Returning to a Gym
It was in about 2006 or 2007 that I was last a member of a gym. Even then, it was nothing more than a tokenistic gesture to me to get in shape. I never struggled with weight or body image issues until the summer of 2020/21, and I didn’t like what i saw in the mirror. I was nearing 40 years old with 2 kids and my sedentary and mundane lifestyle would catch up to me. The gym became a two-prong approach to carve out some time to myself while also expending some negative energy in a positive way. Win-win you might call it. I was seeing my psychologist who was helping understand how to better regulate my emotions while also on a journey to understand my neurotype. Exercise was a safe outlet to achieve my goal. This goal I set for myself was:
Be in the best shape of my life by the time I turn 40.
Compete in a Triathlon with the goal to one day compete in an ironman competition.
2 completely achievable goals that I could work on and because I was 38, about to turn 39, I had a reasonable amount of time. I weighed in at over 80kg and stood about 6 foot 2 inches or about 182cm tall. These goals are still with me today as I write this a few years later on and still form a part of the motivation. I was running a small business that was making a good amount of money and I had the expendable income to put into myself. Even despite the fiscal position, the mental health improvements by having a place to go and just be me against me. I joined a gym that was open 24/7 and could use other gyms located around my city. There were so many to chose from so I plunged in and purchsed a 12 month membership in advance and committed to it. By spending the money up front, in my mind, the money was already gone and if i didn’t use it, I would lose it. So that was done, now what? I had to have a plan of what to do, I was a noob and really didn’t know what to do. That initial fear of going to a gym for the first time was daunting and very real. I felt like everyone there would be judging me, knowing I’ve got no idea what I’m doing, and they probably did. I had the self confidence to push through all that and not care what anyone else thinks, at the end of the day, that’s a “them problem”.
I had a few setbacks at the very start. 2 days after joining the gym, I got sick and would set me out for a couple of weeks. An infection of my lungs that would see me in hospital and a bout of gastroenteritis almost straight after. It was like the world was telling me to not go to the gym. I had already paid the membership so i couldn’t back out on the commitment now, the money was already spent. I remember getting the text message from the gym stating something like “we’ve noticed you haven’t been to the gym since joining, is there anything we can do to help you?” There, of course, wasn’t anything I could do except get better. Another setback would happen a month or so later on, Covid-19 hit and shut down the gyms for a few weeks. When that happened, I had at least been going to the gym and found my rhythm in a workout. The gyms would then have a notorious “germ spreader” association with them so it really took some mental energy to push through and keep going on the journey I committed to.
To make it all happen and not just rock up at the gym with no purpose in mind and lug some weights around, I needed to have a plan. I had a goal to get to and I just needed the mechanics of a plan to get me there. Looking at my body type and physique, I’m not going to be a strongman or professional weightlifter, tall and lean(ish) I was built for cardio type activities like running. So that’s exactly where I decided to focus on. To get rid of the jiggly bits, I needed to get my heart rate up and keep it there for as long as possible. Insert the treadmill and having a constant machine that I could measure progress on while also not being subject to the environmental factors like wind, rain etc that would be a de-motivating factor. I used the treadmill every session as my starting point and decided to run 5km and track progress with the time it took to do that. the first time sucked so bad, I could feel everything I didn’t like about my body moving, and right on queue the brain starts up with the nonsense of trying to get back to the comfortable area. “why are you doing this?”, “you’re an idiot, this is clearly not comfortable!” was some of the ways my brain would try sabotage me. Coming into the gym with a clear goal and some understanding that my brain was going to do this, I could counter the negative self-talk with positivity and replies to the tune of “you got this mate, it won’t be long and you’ll have a body like Zac Effron”, “you are capable of way more than you think and I can prove it”. I decided to identify as a runner, my identity is something I set for myself and saying that about myself would also become a bit of accountability as well. Anyone can talk the talk, not many can walk the walk. I wanted to be the person who does what they say so identifying as a runner was what did it for me. It didn’t matter that I only ran on a treadmill at this stage, I was only accountable to myself.
It worked, I got better and progress was beginning to show after a few weeks of commitment. I was going to the gym 5 days a week, some might say that is too much, but it became my sanctuary, my place to escape the high stress life that was going on at home and just be me against me. Using this “place” for this reason made me want to keep going and get those goals. I came to the gym with a little bit of knowledge knowing that breathing was the most important part of cardio exercise and controlling that would be key to any performance increases over time. Watching my heart rate get higher and higher and the continuous alert that I’ve set a new maximum heart rate also saw my fitness age drop and drop. It was amazing, this all started to happen in the first month of commitment. I started by taking 35minutes to do the 5k, soon enough I broke through the half hour mark very quickly. To get this payoff so rapidly made me wonder a bit more about my body and perhaps I’m a freak of nature. I was capable of way more and had only just scratched the surface of this capability.
After the running session, I would move onto strength training and trying to improve this aspect of my body. I looked at the “meat heads” as i would call them. The people at the gym that seem to do little to no cardio exercises and seem to focus only on lifting heavy weights. It got me thinking about my own goals and motivations to my purpose. I knew I didn’t want to get big with massive muscles, that would be contradictory to my identity as a runner. My body physique is tall and slim so by adding on lots more weight to my knees and ankles that I was not built for would certainly end up in constant injury. This is when the methodology or catch phase of “stronger, not bigger” would develop from. The strength training at the early stages was all about the pin-loaded machines and moving this weight around and a few dumbbell exercises. I was able to track improvements by simply moving more weight, but I felt this was for no purpose. I needed help to get where I wanted to be and to avoid injury. It was time for a personal trainer to help me into the next step, so that’s what I did and will dedicate my next post to this experience.