This is something I have carried with me for a long time now. I have told various people about it in various conversations over the years, but had never gone fully public with this.
Until now.
I thought that I could just put it in the back of my mind and move on with my life, which I have done to a great extent. However, the memories, and more importantly the lingering and residual trauma, still haunt me to this day, and I believe keeping it mostly inside me has held me back somewhat, for a number of reasons.
I refuse to let that happen any longer, which is why I am now publicly calling out the Les Mills BODYSTEP Program Director Mark Nu’u-Steele for the bullying and intimidation that I suffered at his hands over an 18-month period during 2010 and 2011. Even though I am not as actively involved in the Les Mills community now as I was back then, I still believe it is my responsibility to speak out and ensure that this kind of situation never happens to any other Les Mills instructor out there.
Being on the autism spectrum, gaslighting happens to us on an almost daily basis (even for the most routine things), and at the time being undiagnosed, I did not know any better and I felt a whole heap of shame and guilt for “bringing this upon myself”, as a lot of bullies and those in power like to put on their victims. And even in the years since my diagnosis, where I do know better and am a lot wiser, those thoughts still come back now and then – even more reason for me to speak out now before it consumes me again.
How did it all start?
I first met Mark Nu’u briefly when I had my photo taken with him at a Les Mills masterclass filming after-party in Auckland in May 2009. I had just done my instructor training in BODYJAM about six months prior, and was still a starry-eyed fresh rookie instructor who had been drawn into this seemingly magical world that I never knew had existed.
I then got to know him a bit better when I came back for the following round of filmings in August 2009 – it was the round of BODYSTEP release 78, which ignited my love of BODYSTEP for the first time (and ended up being the release I would train on a few months later). I had also met and got to know other people like Sarah Robinson, and I felt accepted and welcomed into this ever-growing extended family.
I saw him again at a local instructor workshop in Melbourne that November where he was making a guest appearance, and I remember having a really good chat with him – I recall he was a nice guy and very down to earth.
I had skipped the next round of filmings and wouldn’t come back until January 2010, where they were preparing for the BODYSTEP 80 filming (it was a milestone filming as it was celebrating 20 years of the program). I had managed to get along to several of the trial classes, so I almost knew the release back-to-front before it had even been filmed.
Unfortunately I had to abruptly leave Auckland the week before the filming, due to a storm of clashing catastrophes in my life at the time (some of which I will write about another time). I remember messaging Mark on Facebook to tell him what had happened, and he made a comment about how I had suddenly disappeared.
I would not see him again until May 2010, and that’s where things started going downhill…
The Snide Comments Begin…
I had gone to the FILEX Les Mills workshop in Sydney in May 2010, to see the releases that I had missed at the filmings the past January, including BODYSTEP 80 and also BODYVIVE 15. It was the latter where Mark’s treatment of me took a very insidious turn.
I was in the front row as he was presenting a strength track, and while he was coaching about eye gaze, he then looks at me directly in the eye, and says,
“Patrick, stop looking at my crotch – I’ve heard things about you”
I had to do a double take just to make sure I had heard that correctly. But surely enough, that is what he said, over the microphone, in front of around 100+ people in the auditorium at the time.
The whole time afterwards, I was asking myself, “what the fuck was that all about?”. I even said as much to Carla, his wife at the time, but it was laughed off as “Mark being Mark”. If this were now, that in itself would have raised alarm bells for me, but me being the naïve instructor I was at the time, I just smiled and nodded, even though inside I was feeling really grossed out by the experience.
The next time I would see Mark was at the November 2010 filmings – I had come up just for the weekend, and had managed to get to a few filmings, including BODYSTEP 83. As an aside, that BODYSTEP release is my favourite of all time.
About a month or so later, one of my close friends in Auckland at the time had asked if I would provide a write up of my experience at the filming, and I was only too happy to do so seeing as I loved the release so much. I obviously did not talk about the music or songs, but I did discuss some of the choreography in light detail. I had also talked about the experience of one of the presenters battling an achilles injury against time to make it to the stage.
I made a link to it on my Facebook at the time – and that’s where I saw a really nasty side of Mark that I had never seen previously. He had made a comment on my Facebook post along the lines of,
“What and who the hell do you think you are to be posting about a release like this?”
Here’s the thing – there was nothing negative in my blog post whatsoever to suggest I was criticising the release – indeed I was gushing praise over it the whole time. And other people on that Facebook post basically called Mark out for that comment, after which he deleted it. But still I could tell something wasn’t right…
2011 – the bullying continues…
In January 2011 I came back for the following filming round, which I would end up doing for all four quarters that year. That particular round was BODYSTEP 84, where they were starting to make the program more athletic.
