When Movement Changes - Navigating Menopause, Hidden Disability and Movement Differently With Fiona

What happens when a 52 year old woman with a hidden disability rediscovers roller skating after more than 35 years away from it?

In this powerful and intriguing conversation, Fiona shares how roller skating became far more than a hobby. After years of chronic foot issues, surgery and limited movement, skating helped her reconnect with freedom, confidence, community and herself.

From skating through South London parks to learning alongside younger skaters, Fiona opens up about navigating movement with an invisible disability, the realities of menopause, fear, identity, ageing and what it means to find the thng that makes you come alive..

This episode explores:

• Returning to roller skating again in your 50s
• Living and moving with a hidden disability
• Menopause, confidence and identity shifts
• Finding spaces where you can fully be yourself
• How skating became both escape and empowerment

 Honest, funny, raw and uplifting, Fiona shares a side of midlife movement that rarely gets talked about, one built around resilience, adaptation, joy, music, community and finding new ways to feel alive again. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

She was just going to get cat food. Kleona was on her way to buy cat food. That's it. No grand plan, no bucket this moment, no midlife resolution. Just a summer evening in South London that led her straight into a world she didn't know existed. A world of roller skates, rhythm, and a community hidden in plain sight. She's 52, she's navigating menopause, she lives with a hidden disability that means she can't run, can't dance, can't even walk for too long without paying a painful price. Three days after the accidental encounter, Fiona bought her skates, and what followed is a story about far more than learning to skate. In this episode, she takes us into London's skating scene, the Sunday services, the park crews, the global community that speaks and moves instead of words. She talks about learning again and about being a woman in her 50s reclaiming space on wheels, through menopause, through a body that's changed, through a version of herself she's still figuring out. And when you ask Fiona what movement means to her, she doesn't give you the answer you expect. She gives you something that sits with you long after the episode ends. This is Fiona's story, and by the end of it, you might just be Googling where to hire a pair of skates. I'm Anika Griffith Elliott, and this is Unshrinkable Midlife Moves. Hi Fiona, thanks so much for joining us today. You're going to be sharing your story, your movement story all around skating, and I can't wait to hear it. So before we get started, tell us a bit about yourself.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Hi, I'm Fiona and I'm from South London one, soon to be 52 years old, and I am a roller skater.

SPEAKER_00 1:52

And how did you get into roller skating?

SPEAKER_01 1:55

It was quite by accident. There was a roller skating event taking place near where I lived, and I happened to cross it when I was on my way to the shop for some cat food. Summer of 23. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:09

A couple of years ago.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

I saw engagement from a lot of age groups. There was diversity in races and lots of just enthusiasm and a good vibe. And I just thought, oh thank God, there's something going on in my area. That looks appealing to me. And that's where it started. And I bought my skates three days later. I tapped into it as soon as I could.

SPEAKER_00 2:35

Have you done any other types of movement previously in your life up until then?

SPEAKER_01 2:41

I did ballet, gymnastics as a child, athletics as a teenager. I've jumped out of a plane as a 40-plus year old.

SPEAKER_00 2:51

So have you been moving all your life, or was that something you did as a teenager and then stopped and returned to with skating?

SPEAKER_01 2:57

Or between my twenties and 30s. Using the reference of movement, I was probably more static. But that was a result of physical issues rather than a desire to not be moving, so to speak.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Yeah. So you stopped moving for quite a while. Okay, so tell us about your skating journey because I am absolutely intrigued. And then, as I'm sure you'll share, you'll explain the different elements about your own personal skating experience and what that means to you, which is quite unique to a lot of other people.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

The skating community is fairly niche to a certain extent, underground, because you can live in a whole area of London and never be exposed to it. But I can guarantee you there is roller skating that happens everywhere in London as a community that meets up. There are multiple group chats and all sorts of various events that are held around London, outside of London, around Europe and around the world that we all travel to, not necessarily every one of them because who's got money for that? But they are there, and it's great just to meet other people and you can understand one another through your roller skating moves as opposed to your language, verbal language, so to speak. So I may do an example of a move that we call the downtown, but it will be that same move all over the world. So it's sort of like traffic lights or other things. Red will always mean red around the world, and green will always mean green. So it's that sort of thing. But and that's what I found interesting. You have a sense of freedom, you can skate by yourself with a lot of people, or skate with the people within the people, however, your mood desires at the time, and no one's offended by that. Whereas you can go to some places where maybe there's ten people, for example, and one person isn't engaging with the other nine, and everyone's looking at that one person. But in this community, they let you crack on, or we let that person crack on because we're all here for a different purpose, and we're just glad that you're here. Your reason for it is secondary, if that makes sense. You're accepted into the community, and then as humans are you gravitate to where your tribe is. You will always find what you feel comfortable in within the community because it's so wide and diverse, and that's what I've always found.

