“I think people were putting their own insecurities and their own misconceptions into the commercial, but they weren’t really there,” Chris Porta, a Virginia-based Air Traffic Controller who has been a Peloton member since July 2018, tells PEOPLE.
Wieland — who has been a member since December 2018 — adds, “There’s no better investment than being able to have something that can take care of your health.”“In 2018, I had a pretty severe [MS] relapse that started in August,” says Wieland. “I was hospitalized three or four times. And I got out of the hospital, I think in November. At Thanksgiving, I could only walk about three steps. In December, I started to walk a little bit more.
“After bringing her home, most people assume that everything’s fine — and that is like the furthest thing from the truth,” says Hughes. “She came home on oxygen and machines that were monitoring her, and then we ended up getting a feeding tube. This whole process, it completely changed self-care for me.”
“It has been such a lifesaver for me,” she says. “It was never about losing weight or anything like that. For me it was always just about feeling good and working out makes me feel good.”She’s also a member of several Peloton Facebook groups, including Black Girl Magic: The Peloton Edition, she tells PEOPLE.Sabrina Kasner, a member of Peloton since March 2019, like Hughes, finds the ease of having fitness equipment at her home crucial.
And like Hughes and Wieland, Kasner has found support online in a Peloton group just for riders who battled breast cancer.