Catherine and Christina Mahtook know a lot about the power of positive choices. With ready smiles—two completely identical, radiant smiles, since they are twins—they overflow with practical ideas and tips for living a joyful, balanced, healthy life.
Yet it would be easy to understand if they had a less-than-optimistic outlook.
Before they could finish each other’s sentences, the twins lost their dad, Mikie Mahtook. He passed away when they were just 2 years old.
“We didn’t really know him,” Catherine Mahtook says, seeking, characteristically, an inspirational twist on this potentially painful subject.
“But we have always gotten to know the best things about him through all of the great stories our family tells.”
The Mahtooks grew up in Lafayette in a large, bustling family they compare to the one in the film My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Now juniors at LSU, they are still figuring out who they are and where life will take them.
When they find a source of joy, inspiration or fun, they can’t help but point it out to others in a reverberating, staccato tumble of contagious enthusiasm.
It’s a feeling they have packaged into an enterprise, which they named T.A.S.K. By Twinatics.
Twinatics rhymes with fanatics, because they are passionate about the message they are spreading. T.A.S.K. stands for “to always spread kindness,” a motto the twins live by and one integral to their overall mission.
Their website, blog, Twitter feed and health and fitness habits have caught on around LSU. Now they are working on reaching the rest of Baton Rouge.
When the twins, who turn 21 in March, earn their public relations degrees in a year or two—they have the same major and take all the same classes—they hope to be poised to take their site and lifestyle to a national market and to open a fitness center here in Louisiana.
Mission: To inspire those around them to be their best selves, both physically and spiritually.
“One of the many gifts Catherine and Christina posses is the ability to take a passion or dream and make it into a reality,” says friend Carley Wahlborg. “I witnessed the initial stages of Taskbytwinatics.com and have watched it evolve in the past months. I have no doubt it will continue to grow and impact lives in our community.”
Tough times were the catalyst for the Mahtooks’ enterprise. Two years ago, their mother, Mary Ann, was diagnosed with breast cancer.
Much to their relief, she made it through treatment and went into remission. But then came the second act that cancer survivors always have to face. How do you make sure it doesn’t come back?
“Last May, the fear started creeping in,” Christina Mahtook says.
The twins, faced with the prospect of losing their mother, prayed, fretted and finally asked: Could there be a way to actively push cancer away so it wouldn’t revisit their mom or descend, darkly, upon either of them one day?
“Once I totally finished all my treatments, I wanted to embrace a healthier nutritional lifestyle that would help keep the cancer in remission,” says their mother, Mary Ann Mahtook. “I prayed that God would guide me in that direction, not realizing my girls would be that answered prayer.”
Christina decided to turn the tide by delving into her own independent study on how food and lifestyle choices can hurt or heal.
“We’d always followed your standard low-fat, low-carb, high protein diet,” Christina Mahtook says. Much to her surprise, though, evidence from books such as The China Study, by Dr. T. Colin Campbell, and Keep It Simple, Keep It Whole: Your Guide to Optimum Health, by Drs. Alona Pulde and Matthew Lederman, pointed in another direction when it comes to health and, especially, preventing cancer.
A plant-based diet, with reduced or eliminated meat and dairy, is superior to the standard American diet for fighting disease. Milk, Christina notes, actually contains proteins such as casein that promote the growth of tumors.
Christina shared what she learned with her mom, sister and older brother, former LSU baseball star Mikie, 23.
“We went on a 30-day challenge,” Christina Mahtook says. “At the end, we felt so good that we didn’t go back.”
The typical plant-based diet doesn’t always fit into the college or Cajun lifestyle. Moderation is the key to success in any dietary change, says Catherine.
“Seeing how passionate they are about finding new recipes or the latest health craze inspires me not only to live a healthier life, but inspired me to find something to be just as passionate about in my own life,” says Katherine Fremin, who is a fan of T.A.S.K. by Twinatics.
“I switched to a plant-based diet last semester and there was a huge difference to how I felt,” she says. “It’s hard to make the switch; I fell away from it under the pressure of living in south Louisiana and being a part of a Cajun family. But I’m finding a balance between the two. I definitely know it’s possible to follow a plant-based diet and have a little gumbo or etouffee every now and then.”
Another strong distinction the Mahtooks make is that, while they avoid dairy products, they don’t consider themselves vegan. Their dietary choices are nutritionally motivated. In other words, while the twins will usually pass up a hamburger, they wear leather and don’t attend animal rights marches.
“They continually motivate me to be my best self, in all aspects of my life—nutrition, fitness, mentality,” says Mary Ann Mahtook. “We have all learned the true meaning of perseverance. It taught our whole family many lessons that have quickly turned into beautiful blessings.”
Today we are jogging around the LSU lakes as the Mahtook twins share the story of their enterprise.
It’s a glorious winter afternoon. The lakes are shining like freshly minted coins after what feels like years of rain.
The twins have spent many hours jogging these lakes. They have completed the Louisiana Half Marathon twice.
Running, they say, is “our alone time, our prayer time, and our escape from the stresses of everyday life.”
Wait a minute. Alone?
“Well, we mean alone, together,” Catherine chuckles.
The twins are rarely separate. They are so identical their parents had to keep their hospital bracelets on them for weeks after they were born to tell them apart. Few can still tell one from the other. And it’s especially difficult if they decide to wear a similar outfit.
They share a room, a checking account, a car, shoes and clothes.
For this running interview, all is well until Catherine takes off her jacket and is wearing the same color shirt as Christina.
But no worries, they say. They answer to one another’s names and don’t mind getting mixed up.
Along with the healthy diet, the twins learned, plenty of exercise plays a significant role in cutting down a person’s chances of getting cancer.
The twins are huge fans of BeachBody’s Turbofire workouts. These weight-bearing fitness videos, they say, are a more doable approach to the BeachBody company’s popular P90X system.
Finding a workout you enjoy is the most important part of being successful at exercise, they teach.
“So many people express their negative feelings toward exercise,” the Mahtooks write on their blog. “We hear it all the time. Running is hard, I hate the treadmill, or group classes are intimidating. Those thoughts are normal. It doesn’t mean you hate fitness it just means that you haven’t found the right workout for you.”
Perhaps the simplest tenet to the philosophy the Mahtooks promote on their website, blog and Twitter feeds is the power of being nice to others.
The twins, who are members of the Kappa Delta sorority, started bringing surprise cups of coffee to their sisters.
“Everything good happens over a cup of coffee,” Catherine Mahtook says.
They were surprised at how great they felt after they’d brought coffee to their friends.
“I said, ‘Christina, if a cup of coffee can make us feel so good, what would happen if we started doing more to make people happy?’ ” A short time later, the twins started to promote their idea “to always spread kindness,” or T.A.S.K.
They make a special effort to promote the idea with T.A.S.K. Tuesdays. Every Tuesday, they push this challenge: Do something randomly nice for someone else.
“You can leave a few dollars tucked into a gas pump with a note that says, ‘Today, gas is on me.’ Or buy coffee for the person behind you at the drive-thru,” Christina Mahtook says.
The twins tweet about their acts of kindness and encourage others to share what they’ve done, too, using the Twitter hashtag #TASKTUESDAY.
“We have big plans for the future,” says Christina. “Eventually, we want to open a machine-less health facility. At our facility, each person will use his or her own body weight to get in the best shape of his or her life. Our team of fitness experts, nutritionists, doctors, and mentors will guide our clients to achieve their personal T.A.S.K. Our vision is that our facility/gym will be a place of optimism, love, energy and over-the-top fun. We want everyone around us to experience true, authentic happiness.”
