I went here today for an intro class and what I can say is my first experience …wasn’t it. I came early, had to buy some expensive socks (they were cute though lol), and then wasn’t attended to. I was told 3 times the instructor was going to call me personally, talk with me regarding my experience with Pilates, diagnoses, and any surgeries I’ve had. I noticed everyone had went back without me and I was still told to wait. Eventually I heard “she’s right here” and had to do my walk of shame to the class. Now, this is not in any way a review of what the instructor knows but a review of their professionalism and judgment. Immediately once I met with the instructor, we discussed my prior experience with Pilates and immediately felt judged on based on her responses to my knowledge on what type, being told “you should know if you took it”, and when discussing why I chose to do Pilates (wanting to be more active, get healthier, enjoying it prior), we had then discussed diagnosis where I do have chronic pain among others to which I was told “You just need to be active” and then dismissed and the intro class started. It seemed as though the only person being called out for any mistakes being made was me, all other girls being complimented or nothing was said to. If I didn’t get to something immediately or moved slightly slower or too fast to grab something, I was immediately called out. There was a point where we were doing arms and had to use yellow bands. I knew what to use, however, the purple band was stuck on the yellow one and I was untangling them only to hear, out loud in front of the entire class, “No Jayde, we’re using yellow, not purple”. I was ignoring the comments up until then and told her “I know that, the purple was stuck on it”, got ignored and she had reiterated the instructions, only looking in my direction. At this point, I was ready for the class to be over but continued. Once back on the reform table, I was getting my feet in the loops and before I could even do so, the instructor condescendingly told me “ya know what? I’m just gonna help you” and did it for me and walked away while out loud making a comment about “safety”.
Even if I was doing something wrong or my form had been wrong, I wouldn’t mind being corrected nicely and shown the proper way rather than being called out and just told I’m wrong.
Each experience or comment made towards me also seemed unfair due to seeing others doing things similar or the same way. Once class ended, it seemed like positive interactions between the other girls who took the class and the instructor while as I walked past before leaving, I got a comment from the instructor saying “yeah I’m sure that was hard wasn’t it?”
Needless to say, I didn’t sign up for a membership and won’t be coming back. Overall, the experience felt judgmental, condescending, and like I just didn’t belong there.
Now I’m not skinny, I have tons of tattoos, and wore some joggers instead of yoga pants, came in with a hoodie (that I had taken off anyway), and didn’t come with a group of girls with me, and just overall felt like I was being judged for being me, looking a certain way, being a certain weight, or not being perfect up to the Blue Bell standards. While I hope that’s not the case, I won’t be back regardless of how much I enjoy Pilates and can find other ways of being involved in Pilates, yoga, and utilizing my gym.