Madeleine Schaper
My name is Madeleine Schaper. I am a Certified Holistic Health Coach.
My Mission: To coach, educate and inspire anyone on a their health journey. To provide tools and resources for anyone in a caregiver role to enable successfully achieving their personal goals to maintain their own wellbeing.
I Believe:
Health and Wellness is a journey and not a destination.
Everyday is a new opportunity! It’s a daily choice to make ourselves a priority.
Balance is key but is always changing.
Perfection is doing your best.
In leading by example, even in my imperfections.
We are all in this together.
Be KIND. This is all inclusive, even yourself!
Change needs to be sustainable. There are no quick fixes.
Our bodies are complex and fascinating machines. Seek to understand and listen to what it is telling you. Pay attention.
Care for yourself as you care for others!
Always have GOALS! Back those goals up with a plan. Otherwise they are just desires.
“Put yourself at the top of your to-do list every single day and the rest will fall into place.“ – Unknown
My Experience
Journey in Health and Wellness
My story…
Like so many of us, I have struggled with my physical and mental well being throughout my life. I have found myself both overweight and underweight. I have have lived with chronic pain and struggled with depression and anxiety.
Along with the struggles I have also achieved so much. I learned so much about healthy eating habits; I’ve gained strength through solid functional training techniques; I’ve gaining endurance and cardiovascular ability through running. I have found what works for me through education, training and good old trial and error.
Sometimes it’s the little things and sometimes it takes a big shift to get to where you need to be. It’s easier to course correct with small changes. But sometimes it takes more drastic changes to get you back on track. I’ve been in both places. I’ve had to make some tough calls and made more drastic life alterations to get my health back. I’ve had great support of family, friends, trainers and coaches.
I knew over 20 years ago I wanted to be a health coach. I thought I had to be the perfect case study. I know now that health is more than what the scale reads and the absence of pain and illness. It is a balance of physical, mental, spiritual wellbeing and it is a life long journey. Today I know I have the tools to make the choices to maintain my health and wellness every day. That is why I created Daily Choice Wellness.
Caregiver
My life as a caregiver…
Being a caregiver can be part of our nature. My nature tends to be to put others first. Family, friends, house and home, and business are all competing priorities. Then you factor in family that require more care, the demands can be stressful and debilitating if we let it. When I was young, I self-appointed myself “my brother’s keeper” of a brother who struggled with mental illness. Years later I had the honor of caring for both my parents through the end of their lives. My father suffered from Alzheimer’s and my mother from cancer.
I wasn’t alone in my role of family caregiver. I had a lot of support from family, friends and even employer. (At the time of my parents care needs, I worked for a home health care provider) I was surrounded by support. But the lessons learned can be hard ones. While the support was there in many ways, I did not seek out or embrace fully the support needed to thrive during this time. So I just survived. The result was that my physical and mental wellbeing suffered.
I recognize that I gained so much during these times. But I also suffered. My passion is to provide people with with the tools and resources to thrive during these times. It is a gift to be able to care for the ones we love. But we have to be able to care for ourselves as well.
Career Theme
My career: An evolution…
This is not meant to be a resume but rather a highlight of a few themes in my career.
I started off my career in human resources and recruiting. For me it was about bringing people together with the right opportunity. I also was very focused on building the right team for the benefit of the company and the team.
Over time it became clear to me the I wanted to try to make things work in the best way possible. That is when I became fascinating with technology and processes. Putting technology and processes in place to make things work better and solve a problem. Technology was fun for me because I like understanding cause and effect. Understanding how the parts of things worked together as a whole.
My skills and knowledge evolved into project management and strategic planning. Taking a vision, envisioning the roadmap and building a plan to get there. And of course executing on the plan to make it happen! But it is not as simple and clear cut as that. There are many obstacles in the way, many influences that alter priorities. Adjustments need to be made along the way to address new information, changing priorities and differing conditions. Doing that create results that are to the benefit of all involved.
Finding Purpose: Whenever I embarked on a new opportunity, I always look for the purpose in it. Who was it benefiting? How would I grow? What can I contribute to others? This was my attempt to always find purpose in the work I do. That is what leads me to Daily Choice Wellness. My own health and wellness journey along with my desire to help others achieve their own health goals even when faced with competing priorities; this is my purpose.
Certificates
