned along the way and, and just you know, expand a little bit on that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean there's been a few, and I think all of them are like kind of your school of hard knocks, learning experiences. But one thing I know for sure is that this couldn't be possible if I didn't work where I worked. There was a level of, again, just costs and support associated with running a program like this, especially if your goal is to never turn away an athlete. We have athletes that you know we do a fair amount of scholarship in. Everybody pays something just so they have some skin in the game, but we do a fair amount of scholarship in. That's just not, that's not feasible for most jams. And so I did learn that while I have this great idea and that's the way I would have been able to make this happen If I didn't work where I worked. So that was kind of my one of my biggest. Like you know, you get these grand ideas, but without the support of of what we do and where we work, it would not have been possible.
Speaker 2:I think there's little barriers that have come along the way that are frustrating, but I can't quite find a way to work around them. There's so many athletes within the Omaha community Adaptive athletes that could benefit from a program like ours, but there's no great way of getting those athletes to us, and so I think that is something that I continue to spend my wheels on, as just far as how can we get these individuals engage and make it easy for them. And so you and I were talking about an individual last week who the cost of transportation would be just crazy to try to get where we are. So that's one. That's one thing that, like, I continue to spend my wheels on and try to figure out if there's a way to work through it.
Speaker 1:That was like hey, for a 20 minute drive one way, it was 55 bucks. I think that individual right around trip $110 each time. That's just big barrier yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so Omaha, if you're listening, we need better transportation for adaptive individuals. So I think that's just that. Like frustrating is.
Speaker 2:One of the benefits of being a dietitian is that you are used to wanting something more for someone than they want for themselves, and so the other pretty common thing is you meet with someone, you put the best plan in place, but those behavior changes are really really hard right, and so I think I was prepared for that with the gym too, and you do see it where you're just like, oh, I just I wish you put a little bit more into it.
Speaker 2:I wish you pushed yourself a little bit harder. I wish you would take some of this back with you when you go home and continue your workouts there. I mean, I think there's things that you see that you just wish you could get a little bit more, but also an appreciation of man. They took the time and the effort to get down to this gym this week, and that is pretty impressive, because it's not just jumping in a vehicle, like you or I would, to head to the gym. What other lessons have I learned? I hate bookkeeping. I've learned that, so I do all the invoices and stuff for the gym and just keeping track of payments and, oh my God, I hate having to contact people and be like hey, I'm just, you're having fun.
Speaker 1:That's not your favorite part.
Speaker 2:No, no Cause, right, in an ideal world man, we could just open it up and say, hey, it's just, anybody can come, and you know we're not going to ask anything. But the reality of it is we're still. We're a CrossFit gym, we're still a business in a sense, and even though we have a lot of support from QLI, we still need that engagement and kind of extra buy-in from the athletes too. So, yeah, no, I really don't like that part, though that is not my favorite part. The other part that has been like what I've learned is I have Addy, who is an amazing head coach who's been with us from the get-go. She was initially a that's what I'm looking for here she worked at another gym and so she was just kind of borrowed to us and now she's our full-time coach.
Speaker 2:But when you have your full-time coaches there, they're really spot on. They're there, they're committed. It's the whole process of finding volunteers. We can't run our program without volunteers. So just finding good, reliable volunteers to help us make sure this program remains that part has been challenging as well. We've gotten some great volunteers, but the fact of the matter is, if it's not a paid position, other things come up in life that might trump coming to the gym to help out, and so that part has been challenging as well, cause we wanna make sure we always have the appropriate number of hands, ears and eyes in that gym to make sure everyone is safe.
Speaker 1:All right, seth, that was fantastic. I think we've really appreciated the conversation. It's fun to kind of like recap some of the things that you've walked through in the last five to six years, the lessons that you've learned, but beyond that, just the impact that you guys have been making down there too. So you're absolutely right. I mean, without the support of QLI, the leadership at QLI and team members here, it'd be really hard to make that thing go. And that's really the people have made it successful. Right, it's not just a program, it's not just a thing, but the people that are involved have made it really special and made it go over this length of time.
Speaker 3:So as a physical therapist I have.
Speaker 3:I think there's so much to learn around this approach.
Speaker 3:Steph alluded to the fact that it's used as an adjunct to traditional therapy and in a lot of ways, as a physical therapist, I realize that the intensity that I trained when I was practicing more of my folks at was nowhere near what it needed to be or what it could be, and so if you're a clinician out there, I think there's plenty of nuggets to learn around the intensity that you are training at, the amount of repetitions and your programming and how to collaborate with other industry experts and the amount of adaptation that Addy does.
Speaker 3:It makes it a really personalized program, but the creativity around it, I think, has been really cool to see. So my plug would be if you're a clinician, expand your thought process and continue to learn from other industry experts, and then, if you're on the industry expert side, like Addy, who's not a therapist figuring out how do you create that collaboration, because I think there's space for both in there, especially with this population. So I think it'll be interesting to see where this progresses. But yeah, I think it was eye-opening to me to see that. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I mean I was just going to drop the creativity bent as well, Like I've learned from Addy just watching her the ways that she's modified different movement patterns, and certainly having some of the equipment that you guys have in that space too is helpful to get those movements, and so equipment matters. But I think creativity is something that you can never have enough of. That as a therapist, as a personal trainer, as a crossfit instructor, adaptive fitness instructor so valuable. But yeah, that being said, Steph, thanks for joining us and just talking through your process of getting that up and going, and it's been fun to kind of hear the value that is provided to people's lives and yeah we just appreciate you and appreciate you talking with us today.
Speaker 1:So an audience. Thanks for joining us for the conversation.
Speaker 2:Thanks for joining the conversation with us today. If you found it helpful, please share with your family and friends. You can learn more about us on our website at ContinueTeleRehabcom, or check us out on YouTube, Instagram and Facebook.
