414: Am I Competing In A Bodybuilding Show?

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps After Babies Radio Episode 414.

Hello and welcome to Biceps After Babies Radio. A podcast for ladies who know that fitness is about so much more than pounds lost or PR's. It's about feeling confident in your skin and empowered in your life. I'm your host Amber Brueseke, a registered nurse, personal trainer, wife and mom of four. Each week my guests and I will excite and motivate you to take action in your own personal fitness as we talk about nutrition, exercise, mindset, personal development and executing life with conscious intention. If your goal is to look, feel and be strong and experience transformation from the inside out, you my friend are in the right place. Thank you for tuning in. Now, let's jump into today's episode.

Hey, hey, hey, welcome back to another episode of Biceps After Babies Radio. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke, and today is going to be a little bit of a chit-chat. I don't have a firm outline. I'm just going to kind of sit down and talk to you about some of the things that have been on my mind and some of the things that I'm thinking about for the future. So you can just imagine that we're hanging out at the gym and we're chatting in between reps and sets, and you kind of ask me, what's going on? And this is what I would chat with you about. 

By this point, you've already seen the title of the podcast episode, and I am not going to answer the question right out of the gate. So I'm going to string you on for a little bit longer, but I really want you to understand what has gone into this idea, this goal, this dream, and kind of take you along for the ride because it's been a little bit of a ride. And where I'm going to start the story is actually all the way back in 2020. Because in 2020, during a Ask Me Anything on Instagram, somebody asked me a question and I responded and answered it on Instagram. And I actually have a screenshot of this story.

Evolving Mindset and Initial Exposure to Bodybuilding 02:06

So I went back in my archives and I pulled it up. And the question was asked, would you ever do a bikini competition? Let me read my answer to that question. I said, nope. And here's why. One, I have a healthy body image and I don't want to screw it up. I have seen too many competitors get really lean and then struggle moving forward, always comparing their body to their leanest. I don't need that. Two, while I see the appeal and the challenge that a competition provides, I don't think I could get to the body fat percentage I would need to get to in what I would deem healthy. And when fitness becomes unhealthy, I'm out. Three, being judged subjectively on how I look isn't for me. Ask me to do something with my body that's objective, like picking up a heavy bar and I'm game. But trying to please a subjective judge based off of the look of my body, nope. And I finished it saying, just to be clear, you can set any goal you want to in your life. That's none of my business to judge. That's just why I won't ever do a bikini competition. And I followed through on that. 

Since 2020, I've done a lot of CrossFit competitions, a lot of performance competitions, but I never really thought about doing a bodybuilding competition until a little over a year ago. So what happened? What changed? Well, last spring I did what I called Cut With Me. So I wanted to do a six-week cut and I thought it would be really fun to bring people along for the ride in real time, like a reality TV show where you got to watch me actually cut in real time. And every week, I uploaded a video and talked about my data. I talked about how I was managing things, my mental game. I talked about meal prep and what I was eating. And I showed all of my stats, all of my data. It was a really fun opportunity to be able to take a lot of you along for the ride in that cut. Now, if you're like, oh my gosh, I'm so sad I missed that. It still is available for purchase. You can go to bicepsafterbabies.com/watchmycut. And it is a really cool experience. People told me it was really fun to actually see it executed in real life. The real messiness of a cut. So I did that last spring. And when I was in that cut, I found myself on bodybuilder TikTok. I think the algorithm knows what you're doing. And I was being fed a lot of this content from other bodybuilders. And it was so interesting. I actually really enjoyed watching it. It gave me really good ideas for my cut of ways that I can manage hunger and deal with things. And I really enjoyed the content. And it was the first time really ever that the thought popped into my head of, hey, maybe this is something that I would like to do in the future.

