Every summer it's been the same thing; "it's warm out, I'm going to start running, swimming, and going to the gym." And every summer I run for a few days, maybe even make it a week, and give up because the weather's too bad, or I'm too comfortable on the couch, or there's too much going on. I keep visualizing this idyllic past where I used to run three to four times a week and weighed 135 lbs. Even after two kids I regained that 135 lbs mark, but once I started having seizures (yes, I have epilepsy) and stopped waitressing 3 years ago, the pounds started to slowly pack on. Actually, I don't even think it was all that slowly. Somehow, this summer was going to be different.
Maybe it was the first time I went to a Yoga Tune-Up class and realized I loved it. This wasn't hard - I actually felt good. I was skeptical at first because the instructor went around the room and asked us all where we had pain and what we wanted to work on. Nearly all of us said neck, shoulders, upper or lower back, myself included.
"That's great! I know we haven't done this in a while, we're going to work on our legs and feet."
wtf was the point in asking? Did you even listen to our answers, or were you just hoping someone in the circle would justify the plan you had already chosen?
I was very tempted to leave and go home - giving up on this year's brand of "I'm going to exercise!"
But I stayed. And I'm glad I did. While it didn't do a damn thing to help my back or any of my sore spots, it did help to unlock some muscles in areas I didn't even realize were tight. I left feeling great, and looking forward to coming back.
That was Thursday night. The last Thursday in July. I had just finished teaching Summer School after a year of ups-and-downs and a past two months of what I would like to call "absolute hell", but I know there are people in far worse situations. I think I cried more in June than I did in the past 5 years of my life combined. I mean there's the sniffle at emotional movies or ads, but I'm not counting that. I'm talking like really: crawl-into-the-shower-and-bawl-your-eyes-out crying. I don't typically cry. Period. Maybe I'm emotionless (or so I would've thought) but it seems June and July have told me: "nope! we just need to make up for lost time!"
Joy.
I digress.
Summer School had just ended. My kids were away at camp for the week. My husband was at work until all hours of the morning. I had no idea what to do with myself.
So I went to the gym, and sat in on what was my first Yoga class in close to forever. (I used to have a gym membership at another gym and I tried a Yoga class there once before like 5 years ago, but it seemed to all be pro-yogis so when the instructor would call out random patterns I was like "sprechen zie English?" and I'd never gone back since.)
I had told myself if I didn't use the gym membership I'd had for the past year, I was canceling it in September. So, let's give it a try. I had purchased this membership for one reason: to use the pool. That was it. The gym membership was cheaper than pay-by-the-swim at the local public pool IF I went 3-4 times a week. And at the start, I did. I did laps, I soaked in the hot tub, I luxuriated in the steam room.
And then I didn't anymore.
And then I was paying for a gym membership to a building I hadn't set foot in for probably 7 or 8 months.
It was going to be August or never.
The weekend went by with a few too many things to do. My kids were home from camp - the first time sleeping away from home for that long for my youngest - and there seemed to be ten million things needing my attention.
I checked the fitness schedule and found another Yoga Tune-Up: Wednesday. Off I went bright and early Wednesday morning.
This time, my world was blown apart. It was a different instructor, and what a difference.
He started us off by asking us how many of us sat at desks for our jobs, then realized that probably wasn't the reality for most of us
"It's 9:15 on a Wednesday morning, of course you guys aren't spending your work day sitting at a desk." So he changed tacks and talked to us about how we spend most of our days sitting, and it's not good for your spine. Learning bad posture and practicing it regularly hurts your spine, which in turn can have a negative impact on other parts of your body. You need to maintain neutral spine. Or something along those lines. There was a lot of talk about posture. A lot of talk about making sure you did movements correctly and being aware of your body. I was aware that my arms were so weak I could barely hold myself off the floor in any position. We did this really cool stretch with the yoga strap where we extended our leg out to the side while keeping your shoulders square to the ground and just felt the stretch throughout our whole body. So good!
There was just something to it: watching him move; the way he would glide from position to position with total control of his muscles, and hearing him talk about working the muscles to promote your range of movement and reduce pain. I instantly wanted to go to the gym every day; take more yoga classes, learn how to use some of the machines to strengthen my upper body, and eventually upgrade to the more cardio-based stuff to really get into the fat-burning, heart-pumping, improve-your-overall-fitness style classes.
We worked on our calf and leg muscles in that class.
I left there ready to take on the world.
I asked at the front desk about my 1-hour free session with a personal trainer thinking I would get myself set up with a goal and learn how to use the different machines. The down-side to being a high school teacher and going to the gym in the same neighbourhood where I live and teach is that there is a high probability I will run into some of my students at some point or other (I often bump into them at WalMart or Tim Horton's). At least this was the slightly more expensive gym in the neigbourhood, so that would discourage some of them.
But still, I didn't want to look like it was my first run at the gym, or even worse - have one of them decide to help me figure out one of the machines.
No thanks.
So I signed up for my personal training on Friday and left feeling really good about myself on Wednesday. I was going to do this! I even went home and started looking up the schedule and planning out what classes I was interested in and what times they were offered at.
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