Wednesday, June 29, 2011

it's all me

Rachelle and I have temporarily joined a gym. When I say temporarily it's because it's the closest gym that has a pool, but it's $100 a month PER PERSON to be a member if you're on a month to month plan. We'd need that flexibility due to our impending move. The gym we're going to right now offers a free trial week, which we're using now. When the trial week ends, we're done with them. $100 a month, even with free classes (except pilates) is not a good deal. There is another local gym that we'll be using a weeks free trial on next, sort of like gym tourists. We know this other gym is more affordable, but we don't know about the pool situation.

One of the negatives about attending an adult gym as opposed to the student-centric gym at BU is that for some reasons I started having a lot of negative feelings about myself. Sure, I was the heaviest guy I saw at FitRec, but there were other out of shape folks to the point where I didn't constantly feel out of place. I don't know what it is about the new gym, as I've seen a couple other flabby guys, but I definitely feel uncomfortable.

It had gotten to me so much in just a couple of days time, that I actually had a pretty hard time motivating myself to run yesterday. I was running in the area near the gym, and I just felt like everyone would see me running. I felt fat, and I thought everyone would be watching me and judging me, and it made me feel miserable. Plus, it was hot, so I would be slower than normal.

Then I realized the only person who was judging me was me. I've eaten OK the past couple of days, not great, not terrible, just OK. I felt like a sausage in my tri-top, and I kept worrying about it coming up. I hate running with my belly hanging out. I had to keep telling myself over and over again through the run "no one cares about what I'm doing but me". No one was watching me, and if a couple of people snickered at some fat guy running (as I always suspect people who see me are), so what?

I wound up running two miles, and even did some hill work. Well, hill work for me anyways; there are some slopes to the road behind the gym, so I gained 52 feet in total elevation over 2 miles. Not much, but better than nothing. In the heat, it felt like a lot more work that it actually was. I'm hopeful that all those running will pay off next Monday, as I fully plan on a 10k PR, even though I don't know anything about the course.

Evidently the internal chanting and pep talk paid off, as I felt less out of place at the gym once I finished my run and started swimming. We wound up doing around 2400 yards in a bit over an hour, and I felt much better than I did during the 1000 yards we did the day prior. I love using my Swimsense watch, especially with the new updates that account for almost any size of pool, and allowing me to more accurately track my weight.

2 comments:

  1. Ben,

    I turn my music up loud when I run and do my best to ignore all the comments that come my way when people feel like being jerks.

    They're lazy and probably not walking more than 10 steps to and from their car.

    Keep dropping those pounds and imagine how much better you'll feel and look. Remember, there are people out there who can't do anything about the way they look. If you remain STRONG and determined, the pounds will go. You know you need to lose them for Cedar Point, so kick yourself in the butt, think positive, and keep running.

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  2. John, You're right about all of that. Usually I'm not so insecure as I was those few days the other week, and I've been doing a lot better. The voices in my head carry a much different tune now, and when they don't I've been working on ignoring them.

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