SPEAKER_00 5:57

So tell us a bit about your first skating lesson.

SPEAKER_01 6:02

Yeah, when I went, I could already skate. Because I stopped roller skating probably when I was about 13, but I had a gap of 35 odd years and never putting on a pair of roller skates.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

So, what was that like for the first time?

SPEAKER_01 6:15

It was just a bit more daunting because of my age and broken bones and all of those sort of thoughts, which are less prevalent in younger people. It was just that, and just thinking, am I gonna look old? I don't want to look like some old person doing young people's things. And it was a while before I saw my age group and older people than me skating and what we call OG skaters because they were skating from the 70s, or they've continued skating all the way through their life, so they are just fantastic and 60 years old. I was like, okay, I got this. So that was part of the journey. A lot of it I started off by going to the park by myself. I mean, there are other skaters there as well because it's a famous within the skate community as an area to go and skate outdoors without police or anything like that coming to interrupt you and ask you what you're doing there. Well, clearly I've got roller skates on, but sometimes you have to explain your reasoning for being somewhere when you've got roller skates, and that's another issue and challenge within this country, more so London. So there's lots of challenges. Nothing that you want to enjoy is straightforward because roller skating, you shouldn't have to pay for that pleasure and pay what is a lot of money to a lot of people to do it. And we're not a country that has good weather consistently, and we have a lot of rain and bad winters, and you've got nowhere to skate for six months of a year, unless you can fund it to play to go and skate indoors, an event or social skate. That was another thing to get used to, and you just sort of find your way, you find your choice of skating that you want to do. Some people want to skate on the open road and be amongst the traffic. Some people just want to skate within a park, some people want to skate on a dedicated surface, some people want to jam skate, which is when you're dancing and spinning and doing all sorts of moves, cutting shapes, shuffling, and uh you do pretty much what you could do on a dance floor, but on skates basically. Some people want to do roller derby and just speed around as fast as they can, knocking people, bumping into people and whatnot. Some people want to do roller hockey, which I do from time to time, but not regularly because you have to have certain other skills for that as well, which I don't have, so it ups my chances of injury.

SPEAKER_00 9:12

What kind of skills would you need for that?

SPEAKER_01 9:14

Stopping pivoting on skates because it's literally like hockey, you need to be able to turn as sharply as you could turn on your toes.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:23

And stop at an abrupt stop like you do on ice skating. Yeah. You see, then do a power stop and go back the other way. Yeah, that's not in my repertoire. So I leave that to those that are into that. So there's lots of areas within roller skating that you can do, and it's often quite family-oriented, which is nice to see as an older person as well. To see people that are in their 30s bringing their young children along to roller skate. And that's how I was introduced to skating as a six, seven-year-old originally, with those metal skates that you had in the 70s that you tied onto your shoes. So seeing it coming full circle, decade after decade after decade, it's quite wholesome because it's still something that I did as a child that is still relevant today, whereas lots of activities have fallen by the wayside because we have the internet now and Google and social media and all the rest of it.

SPEAKER_00 10:28

I am really intrigued about the roller hockey. What made you have a go at that for the first time?

SPEAKER_01 10:34

It's in the park where I live. So it's part of a community that I skate in half of the park on our regular meetup, which we call Sunday service, which normally runs from about March till October. For an hour or two, they have the top half of the pitch, and everybody else has the rest of it. So it's just there to join in, watch whatever you want to do. And then when they finish, they just come and join the rest of us skating around. So it's just another branch that was readily available in the spot that I regularly skate in, so I could just watch and say, I don't want to go. I'm thinking, okay, yeah, I know how to use a hockey stick-ish from memory. And so that was just fun, just going up and down. But when they're into it seriously, with a proper puck and they're padding and they're speeding past you, these grown men tearing past you on skates and rollerblades. You're just like, Yeah, that's appealing to watch. It's just nice to sit back and chill and watch. It's not something you see every day, and to see it in front of you for free is part of its attraction. I mean, I don't really like hockey on a TV. This is the best presentation of its form for my eyes.

