My name is Therese, and I write books where I tell the honest truth about things that fascinate me. Usually along the lines of “what did ladies use before ‘extra-absorption with wings was invented?” and “how much arsenic needs to be eaten to maintain a blooming complexion?”
Today, the thing I’m fascinated with and the thing I want to write the honest truth about, is Brittney.
There are a lot of people on the internet who want you to believe they can “fix” you. I think a lot of them are creepy, to be honest. Of all the people in history who’ve claimed to save human souls only One ever made a go of it and He could walk on water. Many lifestyle guides want you to believe they can, too.
But we’re all human; we all sink unless we’ve been taught to swim. And learning to swim is a long, terrifying process for some people, requiring courage, commitment, and a little bit of faith.
Brittney is different because she won’t pretend there is any other way to cross that water.
You may not see it at first. She has the same beauty: she glows bright in the same artful photography (plenty of white spaces and symmetrical kitchen appliances!) She radiates promise: you know she’s done well, and she kindles the hope in you that maybe you could do well, also. All that is true, but those pretty women with plans for success are a dime a dozen today. Why would you pick Brittney out of the tangle of people vying to improve you?
I picked her because she was the only employee at the gym who got my jokes the first day I trundled my 100lb overweight body in. I had a prejudice against attractive people, suspecting they never had the need in their easy lives to build a personality. I didn’t expect to connect with a trainer.
But I kept picking her each week. Each week she’d show more of herself, warts and glory all together. I’d swear a string of pure depravity directed right at her, more than once accusing her of bathing in the tears of her clients to maintain her youth. And she full body laughed each time, then told me to shut up and keep working.
“I’m stopping!” I’d exhaled in an airless shriek. That particular day she’d laid me upside down on some sort of steel monstrosity that looked specifically designed for grown-up spanking sessions, my legs shaking and refusing to extend that final push against their 20lb weights.
“No, you’re not,” she says calmly. “It’s the final five seconds of pain where new strength is built.”
It wasn’t so much the wisdom of the statement, which I’ve since applied to every challenge that hurts or scares me…it was that she knew it was the right thing to say to me. And to follow it with a grin and, “See? You were a big swearing crybaby for nothing.” When I’d succeeded.
That’s whatIneeded. The sweet older lady trying to get her pre-surgery strength back, she needed something different, more cheer and pep, and Brittney had it. The uber-competent 20-something wanting to have Michelle Obama arms in time for graduation, she knew that girl needed a little more drill sergeant. And none of these women got a fake Brittney. That’s so important,friends.
They got a Brittney who recognized them and had enough depth inside of her to provide for each a real, personally tailored experience. Brittney’s emotional intelligence is high, and she reads people, their needs and their weaknesses very well. It’s really annoying. But useful in her particular field.
I her chose again, to guide me through the most hated thing in my world. I learned after a devastating television appearance that my career was going to stall if I didn’t make myself more camera friendly. It was time to lose weight. I gave up on diets 10 years ago and had a happy, if slightly achy and waddling life, without them. But I was growing, my standard of “ok” was changing.
Brittney does growth better than anyone I have ever met. She craves it. She does not like to stand still.
And thus I stomped through the cozy art installation she calls a house and said, “Fine…give me your stupid ‘Omptimeda’ diet. (Not it’s actual name but what I actually call it).
I argued that the weight was coming off too fast, she produced legit science words I can’t remember nor pronounce (and I pride myself on words) to explain the science of fat burn vs. starvation. I argued all diets fail. She had 100s of counter-examples. I argued that it was stupid to decorate your dining table with a trough of giant twine balls. Easy to diet when you’re giant table is full of TWINE. She said they were awesome, shut up, and she’s not taking decorating advice from a woman who framed her grandma’s drawers and hung them in the guest room. Till all I could do was truculently take home a box of weirdo granola bars and instant mashed potatoes and…watch weight come off.
The Bottom Line, friends. If you need to be coddled, don’t seek Brittney. She will support, not baby. If you need to be lied to because truth will shatter you, don’t seek Brittney. She won’t tear you to pieces but she’s not going to insult your intelligence with saccharine lies and belittling head-pats.
If you want an angelic, ethereal guru to help you grow, don’t seek Brittney. She grew up shoveling bark chips with the boys at her Dad’s shop; she knows all the best cusses and swears, but the woman loves Jesus and she doesn’t use them unless provoked.
Don’t seek Brittney if you want a service robot for whom no one exists but you. Brittney is real, and she’s excited in make you a part of the beautiful life she created for her and her family. Brittney does not close her office door unless utterly necessary: her four year old son may need to tell her something very important about his Lego and the woman has the right priorities.
Other things you should know:
Brittney does not dress as a sexy kitty cat, bunny, or cowgirl for Halloween. She dresses as Slash.
I do not believe she owns any pant-suits…they are hard to sweat in, and Brittney holds few virtues higher than sweat.
Brittney feels entitled to nothing, but deserving of everything, as long as the aforementioned sweat is part of the journey toward it. You need to be ready to make peace with discomfort, work, and challenges, or you won’t fit together, you and her.
We’re all human, and some of us haven’t yet learned to swim this lake of life. We dog paddle, we tread, we even begin to drown. Brittney will help you. She will hold a supporting hand under you and tell you how to increase the power of your strokes and the productivity of your kicks. But only you can do the actual swimming.
The stuff you will see on this site, all the stuff that seems beautiful and perfect, that’s real, I’ve seen it. That’s the way she wanted it and that’s the way she made it. Her husband really is a handsome friendly go-getter. Her kids really are smart and adorable. They really do lay the cement for their Industrial sized American Flag themselves and they really do host clay-pigeon shooting parties that ROCK. Brittney really is beautiful, wealthy, healthy, and ready to smile.
But she made the choices to be that way. Tough, rough, and passionate choices.
If you are ready to make those sorts of choices, meet the best guide available for the next chapter of your life.
-Therese Oneill, NYT Bestselling Author of Unmentionable and Ungovernable
(not a paid endorsement).
Buy Therese's books by clicking here!
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