Episode Details

Aileen Creagh had a student tell her she would love to bring her friends to the studio, and then say she was not going to. This is the one place she goes where she is not who she is everywhere else, and she wants to keep it that way. Aileen told her that was allowed.

Aileen Creagh is the owner of Empowered Aerial Fitness in Stamford, Connecticut, a studio built around pole, aerial hoop, aerial hammock, flexibility, and dance. She is a mother of five, eight years divorced, and she came to this the way many of her students do, through a friend talking her into a class. She had danced and done gymnastics for years and still describes that first hour as humbling. What kept her coming back was not the skill. It was a group of women who showed up for their own reasons, worked hard some nights, were silly on others, and occasionally cried, and who she says carried her through the end of her marriage. She opened her own studio with that as the goal.

She and Lisa talk about why she refuses to market any of it as becoming sexy again, and what happens to the people who count themselves out before they walk in because they assume they are not young enough or fit enough. Aileen's position is that confidence is the thing that reads, not a look, and that the equipment is neutral.

The core of the conversation is what this offers someone in the middle of something unbearable. Aileen describes dancing out whatever she arrives with, including nights where all she does is roll side to side on the floor and breathe. She talks about the difference between a gym where nobody looks up from the desk and a room where somebody knows your name, and why an hour of that helps without anyone having to discuss their trauma. She tells two student stories, one about a friend who bought herself a pair of six-inch shoes and could not stop looking at her own legs, and one about a student who would not take her shirt off for months and now competes. She closes on what her mentor told her she was actually selling, which was permission, and on the smallest unit of progress she will accept from a beginner.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why a community you do not have to explain yourself to can help as much as one you do
• What is wrong with framing any of this as getting your confidence back through looks
• Using movement to discharge anger, grief, or exhaustion on a specific bad day
• What separates a studio from a gym, and why being known by name changes the hour
• How a room of every shape and size dismantles the reason people stay home
• The smallest version of progress worth counting, and why it compounds
• What her mentor meant by saying the product is permission

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Five kids, a divorce, and the class that carried her through it
5:00 Why she refuses to sell becoming sexy again
9:00 Confidence over a look, and bruises as badges
11:00 Dancing out anger, sadness, and exhaustion
14:00 Community as medicine, without talking about your trauma
19:00 A room of every shape and size, and two students who changed
25:00 What her mentor meant by selling permission
28:00 Progress that counts, and where to find the studio

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Empowered Aerial Fitness, Stamford CT: https://www.empoweredaerialfitness.com/

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry a