When you think of Turia Pitt, a few specific words instantly come to mind. Bestselling author. Resilience coach. Motivational speaker. Former mining engineer and elite endurance athlete. 

She is, by all traditional metrics, the ultimate definition of a hyper-achiever — a literal force of nature who has spent years inspiring the nation with her capacity to overcome the impossible.

Turia Pitt is a bestselling author. Image: Instagram/@turiapitt.

But behind the accolades and the public triumphs, Turia recently had to navigate a completely different kind of recovery journey. One that didn't involve physical rehab, but rather a profound unlearning of the intense pressure she has always placed on herself.

Sitting down with ex-professional netballer Liz Ellis on the latest episode of Full Plate, a new podcast created in partnership with Woolworths, Turia opened up about navigating periods of solo parenting, surviving a massive bout of burnout, and how she completely revolutionised her relationship with food, fuel and perfectionism.

"I was deep in a hole."

For a long time, Turia operated under a strict internal script: stop complaining, suck it up, keep going. It was a mindset that served her beautifully as an Ironwoman competitor, but when life shifted to running a business from home and parenting while her husband worked away, that same "eat the frog" attitude became a trap.

"One of the reasons why I had burnout in 2024 is that I worked from home, so I wouldn't see anyone all day," Turia shared on Full Plate.

"I expected myself to just keep parenting and keep running a business, as if life would go on as normal. Instead, I did a lot of internal minimisation rather than acknowledging that it was actually really hard."

Turia Pitt has two young boys. Image: Instagram/@turiapitt.

When your mental load is entirely maxed out, something has to give. For Turia, the first thing to fall off the plate was how she looked after her own body. The structured, nourishing meals disappeared. Looking back at her peak triathlon days, she now recognises a pattern of under-fuelling during training that caught up with her.

"I was doing all this training for the Ironwoman races, but I wasn't fuelling myself enough," she admitted, noting that she simply didn't have the knowledge back then to balance a six-hour bike ride with proper nutrition.

Now, she sees that approach to food as a wider pattern of pushing through without properly looking after herself.

It wasn't until she read back some deeply dark pages of a book draft she was writing that she texted a close girlfriend, booked in for a mental health care plan, and started unpacking her burnout with a therapist.

The "smug" breakfast and mellowing out.

The biggest takeaway from her recovery? Realising that food doesn't have to be a battleground, and perfection is a myth.

These days, Turia's morning fuel looks a lot more intentional — and a little bit "badass," as Liz Ellis put it.

She starts her mornings at 5am with what she jokingly called a "smug, holier-than-thou" breakfast: a healthy, efficient mix of oats, chia seeds and sesame seeds soaked overnight in milk, topped with yoghurt and fruit.

And her coffee comes with a twist: instant coffee blended with a massive tablespoon of high-fat ghee, a splash of milk, and a bit of high-cacao dark chocolate.

"I love how it tastes... I think it slows down the absorption of the coffee," she laughed.

But while Turia is perfectly content with her nutrient-dense breakfast, she's stopped expecting her two young boys to match her high standards.

"They can be quite challenging to feed, probably like most kids, but they have Nutri-Grain for breakfast," she confessed.

"I know it's not going to keep them full... but I've just come to this realisation that I can't fight every battle as a parent. If they want to have cereal, they can have cereal."

Ditching the dinnertime pressure.

For anyone who's ever stared at the fridge at 5pm with zero energy left, Turia's new-found food philosophy is incredibly liberating. She has officially retired from the exhausting sport of trying to please everyone at the dinner table.

"Cooking dinner can be such a thankless job, because you cook a meal and it's not going to please every single person at the table," Turia said, recalling the disheartening routine of buying meat from the butcher, cooking a fresh recipe, and being met with complaints from the kids.

Turia Pitt and her family. Image: Instagram/@turiapitt.

Her solution is based on total flexibility and a heavy reliance on clever shortcuts. When her husband is away and her "game face" is completely gone, she happily orders a burger. Other nights, she leans on reliable frozen pizzas, or turns to quick flavour fixes like Mingle seasoning packets to whip up a no-fuss chilli con carne or spaghetti bolognese.

Ultimately, her recovery has been less about achieving an idealised version of health, and more about finding joy in the messy, unstructured reality of daily life. 

Whether she's making a hearty chicken and brussel sprout soup for a friend who's just had a baby, or eating a hunk of steak by herself, she's finally running on the right kind of fuel: self-compassion.

As Turia perfectly puts it: "You still need energy, you still need fuel... to rock up to work feeling optimal. You've just got to take the pressure off yourself."

Listen to the full conversation with Turia Pitt on Full Plate , wherever you get your podcasts.

Feature Image: Instagram/@turiapitt