Trials and tribulations have the ability to make us realise our inner strength. As they say,when the going gets tough, the tough gets going.

Life dealt a heavy blow to Smilie Suri when her marriage with dancer Vineet Bangera hit a rocky patch. Adding to her emotional trauma and depression were health woes like PCOD and thyroid. However, rather than accepting defeat, the actress regained her grip on life with pole dance, and has now turned into a full-fledged trainer of the dance form.

She says, “I was battling depression when I found pole dance, and it has brought me a lot of emotional stability. I don’t feel the need for anyone to back me up anymore. Of course, I still have days when I cry myself to sleep, but all that it takes to wipe away my blues is one student sharing how confident and independent she feels after learning it.”

Smilie’s tryst with pole dance began by chance, after her aerial dance class got cancelled one day. She recalls, “It made me feel sexy and empowered; my weight no longer bothered me. I liked it so much that I decided to pursue it professionally. I even underwent a seven-week training program in Singapore, in pole, chair and static pole dance. That experience changed me completely — it was like finding a parallel universe. Till then, I was mostly surrounded by boys (brother Mohit Suri and cousin Emraan Hashmi), but all my classmates there were girls. I found sisterhood, feminine energy and became a girl again.”

Pole dance is often looked down upon, as it is associated with strippers. Smilie clarifies, “Both Bollywood and Hollywood are responsible for stereotyping it. Pole dance involves a lot of balancing, hand and head stands. It was done by strippers, but it has become a sport now. The need of the hour is to practice it like a sport and get fit. And what’s wrong with feeling sexy? Ours is the land of Kamasutra. In my academy, I teach Bolly pole as every girl likes dancing to Bollywood numbers. The idea came about after my sister-in-law (Udita Goswami) insisted that I teach her pole dance to a Bollywood number.”

Interestingly, Smilie’s family too was averse to her learning it in the beginning. She reveals, “My family thought that I had gone cuckoo, but eventually, they came around. Mohit and Emraan told me to promote fitness through it and not pursue it as a dance — they probably must have been to bars and seen it (laughs). When I ran short of money and was starving in Singapore — I didn’t eat for a couple of days as I was saving up to buy a competition-grade pole — Mohit sent me money. Emraan also supported me emotionally, whenever I had a breakdown after eight-hour-long training sessions. Now, I plan to start a pole-conditioning class for men. I will start with my brothers, Mohit, Emraan, Kunal Deshmukh and Aditya Dutt.”