The first trial class I went to for it, there were a few presenters on stage in Studio 2 – Mark, the other presenters, and also the filming coach. Right before they started the class, Mark suddenly bellows out over his microphone almost randomly,
“No posting on Facebook or anywhere else about this, do you understand?”
I can remember the other presenter being “WTF” on stage and having to make some funny remark to keep things on track. I knew damn well though to whom Mark directed that comment, and my suspicions were confirmed a few hours after the class when I got this private message from him on Facebook…
“Ok, I’ve said my bit now. Enjoy your filming :)”
Not to mention that it was creepy to begin with, something inside me continued to feel very uneasy about the whole experience. But there was more to discover still…
It was also during this particular filming trip that I had discovered that Mark and a group of NZ and international instructors had started a little bitch group about me, using the code name of “Bambi” to describe me. I had also learned they were mocking other people as well, but their venom seemed mostly directed at me. Some of the people involved included:
* A local somewhat high-profile member of Les Mills Auckland (who sadly took his own life only a few years later);
* An up-and-coming presenter from Slovenia; and
* A BODYSTEP and BODYVIVE instructor from the US who was somewhat close to Mark following their collaboration on a specially-themed BODYSTEP release a couple of years prior.
I’m almost certain there were more people involved in this, but these are the ones I can confirm from screenshots that I saw at the time. Now I don’t know what I had even done to these people to warrant this treatment, but at that time it was quite distressing to read, and showed me a very ugly side of Les Mills that I had not seen previously.
Over the next couple of filmings in May and August that year, things were somewhat civil between Mark and myself. I even tried to get along with Mark, as in my eyes, he was in a position of authority and I wanted to make sure everything was ok (because of course I was thinking I had done something wrong, even if I actually hadn’t). That’s how insidious gaslighting can be, especially towards those who are neurodiverse.
But little did I know the worst of this was just around the corner…
THAT Filming…
I have mentioned this filming on a vague level in previous posts and the events that happened there. But now I feel ready to tell everything…
It was November 2011 and it was the BODYSTEP 87 filming. And it seemed to be one of those filmings where everything just went wrong – multiple retakes, you name it. But the thing that was the most wrong involved Mark himself…
I was a few rows back, and the filming had just started. We had got into Track 3, and there was a particular part of the track where two combos were being put together, and somehow it had not quite clicked for me and I missed the cue. And that’s where my life got turned upside down…
I suddenly heard Mark’s voice over the microphone booming with quite a hint of malice,
“Were you listening, Patrick? Clearly NOT!!”
Just like at that BODYVIVE workshop the previous year, I had to blink a few times just to made sure I had heard correctly. And then that uncertainty turned into pure horror, then immense embarrassment and, finally, complete shame. He had literally said this out loud in front of 200+ people in Studio 1 during a *live filming*.
It was the culmination of his campaign to belittle me, to make me feel worthless. I got to the end of the track, and then I escaped to the back corner of Studio 1, and just hid away a complete emotional wreck. I remember posting on Facebook at the time immediately after it happened, “No words”.
He had won. He had secured his sadistic victory in making me feel insignificant. He had officially broken me.
After the filming had finished (after what seemed like an eternity), two of my instructor friends found me in that back corner absolutely distraught, and they knew – they had heard the comment as well, and had noticed I had disappeared immediately after that track. My mind was in a total fog, and I was still processing everything in my head – the way Mark had treated me the past 18 months, the snide comments, the outright abuse on Facebook, and it finally came to a head in that one single moment.
The SHBAM 7 and BODYJAM 60 filmings were about to follow, and I didn’t feel up to it, but thankfully my friends who were there supporting me convinced me to stay. It just so happened that two Les Mills Asia Pacific presenters were on the SHBAM filming, and the amount of love that they showed me that night after what happened at the BODYSTEP filming did help to lift my spirits. You will see and hear one of the presenters give me a shout out in Track 7.
I managed to maintain enough energy to go to BODYJAM 60. If you watch, I’m in the front row, and that night I danced like I had never danced previously, if only to temporarily escape the hell that I had found myself in only a few hours beforehand. That alone is why release 60 is my of my favourites ever.
The Aftermath
Right after those filmings had finished, I headed off to Denny’s a few blocks up because I just needed to get away from everyone. I was on a high after SHBAM and BODYJAM, but was also still grappling with what Mark had done to me at that BODYSTEP filming. To say that there were many emotions going through my head at that point would be an understatement.
My friend found me at Denny’s a little while later, and not long after, another instructor friend found us and had brought along a senior LMAP representative. They just sat there and let me recount and regurgitate everything that had happened, including what Mark had said at the BODYVIVE workshop the previous year. They were shocked, and promised me they would make representations on my behalf to Les Mills International to lodge a formal complaint.
