Blind Prophecy

So I bump up from 1/2 hour sessions to hour-long sessions with my fitness trainer today. I’ve been working out with Ben for about a month now and I haven’t seen a lot of improvement yet, but I’m patient and getting back into a regular gym routine.

When I was in the Cub Scouts, I remember my first ever hiking trip. I must have been 9 or 10 at the time, and we were taking a short day hike up to the Francis Peak Federal Aviation Administration Radar Station above Layton, Utah. My dad was joining the us on the hike. About halfway up the trail, however, after a series of steep switchbacks, my father had to call it quits. It was too strenuous for him and he decided to head back down to the cars. I remember being a little embarrassed because I’d fallen behind most of the other boys trying to stay close to my dad, but I caught up with my friends and the other adults, so it was not a big deal.

If I was 10 years old, that would put my father at roughly the same age I am now.

I think I’ve generally done a better job at staying active and fit, and while I certainly won’t be winning any swimsuit competitions very soon, I’m able to walk long distances, jog for a decent length of time on the treadmill, and, yes, go hiking up mountains if I want to. Even being overweight, I still think of myself as Superman, and one of the reasons I’m working with a trainer is because I’m likely to hurt myself in the effort to prove I can do it or burn all my energy on the wrong things and not make the most of my time at the gym.

Then last Friday when I was meeting with Ben, he decided to “go easy” on me by skipping our strength training drills and focusing just on cardio. First he had me doing sprints, which quickly accelerated my heart rate, but wasn’t impossible. Then he had me jump. Yes, just jump. First with random movements, then forward and back across a jump-rope, then side to side across the rope. And I nearly collapsed. I was embarrassed and mortified that at the age of 31 and with no serious health problems, I couldn’t jump for a minute at a time without losing balance or taking long rests between each set.

Ben was very encouraging, telling me to be proud that I’m making the commitment to do something about it – and I am. But I’m disappointed because I did this once already. Back in January 2006 I started working out and I lost about 40 lbs, and I think I was in better shape to start with. But in just a year, I’ve put all that weight back on and having a much harder time of it.

I try not to indulge in self-pitying complaints about my weight or body-image issues, but I thought that now, at the start of this process, I’d record these thoughts in the hope that if I ever start getting tempted to blow off the gym or skip a week of workouts, I can look back and remember how embarrassed and unhappy I was with myself at this point.

ETA: He started off today with a casual, “okay, let’s see you do 100 pushups.” I made it to 70 before having to go outside and vomit. I’m not kidding, I puked on the side of a garbage can in the middle of the financial district at 12:30 in gym shorts with sweat pouring off me like I was Peter “Porno Pete” LaBarbera in a gay bathhouse sauna with a bottle of viagra. This is gonna be rough.

Filed under: personal by Jere Keys