SPEAKER_00 11:46

So tell us more about how your skating journey evolved after you've had your first class and went back.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

Yeah, I started in the summer in July, so I spent a lot of time practicing nearly every day as much as I could in the park. And I think maybe after three months was when I started my first course of skate lessons in Brixton. And I wasn't a beginner, I came in at level two out of three levels. So I did that course twice and the level three course twice. And then I haven't had courses since then. I've been either going to individual workshops or you learn from your peer group. There's a very familiar term within the skate community of learn one, teach one. So if someone knows something, then it's on you to cascade it. And you go to the person that you know does a particular thing particularly well, and that's who you learn from.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

That's really powerful. It means that you've got the culture to go up to somebody and ask without feeling or funny or conscious.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

And I don't think that is something that is replicated in every sport. And as a black person, there's a lot of people of colour in the demographic of roller skating. It's definitely a refuge bolt hole for some of our young black males, whether it's just to keep them occupied and escape rather than be caught up in the scenarios of where they live and being involved in that, it's their way to get away from their area and be within another area, if you like, but safely. And some of them have straight up said, I'm not good at football. I found I was good at this. So there's always going to be egos where there's levels of competence in a skill. That's human nature. But it's nice to see a group of black boys, black guys, black youths, whatever you want to call them, working together to achieve something rather than seeing each other as competition. It's just a nice vibe, and it gives you hope that the generation behind me is seeing the light in some things, and not everything is doom and gloom as you read in the papers or on the news. So it's just something about that and developing your own style in skating, and that's something that you need to do outside of lesson because you're going to be receiving a tutorial from an individual, so they're going to teach you their style or what they think is the best way for you to learn what it whatever it is they're showing you. And I'm very grateful for those because they grounded me and gave me back a foundation I had lost in my child of 13 years because I grew up to be an adult with other things on my brain. And adjusting back to receiving instructions on how to do something, that was a challenge sometimes because I'm a grown woman, and what are you telling me? I don't want to do that. So that was new, shall we say, but worth it. Giving yourself up into somebody else's psyche, arms, everything, trust was something I hadn't done for a long time because I didn't have to, because I'm a grown person. But I also knew that I would have to relent some of my stubbornness to absorb what is being said to me for me to take it on and go on my journey afterwards, if that makes sense. Yeah. So yeah, I haven't been in courses for roller skating for maybe 18 months now. And everything I pretty much do is off my own back with a whole lot of other group of people. We talk in group chats. Shall we go here? Shall we go there? Yeah, let's go here, let's go there. And so we go.

SPEAKER_00 16:01

Would you say it's getting you out and about a bit more than perhaps before?

SPEAKER_01 16:05

Because I don't get out and about for anything else because I've got a problem with my feet. So everything else in terms of a sporting activity is difficult for me to do because I can't have weight or load bearing going through my feet. So the most I can do is walk, and even that I can't do endlessly like I used to. So I'm very limited on the activities I can do. And roller skating doesn't seem like the activity that you could do, but actually, it's probably one of the ones that I am able to do, along with ice skating, because it doesn't move your feet in its ambulatory action, which everything else requires you to essentially walk from your heel to your toe as a natural movement, which I can no longer do. So that's another reason why I really wanted to succeed at roller skating because my movement has been limited by the problem with my feet, and that operation wasn't until I was 14. So since then, everything has been no running, no jumping. So that ruled out a lot of things, no sudden movements to the left, to the right, forward, back, no tiptoes. So it's all got a bit stuck. So roller skating, I definitely hugged as tightly as I could and still do because I'm gonna have this disability for the rest of my life. So I need to do something, otherwise, I'm gonna sit at home looking more like a Buddha day by day.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