I felt good enough (although still quite emotionally raw) to come back down to the restaurant downstairs where the other LMAP instructors were, and spoke to a couple of them. And then, just as we were talking, I got a Facebook notification – Mark had had the nerve to “like” my “No words” post. I almost lost it right there, and my friends could see I was upset. So I showed them what he had done, and they said the usual things – “don’t let him get to you”, “he’s trying to intimidate you” etc.
Running in parallel with this, the following day, the filming coach for that BODYSTEP filming had also been in touch with me, and I had also told them exactly what happened. They would make their own representations directly to senior LMI representatives, who were also overseeing the filming process at the time.
And then I started getting messages from more people, including other LMAP trainers, asking me what had happened. And I was completely honest and told them everything. Little did I realise that some of these people didn’t have my best interest at heart and were just wanting the gossip. But me being the naïve instructor who just wanted to get along with everyone, I believed the concern at the time was coming from a good place.
And then to make things worse, I received yet *another* private message from Mark…
“Really??? I’ve watched the footage, and I think you’re being dramatic!!”
And thus the nightmare continued. The filming coach messaged me a bit later to say Mark swore that the comment was not made with any malice intended – no apology or anything, just Mark trying to absolve himself of any responsibility.
I had a coffee with another friend of mine that afternoon down by Auckland Waterfront, and I told them what had happened the previous night. Their paraphrased response:
“Well Program Directors are under so much stress and pressure, sometimes these things happen!”
This was the partner of a LMAP RPM presenter saying this to me, and I was just thinking “this is fucked”.
Another US instructor friend who was at that BODYSTEP filming said to me afterwards: “Oh I thought that was funny”, oblivious to what had been going on behind the scenes, but nevertheless it felt like yet another stab in the heart. I haven’t spoken to that instructor since then.
I had also put up a post that day showing my gratitude for the support I had received following the incident. And to indicate just how poisonous the whole thing was, a senior LMAP trainer left this very simple but all the same callous comment:
“Oh for God’s sake”
Not surprisingly, I ended up unfriending this trainer not long after, and lost all complete respect for them – and believe me some of the treatment I received from this particular trainer over the years warrants its own post.
Interestingly enough, I had also received a message from a local Les Mills Auckland member, who had told me that people had complained about Mark’s comments in classes all the time, but nothing ever seemed to be done, as it appeared that LMI tended to protect their own.
I eventually made it back home to Melbourne, to pick up the pieces, so to speak. LMAP maintained contact with me over the following days to keep me updated on the situation, and then I finally got the text from them:
“Any and all reference to yourself has been removed from the DVD”
And just like that, it was over. No apology from LMI, no acknowledgement of the harm and hurt it had caused me, just a simple wipe of the comment, as if it had never existed – and dare I say, almost as if it had been swept under the rug.
The Years Following
As someone who had been avidly going to filmings almost every quarter, it won’t come as a complete surprise that after the events of that filming, I decided to exile myself from Auckland for the foreseeable future. And the ensuing fallout from the whole experience also led me to move away from and deactivate my Facebook account in early 2012. I ended up deleting the whole account a few months later – something which was traumatising in itself at the time, but also quite cathartic.
That filming experience also shattered my faith in the Les Mills brand and group fitness as a whole, and during 2012, I needed to dig very deep to find alternative motivations for my continuing to teach. Thankfully it was right in front of me – my members. If it had not been for them, I don’t know how I would have survived as a instructor, and I owe them a whole heap of gratitude.
I skipped FILEX entirely in 2012 as there was no way I was going to expose myself to anyone from Auckland so soon after that filming. I made minimal and fleeting appearances at LMAP workshops, and tried to not interact with any other instructors unless necessary. Ultimately though, I chose to focus on myself and my own development, ending up finally getting certified in BODYPUMP in December 2012.
2013 was the year I finally felt confident enough to come out of my shell after a year of almost hiding from everyone. I went to FILEX that year and reunited with a lot of the friends who had been at that filming only six months before, and it felt ok.
However, one thing that made me feel ill at ease were the attempted justifications of Mark’s actions by certain people at FILEX, one of which included “I guess he’s had a stressful time coming out”. I mean, more and more it just felt like I was being made the issue rather than him, as if I was making a big deal out of nothing. In a sense, it was almost victim-blaming.
I had also noticed at that and subsequent FILEXs that some of the good relationships I had had previously with other Program Directors and International Presenters had suddenly gone cold, and included some very awkward interactions which not only left me feeling uncomfortable, but also left a lot of questions in my head. I had starting thinking in the back of my mind, “Had I done something wrong? Was I being ostracised? Was I being punished in some way? Is this how they treat “troublemakers”?”