Building Muscle and Embracing the Process 04:34

But I really didn't take it any further than that. And then last fall, I had a friend who let me know that she was doing a bikini competition. She had competed years ago, you know, had then had kids and kids got older and she wanted to get back into it. So she's a little bit older than me, but I got to watch, you know, kind of from a distance as she went through prep and then she invited me to her show day and I got to go and cheer her on. And it was really fun to be there. And honestly, a little bit of a different experience than maybe I even thought it was going to be. I think in the past I have, you know, seen women up in bikinis. You're not covering very much in your bikini and thought, oh, I don't know if I could ever feel confident or comfortable standing up in front of a whole bunch of people wearing nothing but like a skimpy swimsuit. But when I was there, it was so much less, less like voyeuristic than I initially thought. And it was just really cool to see women of all ages and all body shapes and musculature to get up there and have their spot in the limelight and be able to show off the hard work that they had put in over months and months and months of building muscle and lifting weights and hard days. And it was really inspiring. And when we finished that competition, my friend, you know, kind of like jokingly was like, you're next. Like you could totally do something like this. And at that point I was like, you know what? I could do something like this. I don't know if I want to do something like this, but I absolutely feel like I could do it. I am capable of doing it. And maybe it might be more fun than I initially had thought. 

So that was last fall. And, you know, during, back up a little bit, during my cut, when I did that six week cut last spring, I also realized at the end of that cut that I had less muscle mass than I really thought that I had. And this is an experience that a lot of competitors have, a lot of women have, where you feel like you have a lot of muscle. You look in the mirror and you're like, Oh, you know, I have a good amount of muscle. And then you lose the fat that's over the muscle. And you realize, Oh, actually a lot of that was fat. It wasn't actually as much muscle as I thought. And that was my experience during my cut last year. And so in order to work on that, I decided to go into a build and, or a bulk. And I increased my calories and I really started, I kind of halfway did it the end of last year, but I really started in January saying, No, I'm going to get really serious about this. I'm going to start tracking everything. I'm going to really push my calories and track my weights and make sure that I'm actually in a surplus to really grow. And so from January of 2026 to June of 2026, I did my own programming. I managed my own calories and I was able to put on about six pounds over that six month period of time, which is a good rate of gain for a good solid build. 

The goal always, when you're going into a build or a bulk is to put on as much muscle mass as possible while limiting the amount of fat that you're putting on. You're never going to be able to not add fat. That's just not how it works. But the goal is to limit that amount of fat. And so I felt like my rate of gain where I saw progress in the gym, the progress I was seeing in my physique and the six pounds that I was adding to the scale was all trending in the right direction. I was doing pretty well with this. And then in June, I decided to take four weeks off and do a four week cut just to kind of see where we were at. Again, I've done this build and now let's cut and see what we actually are working with. And I did a four week cut. And towards the end of that, I was just like, I'm enjoying this. This is fun. Not the cut itself, but just the process of building, adding calories, adding muscle mass, then having this cut process to be able to reveal what it is that I've been able to build. 

Addressing Past Concerns and Bodybuilding Divisions 08:35

And I started thinking more and more and more about doing a show. And maybe that is something that I would like to do. And it just was like this little thought in the back of my mind that just kind of kept coming up and kept coming up. And the more I toyed with it, the more I got a little bit more comfortable with the idea. And some of those reasons that I had back in 2020, they don't quite apply the same way or I don't think about them the same way. I have a really good relationship with my body. And I think back then I was worried because I hadn't always had a good relationship with my body. I think I was worried back then that I was too close to that time period when my relationship wasn't great with my body that if I was going to lose a lot of weight, then I would go back to that bad relationship with my body. I'm at the point now that I just, I have enough time. I have enough confidence in myself. I have enough confidence in my body. I've gone through lots of different phases of different sizes and shapes of my body that I just don't have that fear anymore that I'm going to develop a bad relationship with my body or a bad relationship with food. I feel like both of those are really strong and I'm not worried about them going the wrong way. 