That must have been really difficult to have to adjust how you move, as you said, if you've historically done quite a lot.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Yeah, I mean it's still difficult now, still demoralizing and all other self-esteem, confidence feelings, because it just doesn't affect your movement, it affects your confidence, what you used to go out and do. Going out raving and things like that doesn't happen anymore because I can't really dance because I can't move my feet like that. And if I do, I know there's a price to pay for it, which normally means very swollen toes, maybe bleeding, I won't be able to walk very well for a couple of days, things like that. So it comes with a price, and it's a hidden disability because obviously I've learnt to walk again, and it doesn't look unusual, so people don't see the disability that I have. And it does impact on the skating on some certain moves that I have to work more at. There are some things that we call edges where you need to be able to feel your big toe and your little toe within the skate to be able to dictate where your foot placement is. I can't feel those. So I have to work that much harder to simulate where the body should be without having the feet guide me, which everybody else is using. So that's a challenge and an internal battle, and sometimes it brings tears of suffering and pain, and other times tears are from joy because I've managed to do something. I can now do this move or I can now do that move, and it's euphoric. And even so, when I can do it over and above younger and able-bodied males or females, so that just makes me snap my fingers and gives me a drop the mic moment and a bit of sass, which I'm famous for. I do have a dry humour.

SPEAKER_00 19:38

That must be so satisfying.

SPEAKER_01 19:43

It's like, oh well, you could do that. Oh, did you? And so as time's gone on, there's lots of things that I'm good at, and I'm a more patient person than many people around me of my age, and I can take the time out to break it down to others, teach them this step, and don't look at it like this, look at it like that. You know, colloquial terms that they wouldn't necessarily hear from going to a course. Because that person that's teaching you 80% of the time isn't a representative of you. They don't look like you, they don't speak like you, they're not your age group. So I can appreciate what they take from it may be limited because they're not maybe understanding the language, or maybe they feel embarrassed to say, can you say that again? Or can you show me again? Or the environment just doesn't suit them. And it's the same for a lot of people. Some just literally prefer to learn everything outdoors and fall and get up, fall and get up, fall and get up, and eventually you stop falling.

SPEAKER_00 20:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:55

I do that with some things, some things I don't. If I'm spinning, I prefer to do that indoors than outdoors. I don't really like the feeling of concrete scraping across my skin. But sometimes there are things you just have to do, you have to go through it and be committed. You just go in and it's another part of roller skating. You think it's just you going through that, it isn't. You could be 16 years old and they go through it. My age, you go, and all in between, it's the same human reaction of fear and trepidation to trying something that is consistent. It's just your age that delivers whether you bounce back sooner. The fear is there for everybody, and you can recognise it written on people's face. You can recognise it when you see their chest has not risen and fallen while they're contemplating doing this mood, and you know they're not breathing, they're holding their breath because of the fear, and that throws you off your balance and all. Sorts, and I've been on that journey, so I'm quite happy to hold somebody's hand through their journey so they can feel alone, and that reassurance just helps them get there sooner. So it may take three months to learn a move. When you have someone supporting you that you can receive, you'll get there in a month and a half. And I get a satisfaction from that. Some people have taught things I can teach something better than I can do the move myself. Really? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I've been told I'm a very good teacher, I break things down. I spend a lot of time observing, and I'll watch dreams and dreams and dreams of videos and this and that and rewind, slow it down to 0.5 speed, the whole works. So a lot of my learning is maybe 60% in my head before I've even put on my skates, and then the rest of it is trying to amalgamate the two. Other people are very much on the job people. They're 90% on their skates, and I admire that because they fall a lot. That's their method of learning. And they've never been to a class in their life, they'll never go to a class in their life, and some never want to skate indoors. Some people only just want the freedom of wide roads or cycle lanes or skating through Hyde Park. Because Hyde Park London skaters is a big group that skate there in Hyde Park, up and down by the Serpentine. And they are generally like an older group. So people know if they go to Hyde Park to roller skate, that skate community is generally 50 plus a lot of them. And they are very, very advanced. Because I will never get to learning that level within my lifetime. So I've been skating for 40, 50 years already. There's lots of things you can admire in the scene, lots of things you can take from it, which isn't just about skating or upping your level of skating. Some people only just want to skate around. They just like the friends that they've made, the community of it, summertime. People are bringing knick-knacks to eat and drink and picnics lays out, and we've got our music speakers and all sorts. It's like having an all day if you are from the early 90s of the all day's of South London. It's literally like having an all dayer. You see everybody that you would want to see, the majority, that are everybody hugs, you're right. Yes, yeah, this and that. And you sit down and it's cool. And it's just something that I'd lost touch with through my 20s, 30s of being around a community that wasn't people I worked with or family.