As time went by, those events fell away to the side, albeit temporarily, as there was something else on the horizon that would ultimately take my focus over the next few years – my autism diagnosis. Ironically enough, it was the diagnosis that helped me to finally realise that I was not to blame for any of this happening to me. I was a victim as much as anyone else who has been a victim of any kind of bullying and harassment.
I actually returned to Auckland for a filming round in January 2016, as I was supporting a friend at the time who was presenting for BODYVIVE. Incidentally, Mark also happened to be one of the presenters there – he never once acknowledged my existence, not a single word, not even one glance of eye contact, but with my being in the front row, he knew I was there. The only difference was, I was a lot stronger at that point, and a lot more confidence in myself, and that gave me more power and control over the situation.
Having got to that point where I could kinda sorta put it behind me, I pushed it to the back of my mind as other life events took precedence – I left Australia at the end of 2017 to start a new life in Europe, and ultimately the UK and London. The events of November 2011 were not forgotten though, but were somewhat tolerated in my head.
Nevertheless, I still saw the random posts on social media from people praising Mark, and gushing over what a nice guy he is – everytime I saw something like that, it killed me a little inside. These people include ones who had supported me at that filming and had seen and heard firsthand what he did to me, and had even said at the time that they had lost respect for him – that killed me a little more.
I knew the cycle had to stop sooner or later – it was just a matter of finding the courage and headspace to confront it head-on.
And as life started to settle for me this year in 2021, I had a sudden realisation that it had been ten years since those horrible events. And it also made me accept that I had never fully come to terms with what had happened to me, mostly because there was never any satisfactory outcome or set of repercussions – just an erasing of a comment off a masterclass DVD as if it had never happened in the first place.
Why Now?
So I decided to do what I had got into the habit of doing the past few years with any thoughts that had been plaguing my mind – write this post. It was (and is) time for me to call out the atrocious behaviour that I had experienced all those years beforehand.
A very close friend of mine whom I had spoken to about this only a few day ago said to me, “think about what you hope to achieve by speaking out, what do you want to happen as a result of this, and what do you think will realistically happen?”. All very legitimate questions.
Throughout my whole life, but especially in my time as a dedicated Les Mills instructor, I have been called every name under the sun (sometimes to my face, but mostly behind my back because people are gutless like that) – attention seeker, trouble maker, loves the drama, overambitious. You name it, I’ve most likely been called it. And sadly it is something that seems to happen to neurodiverse people more than anyone else – that needs to stop now.
Back then, I still thought of the Les Mills community as being supportive of each other and wanting what was best for one another. So hearing those things said about someone like me who only wanted to do what he did well, those were multiple daggers through my heart.
And yes, I have thought about repercussions as well. How certain people will react to this – how will they react to me? These include LMAP trainers whom I also consider good friends or at least am on good times with.
To be fair, in the eyes of some other Les Mills trainers and presenters, whether LMAP, LMI, or elsewhere, I was always considered an outsider, an interloper, not worthy of climbing up the Les Mills ladder, amongst other things. That might have mattered to me back then when I was craving acceptance from everyone around me, and indeed it was a big reason as to why I initially didn’t speak up publicly for a number of years (I was afraid of wide-scale rejection).
Nowadays though, different story. I am confident enough in myself and my abilities that what other people think of me and my actions doesn’t hurt me anymore. Since my autism diagnosis in 2015, I’ve used that framework to better navigate my strengths and opportunities, and know what my limits are as a person. I know that being different is ok, and in fact is something I actively embrace nowadays – diversity is a good thing. I know what I will and won’t tolerate.
More importantly, I found my voice – the voice that had been stuck inside me for all those years fearing rejection if I were to speak out. I don’t fear that anymore.
If certain people want to continue calling me names and throwing dirt at me (and I know they will when they read this post), then by all means let them. And believe me, I know there are still those instructors and trainers out there who will defend the Les Mills name to the death, in the absence of any reason or logic – whether people acknowledge this or not, there is a cult mentality within the Les Mills universe.
Which is why, most of all, it is my responsibility to speak out against the sadistic behaviour that I had to endure totally unnecessarily. This kind of behaviour by people in places of power is still pervasive no matter which industry, which profession, and it is up to us all to stand up against it.
I don’t wish for any type of revenge – I just need to have my voice heard on this, the suffering I’ve endured recognised, and the acknowledgement that none of this was ever my fault. Validation is a powerful thing – it ensures that we are not alone in our suffering. And to have validation, there also needs to be empathy and compassion – traits that have been sorely lacking in the Les Mills leadership structure for many years.
Hence why I am speaking up now. I hope that this gives other people reading this the courage and strength to also make their voices heard about any ill-behaviour they have suffered at the hands of peers and/or people in positions of authority.
As I said in my first couple of blog posts on this site, the truth will set me free. To those of you out there still suffering in silence, I stand with you.
No Creative Brain 