I also think my concern about the healthiness of going into a bodybuilding competition is very legit, especially the further you go in the divisions. And I don't know how much you know about bodybuilding division. It's okay if you don't know anything. I didn't know anything either, but there are different divisions that you can compete in. And as you go up in musculature, you tend to go down also in leanness. And so it's a lot more extreme the further you go in competition. So at the very bottom, it's not hierarchical, but at the very beginning of the bodybuilding divisions is a new division that it's actually called the fit model. And that came out last year. It's a brand new division, but it is the least muscular of the divisions for the females. And it is also the least lean right now. You're still lean. Listen, you're still lean, but it is the least lean of all the divisions. Next you have bikini, which again, a little bit more musculature, a little leaner. Then you have, well, in the middle is wellness, which is more of a developed lower body. But again, it's a lot bigger and it's leaner. Then you have women's figure, which again, a lot bigger, more muscle, a lot leaner. Then you have women's physique, more muscle, lean. And then you have women's bodybuilding. Once you get up really even into the figure, definitely into the physique and the bodybuilding, now we're talking about quite a bit of steroid use in order to achieve the amount of muscle that you need for these upper level divisions. 

But I'm not talking about competing in any of those. This new division of fit model is a much more realistic, achievable look without steroids, without peptides, without any enhancements. And it's an achievable, maintainable, not maintainable. I wouldn't say maintainable. It's an achievable physique without going too far into the really unhealthy category. So that concern that I had about it really being super unhealthy, there's this area that I feel like can kind of be that area where it is a challenge. You're going to have to push yourself to achieve the level of muscularity and the leanness required to compete in fit model without it pushing so far into the really, really low body fat percentage that's required for some of the upper level divisions. So that's a little bit different than I thought it was. And then my third point of back in 2020, where I was worried about being judged subjectively, you know, it's still a fair point. However, the more I've been around the sport, the more I start to understand what it is that the judges are specifically looking for. There is criteria. Of course, it is a subjective measurement, but it's also part of the fun. It's also part of the sport to create a look, right? And that's what bodybuilding is. It's about building your body, using exercises at the gym, building muscle in certain places to be able to shape the body the way that you want to shape it. Like that's part of the fun of it.

Changing Mindsets and Deciding to Explore Bodybuilding 12:43

So all of those reasons that I had back in 2020 were totally valid. And I really felt that way back then. And you know what? I've changed my mind and I don't feel quite the same way anymore. And I started to have this just like little thought in the back of my head of what if I did this? What if I competed? Maybe it would be fun. I'm always looking for a challenge. And so this could be a great way to challenge myself. So as I was ending the four-week cut that I did in June, towards the end of June, and I was thinking about, okay, well, what do I want to do for the back half of the year? Right? I cut, or I did this bulk, did this short mini cut. What do I want to do for the rest of the year? And the thought was, well, if I really do want to do a show, I probably still need to build some muscle. And so I probably need to do at least, you know, six months more of a build. And that timing kind of works out well because it puts us towards the end of the year, starting prep in January. And then usually prep is like a five plus months, five, six month process to be able to get as lean as you need to get in order to then step on stage. And that, so that timing kind of worked out in my mind. And as I was ending this cut, thinking about going into a build, obviously I all my programming, I did manage all my calories and things in the beginning of the year. And I could certainly do that at the end of the year, but I don't know what I don't know when it comes to the sport of bodybuilding. I know a lot about performance. I know a lot about programming. I know a lot about macros and titrating calories and things like that. And I know my body really well, but I don't know the sport of bodybuilding. And so I realized if I really want to explore this and take the next step in the journey, then that's going to look like getting a coach, hiring someone who actually knows what they're doing when it comes to this sport. So I can, you know, I can provide the knowledge that I have about my body and about training and things like that, but having somebody who they know the sport, they know bodybuilding to be able to guide me through these next six months and, and then maybe into a prep in the next year. 

