Get your Rock Lobsters TIX for APW Friday, 1/9/26. Click on link in calendar!

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Balance is B.S.

Sunday, February 8, 2026
12-2 pm

Purchase your tickets here!

Can't make it? Purchase a ticket for a parent in our program!

A Community Brunch & Conversation

What health, wellness, and care actually look like right now —in real bodies, real systems, and real lives.

We’re living in a time when taking care of ourselves — especially as women — feels harder than it should.

Access to healthcare is complicated.

Systems are stretched — and often impersonal and unsafe.

Many of us are tired, overwhelmed, or navigating our health and wellbeing with limited support.

Meanwhile, online messaging wants us to believe that balance is just a green juice, a new supplement, or the right optimization hack away. That some magical, mystical destination of perfection is within reach… for a cost. 

We’re calling bulls**t.

Balance is B.S. is an intentional space to talk honestly about the current state of women’s health — and how we care for ourselves and each other within it.

Join us for brunch, connection, and an open, candid roundtable conversation with women spanning generations, lived experience, and perspectives.

Sponsor Our Event
Dr. Loretta Duggan

Dr. Loretta Duggan, born and raised in rural central Georgia, is a board-certified physicianin both Family Medicine and Adolescent Medicine practicing since 2017. She previously trained at Mercer University before completing medical school at Morehouse School of Medicine. From there she completed Family Medicine Residency in Spartanburg, SC and Adolescent Medicine fellowship training down in Miami, FL before returning to Georgia. Although she enjoys seeing patients of all ages, her passion lies in serving teens and young adult women ages 11-26yo on the topics of puberty, periods, reproductive and sexual health so they can live the life they choose!

This has led Dr. Duggan to open her own private medical practice called HER Healthlocated in Athens, Georgia.

Marty Farnsworth, Ph.D.

The Honorable Martha Farnsworth, served as Director of the U.S. Census Bureaubetween 1994 and 1998, participating in an unbroken line of census directors that began with Thomas Jefferson. After beginning her career at the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, she helped to found American Demographics, the nation's first magazine devoted to interpreting demographic and economic data for corporate and public executives. Subsequently, she served as Director of Policy Studies at the Population Reference Bureau, a nonprofitorganization
devoted to educating the public about the demographic component of policy issues. In later years, she has consulted, written, and lectured on demographic changes and their effects on policies, programs, and products.

A fellow of the American Statistical Association, she is affiliated with the University of Georgia’s School of Public and International Affairs.

Cundy Bryson

Mother, mentor, writer and therapist, Cundy Bryson graduated from Naropa University in 1994 with a degree in Somatic Psychotherapy. For the past 30 years, she has worked in clinical settings, academia and private practice where she has established herself as a community leader in body-centered therapy. 

Her approach with clients is multidisciplinary and incorporates training from current leaders in the fields of mindfulness, internal family systems therapy, polyvagal informed therapy, sensorimotor psychotherapy, complex trauma and EMDR.  

Cundy's practice integrates the body and information coming from the body as a healing touch stone. She goes beyond traditional “talk therapy" and believes that change occurs when clients are willing to go beyond personal narratives. 

Cundy encourages clients to explore their neurobiology and the ways that trauma, maladaptive behavior patterns and core beliefs can not only be held within the body but can also be released and expressed.

Dr. Jenny Davis

Doctor Jenny Davis is a triple-board certified physician in emergency medicine, lifestyle medicine, and obesity medicine. As a trailer park kid from rural Georgia and former Medicaid recipient, she fell in love with caring for vulnerable populations in the emergency department. Dr. Davis graduated from Mercer University School of Medicine and then ventured to Yale University for her residency.

After years of witnessing human suffering associated with chronic disease and modern medicine’s limitations, she has devoted her life to understanding and improving the multi-faceted American healthcare system.  Since leaving the clinical bedside in 2021, Dr. Davis held roles in government, health policy, managed care, and revenue cycle management.

Currently, she sits on the Athens-Clarke County Board of Health and is completing her Masters of Public Health degree with a focus on Health Policy and Management at the University of Georgia. In her free time, you will find her out on a local trail with her partner and dogs or on a reformer at Pure Balance Pilates.

Huge thanks to our 2026 SPONSORS:

About the Organizers

Ali Hall, owner of Pure Balance, and Monira Silk, executive director and founder for Athens Parent Wellbeing & ReBlossom were introduced by Courtney Vickery, of Declet Designs, in April 2022 to help one another promote our missions which focused on empowering women (& parents) inside and outside their bodies to encourage growth and equip them with the resources they need to thrive. Less than a year later, Ali & Monira found themselves dancing at The Studio Athens and both joined the adult movement company, Speakeasy. That winter, Ali approached Monira about an idea she had stirring. Ironically, since she named her Pilates studio, Pure Balance, she was a bit fed up with the focus on wellness culture to have everything perfectly in balance. "Balance is BS," she said, and the rest is history. 2026 is our fourth annual event.

Past speakers have included:

Grace Bagwell-Adams of The Studio Athens

Mokah Jasmine Johnson of Athens Anti-Discrimination Movement

Kat Macías, Community Organizer, Movement Chaplain & Spiritual Director

Rebecca Shisler-Marshall, Integrative Life and Wellness Coach & Shamanic Practitioner, Centered You

Taneisha Brooks of Historic Athens

Dr. McKay Crowley, Integrative Medicine Specialist

Hannah Groseclose of Hinge Creative Co

Dr. Zoe Johnson of University of Georgia School of Social Work

Michelle Monroe of Resilient Path Coaching

Stacey Raye Kellogg of Compass Rose Coaching

Dr. Kate Morrissey-Stahl of Revolution Therapy & Yoga

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