SPEAKER_00 25:00

I was just gonna say, so you touched on the group of older, very accomplished skaters. Are there any other groups that you know of that are welcoming or supportive of older skaters? If somebody were thinking of starting, or once they got a bit more confidence of joining?

SPEAKER_01 25:19

I mean, there's the Crystal Palace crew, and there's the Norwood Park crew, and there's the Hyde Park crew. If you're in Brighton, there's the Brighton skaters, that's another crew. They regularly meet down by Hove Lawns, and they have a dedicated roller rink that Brighton Council has built for them outdoors. So that's a plus because there's not another one in the whole of the country. It's not like America, where roller skating is a big thing. There's hundreds of rinks in America, everywhere, every state. In England, there's two. One's in Essex and one's in Tottenham. The Tottenham one is Roller Nation, and the one in Essex is called Madison Heights, so that's not much for us, hence why we travel skating out of the country, because it's not very roller skate-friendly here. The Dutch are very good for skating, so I skate in the Netherlands, Rotterdam, and Amsterdam, and they're more a mature age group, whereas London carries a lot of I would say 20 to 35 year olds, is the vast majority of the community. Yeah, and I think as the older skater, you're in it for the skating. A lot of the younger people, it's a passing phase, it's the here and now for them, and it's just the latest thing that they can be good at. Something else will come along in two years' time, and they'll be off onto that one. And I've seen that in the time that I've been skating, people that were skating when I first started, they've left the scene and gone on elsewhere, never to be seen again. Some have left London, all sorts of things. So it does move within itself, so it's ever evolving, going around, just like it's coming in and out of fashion within itself. The community sort of bulges and expels and bulges and expels. And the ones that are the OG skaters are the ones that have stayed constant through all of that, weathered the storms and all sorts of things.

SPEAKER_00 27:34

So I know when we spoke before, you also were talking about your experience going out and skating for skate events, what that's like as an older skater. Share some of that with us so that anybody again who's thinking about it may be able to prepare themselves or consider as they think about which events they might want to join.

SPEAKER_01 27:57

So the roller rinks that I mentioned before, me personally, if you are a beginner or it doesn't matter what age you are, I wouldn't recommend them because they're not built for that in their normal social times. I would recommend having lessons there. I'm not as familiar because it's not my side of London, so I don't tune my ear into that info when it passes because it's not something I need. But it's again, like I said, it's not a country that really supports roller skating. So I would love to be able to say, oh yes, it'll be easy, it'll be this, it will be that. But if you're not in the right area, it's not going to be easy. Whereof there is a group chat that has people in it from all over the country, and you often get, I mean, even daily, somebody somewhere in the country asked, is there anywhere to skate around here or there, you know, whichever area they mentioned. So I think the last one, a couple of days ago, someone was in Portsmouth and asked if there's anywhere where to skate, and I can't help them. I think, oh dear, Portsmouth, good luck. But somebody somewhere had something to say and could offer something. Because how would you find that out? I didn't know. It took me to randomly catch this event near my home for it to even be in my head after 35 years. So I can't say, unless you're in London, London is the hub of the scene in the country. For that, you would probably only need to put roller skating or something into Instagram and go down that rabbit hole, and you'll start to see things coming up because that's generally where a lot of events are advertised, as well as classes, beginners' classes. But again, one, you have to be a social media user, which I'm not necessarily was to that extent, and when I was, I wasn't looking for roller skating, so the algorithm wasn't showing me such things. So that's another thing where I've learned how algorithms work, because now much of my timeline is skaters or skate related, and and that's how you learn things, what's happening, where, and so forth. So it's not easy in that respect, like I say, if you're out of London, but the best way is absolutely through Instagram if you do not know someone. If you see someone skating when you're outside and you're able to approach them, by all means do, because every skater, we all love someone coming up to us and saying, How do I get into skating? And we just love to say and just babble information at that person because we're just like, Yeah, you recognize that we're a skater, you're not turning us off for something or shouting at us for making the dog scared or something like that, or cyclists. Cyclists and skaters, not always the greatest of friends, either. That's a heads up because we share the same space. So if you're going through a cycle lane or at the traffic lights, often can be contentious, and other times they love it as cyclists because they've got extra company on the roads. So, yeah, see a skater if you're able to ask them.

SPEAKER_00 31:25

And also, as an older female skater, what would you say to look out for in terms of venues and stuff?