Deciding to Take the Next Step Without Committing to a Show 14:41

And I went back and forth with this because, and this is a point that I really want to hammer home because as I was thinking about this, my mind started saying, well, if you hire a coach, then that's it. Like we're doing this, right? Like it's, it's buttoned up, right? You're committing now to doing a show. And I, and I just was not at the point where I am ready to say I am for sure a hundred percent doing a show next year. I just am not at that point. I am at the point that I want to explore it further that I've, I've tipped toed in towards it this year. And I want to take the next step but I really had to work with my brain because my brain really wanted to be like, okay, well, if you do this, then you're doing it. And if you're not sure if you're going to do it, then we shouldn't get a coach yet. And I really had to coach myself and say, no, I can actually, I can hire a coach. I can move in the direction of doing a show and I can decide at any point that I don't want to do it anymore. And that's okay. And the only way I'm going to know if I do want to make this commitment is to take the next step, even as scary as that felt. So I did. And I reached out to a coach and we went back and forth and I got signed up with her and I, I signed up for like the smallest package. So it's like a three-month package. Because again, I told her, I was really clear. I'm like, I'm tipping my toe into this. I'm not committing. I want to take the next step and I want to see if I like it. And if I like it and it's fun and it challenges me in a way that I get excited about, then I'll take the next step and the next step and the next step. But I don't want to commit and say that I am for sure going to do this because Hey, I may hate it. And if I hate it, I'm going to give myself permission to not do it. 

And I think this is a big place that people get stuck when it comes to goals is feeling like if you take one step, you have to take 15 steps and that's just not the way it works. You can take one step at a time and at any point you can decide it's not for you or you can change goals or you can change focuses or you can decide to do something different. And I think allowing myself that freedom to not feel like signing up for a coach while it felt like a big domino and to some extent it was right now I'm investing money. I'm investing time. I'm investing into a relationship like I'm putting my trust in someone's hands. So it is a, it is a bigger step than I've taken, but it also is the step that's going to tell me more about whether I want to do this long-term. Like how am I going to know if I actually want to do this if I never take those steps? And I feel like I have to decide the end from the beginning right out of the gate. It just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. So I'm really leaning into this. I'm just going to take the next step and then ask myself what the next step is and what the next step is. And I will continue to take next steps towards competing in my first bodybuilding show as long as I like it and as long as it's fun and as long as I'm enjoying the process. And that's not to say there won't be hard days. Of course, there's going to be days that you don't enjoy it, that it's hard, that it pushes you outside of your comfort zone, but that's part of the process. And that is a part of embracing the whole process is not just enjoying something on the good days, on the happy days, on the easy days, but enjoying something on the challenging days and the days that stretch you and the days that push you. 

The Value of Taking the First Step 17:59

So I think it's a good question to ask yourself, is there a goal that you've had in the back of your mind that feels overwhelming or feels really big and that maybe you haven't even started on that path or that process because it feels so overwhelming? And could there just be one step that you take? The first step. What is the first step that you can take? Because I promise you, you're going to learn more about yourself. You're going to learn more about the about if it's really what you want by taking that step and learning from the messiness of that first step than you ever are by sitting on the sidelines and trying to make the perfect decision. I can watch bodybuilding TikToks all day long. I don't actually know what it takes. I don't actually know what the process feels like or if I enjoy it or if it's fun until I start doing it. And I saw someone saying once that before you do a show, you want to live like a bodybuilder for a while so that you know that you actually like that lifestyle. You actually enjoy the lifestyle. You enjoy the discipline. You enjoy the monotony. You enjoy the pushing yourself. And if you don't enjoy that before you get into prep, you're going to be miserable during your five to six month prep where you're really digging deep to get the leanness that's required to step on stage. 

Current Training Plan and Focus Areas 19:12

So where am I right now? I am in a belt. I have a coach. She's doing my programming and my macros. And the plan right now is to build for at least six months. I need more delts. I need to grow more of the medial side of my glutes. I have some glute development, obviously, because I've been lifting for a really long time and I do a lot of power. But with more aesthetic and more aesthetic look, you need to build out the roundness of your glutes. And so that is doing more like glute mead work versus just glute max work. So that's what we're working on right now. So it's fun to have something to direct my attention to. We have programming that's focused on that. My lifting is really focused on building more of that capped delt and more of those side glutes. And then obviously, hamstrings as well becomes really important. When you're doing a fit model or a bikini competition, what you're really looking for is an hourglass shape and symmetry between the upper body and the lower body and then left to right as well. 

