Me & Gym: Off Again

Six weeks ago, I started going to the gym again. Me and Gym have an on-again, off-again relationship; we'll see each other for a couple weeks, maybe three, then go our separate ways for a while, then eventually I'll feel guilty and go back to Gym. I'll lift some weights, spend some time on the treadmill. The first visit will go great: I'll push myself, perform really well, feel good about myself. The next visit, I accomplish what I did last time, but it's harder and not as fun. The third visit goes even worse. After that, the excuses start piling up, and the number of my visits to Gym dwindle fastly.

There are two reasons for this. Reason one is boredom. You can only run on a treadmill so many times before "stay home instead, and don't worry that you get winded walking up a flight of stairs" sounds good.

The second reason is poor nutrition. That was why my performance kept getting worse. I was wearing myself out, which was good, but I wasn't eating what I needed to build my body back up. We weren't having Burger King for dinner every night, nothing like that, but our diet was really unbalanced. We were probably getting like two servings of vegetables per person...per week.

One day about three weeks ago, Joe got motivated. For as long as I've known him, he's had an interest in physical fitness; he has a bedroomful of free weights and other heavy things waiting for him in the storage unit back home. He, too, has cycles of involvement with Gym. So for Christmas, I ordered him an intense 90-day exercise program on DVD called P90X. I didn't know he was going to take it so seriously so soon. The day those DVDs got here (when they weren't really a Christmas present anymore because it was January,) he started the program. He said he'd do it from start to finish, following the schedule and the nutrition plan.

If there's one reason I ever complain about my otherwise perfect husband, it's that he hates vegetables. But, according to the "diet," he's required to eat four one-cup servings of veggies per day. Joe, who wouldn't even eat lettuce, is so committed to this that he's been eating spinach salads for lunch every day, and brussels sprouts with dinner. The salad he ate on Day 1 of this endeavor was, he said, his first salad ever.

Of course, I couldn't let him do all that alone (and also he couldn't let me let him do all that alone.) I'd been going to the gym for about three weeks already, but my interest was flagging. Joe suggested I try TurboFire, a 90-day intense workout DVD program for women. I tried it, then buyed it.

TurboFire is a series of hour-long workouts with dancing and kicking and punching. Every day you get to do something different. The workouts are tough, but started at a level of fitness I could match with just enough effort. Every workout includes 10-40 minutes of stretching, which is very nice. While the exercises are going on, there's a second instructor off to the side showing you how to modify everything to make it lower impact, if that's what you need. The moves can be challenging, but that's okay because I just flail my arms and jump around when I don't know what's going on.

Me & Joe 2GETHA 4EVA

Today is Day 16 of a strenuous (to me, anyway) workout program which I haven't had to quit because I'm getting great nutrition. The P90X diet plan we're going by is basically a system of rations, a super-simplified way to get the right amount of calories. For example, my daily allowance is 5 servings of protein, 2 of dairy, 1 cup of fruit, 2 veggies (I usually cheat and get 3,) 1 fat, 2 carbs (which is about four pieces of bread,) 1 snack, and 1 2-TBSP-size serving of condiments. It requires a lot of planning. I always feel full and energized, though, and I'm always able to finish my workouts.

And there's literally no room for junk food. Not like, "If you're eating like this, you have no business eating junk food," but like, there's no ration category for junk food. Which isn't a problem, because since we got it all out of the house, I haven't wanted any. (Except for the other day when I saw someone eating a Kit Kat bar and had to restrain myself from grabbing it and cramming it down my throat.) When you're on a ration plan, every bit of food you're allowed to eat is a treat. I remember how excited I was when I arranged my rations to where I could have a piece of bread with lunch.

Joe's getting results, but I don't really know whether I am. I probably am. You can't work out like that and not get results. Mostly I'm just glad to not be bored with exercising anymore. And those Xes on my calendar keep me going. I can't skip workouts, 'cause I need my red X for the day. Yay!