SPEAKER_01 31:31

So, as a female mature skater, to me, female, mature, skater, activity, all of those things, somewhere menopause is in that and how that impacts you. I can struggle with learning things because of the brain fog, the focus, the concentration. That all comes with being in the sphere of menopause, which anyone as a female mature knows, that period can last a decade from peri all the way through to post and longer or shorter. So it has its challenges because I know some of my symptoms of going through menopause adds to my struggle. I'm acutely aware that when you're going through menopause as a female, your risk of osteoporosis is much higher, which is something you have to consider in terms of if you have a fall and break a bone and things like that, which doesn't even mummy into the glint of the sphere of our male pigs. They do not osteous what is that? And you just think you'll never understand among the many things you will never understand of being a female, let alone a mature one. Also, part of the freedom of roller skating is a plus for me during menopause because you just need the freedom, you need to feel air, you need to feel breeze. Anybody that is where I am in their stage of life will absolutely know what I'm talking about. It's almost sometimes you feel like an advert, you just want to skate along a park, and you've got your arms out just going, wee, whoosh, we I think I said it before, euphoric. You feel a sense of elation for a moment or two, and you're really happy to have been able to find how you can recreate that moment for yourself. I know if I go to the park, put on my skates, the weather's nice, and I go and skate, and I put my arms out and put my head up to the sky, I know I'm gonna feel good. I'm gonna feel like I'm gliding on water, and that's what I need to feel. Not everybody needs to feel that. I didn't need to feel that in my 20s or 30s, or I needed to feel other things. Right now, this is what I feel, and if so, I have it because I can. And so I'm aware that you know, as you get older, you're not always going to have the range of movement within your limbs, you're not always going to be able to have the mindset to do some things that are challenging to you. You don't know what life curves are going to throw you that you're gonna have to manage. This is more important. So, I for myself want to find a part in my day-to-day life, not necessarily skating every day, but for it to be a part of me until I can't skate anymore because I don't want to lose what I've now found that can help with the new paths that I am going on as a woman going through the change because you become not a different person, but things are very different in ways that I just didn't expect, and I'm still trying to process some of them.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

What would be an example of that?

SPEAKER_01 35:00

Relationships with other people, physical changes in your body, in your skin, sleep deprivation, the worst is the hot flushes, and being able to think that you look pretty or slim. All of those things have gone out the window for me in my mind, because I'm always hot, I'm always sweating. That's not attractive, so I'm not gonna bother trying to be anymore. So, you know, it builds into those thoughts. Roller skating can let you be wild and dare I say, a little odd because nobody cares. As long as you're skating, what you're wearing or what you look like is a lesser thing. Pick ballet, for example. You must look in your leotard, in your tutu, everything must be to the point. Literally, nobody cares. I mean, I see people wearing, I think, good god, what are you wearing? Again, I've realized that's a reflection of my age. I knew I was a time I ran around wearing what we were called batty riders. And uh I thought back now, I thought, good lord. But that was when you had confidence and all sorts of things. So the female mature skater took a lot out of me as much as it puts into me, because I was in a place where I was losing myself because this change was just literally, I felt like a ball in a square box bouncing around all the time, and like, what the hell is going on? And yeah, so you never stop learning life lessons, is another thing that I learned because there's lots of things I think I know it all. No, I don't. When I'm 50 something, I don't want to learn anymore. Please let me know everything there is to know. You know, it's that sort of reawakening of myself in unexpected ways, and I'm still on that journey now. I mean, I don't want to get to a point where I say anything negative about roller skating or the community, but I would say that as humans, anything where we are as a group, are more than three, there's always going to be something, it's in our nature. So don't think that doesn't happen within roller skating or the roller skating community. We are far more lateral and liberal in how we are, and we're quite happy to let people be. We have a lot of skaters that are neurodivergent, that are ADHD, and this suits them to keep them calm or their focus or you know, whatever they are on their various spectrum or whatever. So it's not just about making friends, it's not just about socializing. For some people, it is literally the calmness of their mind and their mental health, and you have to respect that that you can be who you be. We have skateboarders, part of our community, somewhat on the fringes, but they are part of the community, and BMXs, and they're like 50 years old, and they're still doing BMX stunts and cherry pickers and swinging around on the handlebars because they were all part of that same community of OG skaters all those years back when we all either roller skated on the skateboard or the BMX. I was a skater and BMX. So there's a whole world, it's like a parallel world that you go into. You go to work, and then you go in a door and you come out another door, and you're in a roller skating world. All your languages, roller skating terminology, speak and friends, you find a divide in your friends, those that are skaters and those that aren't, which is fun because you've got two pools of people to go to for various things. It's fun trying to move friends into your roller skating friends because they've seen you do it, you're all of similar age. Oh my god, okay. Fee's done this now, fee's done that now. I might give it a go, I might give it a go. Phi will be with me, fee will help me this, help me do that. And so that's happened a couple of times on my journey. Some other friends of mine have come along. They may not be as dedicated, but they get the vibe and the social aspect of it. Who knew you'd be skating around to Mary J. Blige at 50 years old on roller skates? Who knew? Or dance hall for that matter? I mean, or soaker. But all of that on skates is you haven't seen us at Nottinghill Carnival every year on roller skates. Get to know us. We're there for the whole day on skates or being around.