So I have some focus in my training over the next six months. And then towards the beginning of the year, that's when I will make the next decision. And I will say, do I want to do just a regular cut and get a lifestyle lean? Or do I actually want to commit to doing a bodybuilding show and entering into a prep, picking out a show date and doing the next step of the process? And I will save that decision for a little bit later when I get more information. But I will say, having been doing this for now, I don't know what, three-ish weeks, four-ish weeks, I am loving it. I'm enjoying the process. It's new. It's breathed new life into my training. It's breathed new life into my tracking and my focus and my goals. And it has challenged me in new ways that are really fun. I am somebody who I feel like the purpose of this life is to grow, to grow as humans, to grow as individuals. 

Health and Fitness as a Place for Personal Growth 21:15

And I think there are a couple of places that we grow the most. One, in relationship with other people. So I find there's a lot of growth that happens for me in my marriage relationship. Anytime you're putting two people together for 20 plus years, there's going to be challenges. There's going to be hardships. There's going to be things that you have to learn about yourself and how to interact with a partner. And I feel like that is a relationship that challenges me, that grows me a lot. I feel like it happens a lot in my relationship with my kids or in my parenting. Parenting is another area where I really feel challenged. I feel like there's a lot of growth. There's a lot of lessons that are handed to me as a parent. I feel that happens a lot in my business. And that has been a huge area of growth for me in order to continue to grow the business, to serve, to hire people, to have a team, to serve clients, build programs, market programs. All of those things have required me to grow exponentially as a human, as an individual, as a leader over the last 10 years. And then I also think the realm of health and fitness, and I'm not just talking about bodybuilding, but the realm of health and fitness is another area where there can be so much interpersonal growth because you're doing hard things. You're pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone. You're changing your behaviors. You're changing the way that you think. And it's one of the things I love about health and fitness is that it can be that area, that playground for growth to push you in ways that you wouldn't normally necessarily push yourself to grow in areas that you normally wouldn't grow in.

And that's where I really see bodybuilding fitting in for me. It's another area to play. It's another area to grow, to challenge myself, to see what I'm capable of, to have hard days that I push through, that I prove to myself that I can do hard things, that I can challenge myself and show up and keep going, even when it's really hard. And right now, at this point, that sounds really exciting. It sounds really fun. So I'm continuing the process. I'm taking it one day at a time. Will I compete next year? I don't know. We'll see. But I'm excited to continue taking steps and to continue exploring it and continuing to see if this is something that I want to do. 

Final Thoughts  23:35

And I will most certainly keep you posted. Definitely follow along on Instagram and on TikTok because I'll probably be sharing a lot more of the day-to-day content there. But that was also something that was really exciting was thinking, hey, if I do this new thing, it gives me some new content to share. It gives me fun things to talk about. It gives me new things to learn as a coach myself. It's a different experience being a client of somebody else coaching you. And I'm learning more about coaching from being a client. So there's a lot of fun things that I want to be able to share as I go through this process. But that's where I'm going to leave it. We will see. And I'm just taking one step at a time. That wraps up this episode of Biceps After Babies Radio. I'm Amber. Now go out and be strong because remember, my friend, you can do anything.

Outro

Hold up sister friend. Do you love Biceps After Babies Radio? If so, the best way to say thank you is to subscribe to the podcast and leave a review on iTunes. I know every podcaster wants you to leave a review, but it's because those reviews help the podcast to reach more people. And I do truly want to know what you think. If this particular episode resonated with you, will you also please share it? Either send the link to someone who would find it valuable or take a screenshot and post it to your social media and tell your friends and family why they should listen. Make sure you tag me at biceps.after.babies so I can hear your feedback and give you a little love. And you know, if you aren't already following me on Instagram or Facebook, that's the perfect time to hit that follow button. Thank you for being here and listening to Biceps After Babies Radio.