"GOD GAVE YOU ONE BODY, SO YOU BETTER TAKE CARE OF IT.”

This was Grandma Rose’s mantra all her life (who lived to be 94 years old). She passed it on to my mother as a core value, and my mother passed it on to me. It is now my life’s passion and the reason behind One Body.

Thanks to my grandmother and my mom, I’ve always had an appreciation for health and fitness, but my journey of whole health didn’t begin until I was in the eighth grade. I was carrying extra weight and wasn’t feeling like my best self. Towards the end of the year, I decided to do something about it. My mom joined a gym with me to make sure I was making changes the healthy way, and we embarked on the adventure together. That summer, my mom and I worked out five days a week and watched our portions. I started to become leaner and healthier, and I felt like my true self. My passion for health and fitness kicked into high gear, and my ears were truly open to all the things my grandmother always said about health and nutrition. It was then that I decided to devote my life to helping improve the lives of others.

After college, I worked as a Health Educator, teaching teens and adults with chronic illnesses how to manage their conditions through eating better and exercising, before managing corporate wellness programs for a large health care organization in Northern California. Soon after my son was born, I started a healthy-living mom blog and became a Certified Personal Trainer and a CrossFit Coach. I blogged during my son’s nap times. I coached CrossFit and did personal training in the early mornings and evenings. Inspiring my readers and clients to embrace holistic healthy living truly energized me! I also partnered with Juice Plus+, a whole-food nutrition company that shared my vision of inspiring healthy living.

Our family eventually moved back to my hometown of Linden and I opened a little garage gym. After growing my gym for five years, my husband and I decided the time was right to build our home that would also house a full-scale health and fitness center for our small town. This all-in-one space enables me and my husband to give our kids the country life we were both fortunate to experience, as well as to create One Body, a welcoming, health-focused space that inspires our community to become better versions of themselves. It has always been my goal to help others honor and take care of their ONE BODY so they can improve their health and achieve their fitness goals. To see it all come together makes me so happy and forever grateful to my Grandma Rose for sharing her wisdom enabling me to share it with you.

Hope to see you soon!

Melissa Cheney