SPEAKER_00 39:47

That sounds amazing. So before we wrap up, thank you so much for that. That's amazing, and it's such a different perspective than we would maybe expect. But before we wrap up, tell me in a word or two what movement means to you.

SPEAKER_01 40:03

I think movement is elasticity in that sometimes you can only go so far and you rebound. Sometimes you can go even further and still rebound. Sometimes you can be stretched and never gain your original shape. I think movement can be it can be many things. It doesn't just have to be about a physical getting A to B. It can be something within your conscious being that has allowed maybe other opinions, other thoughts in that has created movement in your mind. In the same way, movement can also be a mania of the mind because it's constantly moving in a manic state. So it can be many things in many scenarios, and isn't just limited to what the definition is in the dictionary.

SPEAKER_00 41:02

So true. I love that. Thank you so much, Free. This has been amazing, and I really appreciate you taking the time. Anytime, bye for now. Fiona defines movement as elasticity, not just the physical kind, though she knows that better than most. She means the kind where life pulls you in a direction you didn't choose and you stretch with it. Sometimes you come back to yourself, sometimes you come back changed, and sometimes you don't come back to who you were at all. The question she leaves us with isn't really about skating. It's about which kind of stretch you're in right now and whether you're fighting it or going with it. Because here's what stood out. Fiona didn't gradually ease into this new life. She saw something on a Tuesday and had skates on her feet by Friday. There's something to be said for acting before the doubt has had time to unpack its bags. So think about the thing you've been circling, the class, the group, the hobby, the conversation. Give yourself a three-day rule. Not three months, three days. And yet she told us that 60% of her learning happens before she even laces up. In her head, watching rewinding, slowing things down to half speed, speed and stillness, working together. That's not a skating technique. That's a life skill most of us haven't been taught to balance. So before you write off a thing you haven't mastered yet, ask yourself, how much of your learning is actually happening in the quiet moments you're not counting? Fiona also said something quietly radical. She can teach a mood better than she can do it herself. Which means the thing you're still figuring out might be exactly the thing someone else needs you to share. You don't have to have arrived to show someone the way. Think about what you know that you've been keeping to yourself, waiting until you feel qualified enough to offer it. And perhaps the most uncomfortable thought to sit with, the algorithm only ever shows you what you've already looked for. The life you haven't imagined yet is invisible to it. Hiona's world existed for years before she walked past it. Whole communities, whole versions of herself, waiting just outside the frame. So this week, actively search for one thing completely outside your usual world. Not because you're looking for anything specific, just to see what the algorithm has been hiding from you. Because sometimes the stretch finds you, and sometimes you have to go looking for it. So before you go, I've got news. Something's coming that I've never done before, and honestly, I cannot wait. The women of this podcast and in my group inspired it. Their stories of movement, fearlessness, curiosity, and growth. And women who show up every single week without fail, who push through when things get hard, and who say yes before they feel ready, and who surprise themselves. Together, they've inspired something special. For the very first time, I'm hosting the Grit and Grace Games, one day created especially for midlife women. Built around one question. What are you actually capable of? Not what the world thinks you're capable of. I think the answer is going to blow your mind. Head over to gritandracegames.com to find out more and start getting ready because this one's just for you. If this episode resonated, please take a moment to leave a review. It means more than you know and helps other women find their way here. Share this with someone who's in the middle of their own stretch. And come over and find us on Instagram at unshinkable midlife moves. I'd love to know where you are and yours. Until next time.