Related
•
CoSIDA Goodwill & Wellness Committee
•
Communicators Outside the Lines Feature Series
This is the next profile in a series entitled
Communicators Outside the Lines: Better Yourself, Better Your Community produced by the CoSIDA Goodwill & Wellness Committee. Read past profiles at
CoSIDA.com/CommunicatorsOTL.
WE NEED YOUR IDEAS!
If you have any ideas for this series, which will revolve around CoSIDA member volunteerism and health and wellness, please contact Goodwill and Wellness Committee chair
Chris Mitchell, Washington University in St. Louis Assistant AD for Communications, at (618) 560-9280 or
mitchell@wustl.edu.
Q&A with Maddie Heaps
Eastern Michigan University, Athletic Media Relations Graduate Assistant
by Tommy Chasanoff – University of the Cumberlands, Sports Information Director
CoSIDA Goodwill and Wellness Committee member
Maddie Heaps is entering her second year as a graduate assistant at Eastern Michigan University, where she serves as the main contact for track and field and cross country. Heaps, who is originally from California, graduated from UC Berkeley and talks about her transition of moving away and her health and fitness journey over the past year and a half.
Q: Why did you want to get into sports information and how did you get started in the profession?
Heaps: Sports information was definitely something that fell into my life unexpectedly. After creating a sport-specific manager program at my high school to keep myself involved with sports without having to play one, I was looking for the next step to take when I started at the Univesity of California, Berkeley for my collegiate career. My assistant AD at my high school made a call to my former boss, Herb Benenson, and asked if he'd be willing to take on an unpaid intern for the school year. As luck would have it, I fell in love with the profession from the first day I started (a day before my first freshman courses began) and did not leave the Ath. Comm office at Berkeley until I graduated in May of 2018. I give huge credit for my love of this field to Mara Rudolph, who took me under her wing, nurtured me with tough love and incredible experience, and was there for me from breakups to my dad dying, trying to find a post-graduation opportunity to growing my skills within our profession. Without her support and the support of my former bosses at Cal, I would not have the love for this field that I do each and every day. I feel incredibly lucky that my first experiences with our field came in an office like the one at UC Berkeley.
Q: You have made tremendous strides to improve your health over the past year, what is your motivation and what activities do you take part in?
Heaps: Changing my body physically and my mindset came out of necessity — I had moved across the country to a brand new environment where I knew no one and truly felt lost for the first time in my life. I had no one to depend on to make me happy; I could no longer just run home (Berkeley, Calif. and my hometown, Alameda, Calif. are 9.7 miles apart) whenever I was having a bad day. Knowing I was desperate to make this job opportunity work, I knew I had to make some changes.
I started slow, purchased a subscription to the app Noom, which focuses on your relationship with food and your body using psychological tricks and knowledge, and went on a healthy grocery shopping trip. As time went on, I found a type of exercise that I loved and committed to it. Orangetheory Fitness (a High-Intensity Interval Training group workout) was something I was familiar with before moving to Michigan, but I finally put the real effort needed to see real change, from attending classes regularly to connecting with other members and staff. I tried to take things as much as I could day-by-day and focused on small changes rather than restriction and quick fixes. It also really helped to be open and honest with others about the journey I was on. I was constantly sharing progress photos, photos after workouts, etc. on my fitness Instagram (give it a follow,
@__thegirlwho (two underscores) and was sharing the honest struggles I went through on my twitter account. A lot of hard work later, I am finally in a place where I can appreciate myself, my hard work, and the strides I've made since moving 2,000 miles away from home at age 22.
At the end of the day, the biggest change I made was changing my relationship with myself. I stopped hating everything about who and what I was and how it "didn't fit in" with what anyone else was doing and started to embrace the weird and unique person I am blessed by the universe to be.
Heaps (left) with members of the Eastern Michigan staff at the 2018 Camellia Bowl including Greg Steiner, Katie Gonzalez and Alex Jewell.
Q: How do you make the time to work out around your work/school schedule? How do you stay motivated and balance everything during busy times of the year?
Heaps: As a GA and with a full-time position at Eastern, time was definitely and is still to this day limited. I knew that long hours were a part of this job when I signed up for it, but didn't account for the fact I'd want to make such a huge life change on a physical and mental wellness journey. The biggest thing I did was shift my mindset from having to "find the time" to wanting to make the time to take care of myself. For me, that means working out before work, quickly showering and eating breakfast, and heading straight into the office with a large coffee and endorphin-induced smile on my face. There are still days when my motivation fades, but now that I am in the routine of spending time every single day taking care of myself, it is second nature to me. I no longer rely on motivation, but instead, I rely on self-awareness and the constant routine I've set up for myself to make sure I put myself first each and every day.
Schedule in the things you need to be the best version of yourself every day, whether it's reading a book, getting a workout in, talking with a friend, or grabbing a cup of your favorite caffeinated beverage. And then, just like any meeting you make with someone else or commitment you sign up for, do it. Do these things for yourself. Put yourself first. Make an appointment with yourself just as important as an appointment with your boss. If you miss it, give yourself some compassion and try again tomorrow. When it's really not working (think about the definition of insanity here), try something new. Re-evaluate why you keep missing the appointments you make with yourself and make avoiding those times harder than just going and doing them.
I like to think of it in simple terms: if I do not fill up my own cup, how the heck am I going to help anyone else fill up their's when mine is sitting there empty? I made a commitment to myself to love myself and who I am, and who I am needs working out and nutritious foods to be the best version of Maddie Heaps when I enter the office each day.
Q: You recently lost your father, how have you managed to deal with those tough times especially while balancing working in sports information with an erratic schedule?
Heaps: At first, I didn't deal with the tough times — I went into survival mode. Yes, I went to therapy and changed unhealthy habits, but it was just so I could get myself out of bed every day and live life. I threw myself into my work, never really taking a break and constantly burying myself in tasks so I could forget about what I was feeling. It took moving away, being uncomfortable and having nothing to lean back on, to really kick myself into gear to make big and necessary changes. Sometimes the universe needs to give you a swift push off the edge of a cliff to realize the changes that need to be made in your life.
I STILL struggle every single day — I miss my father with every fiber of my being and wish he could see the life I live now and how much I have grown since he passed. I dislike thinking about it this way, but it really took losing my dad to become the best version of myself, to realize that I am worth loving and taking care of, and I wish he could see this person I am now. I spend each and every moment knowing that if I'm taking care of myself, living an authentic-to-me lifestyle and caring for others, that is what would make my father so happy and proud of me as he looks down with his half-diet coke half-regular coke with a smile on his face.
Q: What are your goals for yourself this school year both personally (health) and professionally?
Heaps: This next year, I am hoping to be able to find just a touch more balance in my life. As someone who classifies herself as a person who does everything whole-assed (thanks, Ron Swanson), I can easily drown myself and my focus on one thing and forget about the other parts of my life that are just as important to me — showing myself more self-love and appreciation for what I accomplish is the biggest thing I hope to work on. As always, I want to CRUSH my benchmark times in the gym (9:30 mile, you're next!), keep lifting heavy weights, and sharing my story and my struggles with others so no one feels alone. Professionally, I want to become a better listener rather than speaker — be more present and observant to the little things my student-athletes do each and every day so that I can better tell their stories to the greater public.
Click here to learn more about CoSIDA's Goodwill and Wellness initiatives and find out how YOU can get involved.