Physical exercise, a healthy diet and positive social interactions are all recommended by health and wellness professionals. Living a balanced life including physical exercise, a healthy diet and healthy social interactions is almost guaranteed to ensure longevity and a good quality life. All of this is supposed to ensure you remain agile way into your retirement; you remain unencumbered by lifestyle illnesses, you live longer and your mind remains in tact. This is ideal.
My life is much different to the ideal expressed above. I strongly dislike physical exercise because it's tiring, my skin itches when I workout, I sweat profusely, I am clumsy, my body jiggles, my breathing becomes laboured, my joints hurt, too many skinny self absorbed people go to the gym and after all of that my muscles hurt for days on end. I will not lie, I hate it but really need to lose weight and get into shape so that I can walk up my staircase and talk on the phone at the same time. Right now if I am on the phone and climbing my stairs I mute the caller so they don't think I'm having some form of cardiac event. I'm writing this and my heart rate became elevated. I need to regain some muscle mass in my legs. I wore a pair of heels to church on Good Friday and because of pride I walked upright strutting through the church grounds like a thoroughbred waving and smiling thinking dear God help me. Needless to say that for almost one week after that I wore sandals, rubbed my knees with Voltaren Rub and took painkillers as needed. I then decided that I must return to either my morning or evening walks and physiotherapy.
Well, Good Friday was April 7th and today is May 7th my sneakers are at the foot of the bed with the socks tucked inside, my yoga pants with matching top are laid neatly across the right side of the bed and my alarm is set for 5:30am to wake me up to walk. I still have not walked but at least I wake up, look at the clothes and sneakers and consider my life choices. Every morning I sit in my favourite spot and dose off drifting in and out of thoughts of work responsibilities, how hungry I am and whether or not Café Blue has steam fish that morning, wondering about traffic and if there are mosquitoes outside. By the time I decide I must move I have no more time to walk and I race through getting ready to get to work and promising myself that I will walk tomorrow.
I blame all of this on COVID. During the height of the COVID pandemic, when we were on lockdown and our movement restricted, I seemed to have taken the no movement part to heart. The truth is, I used to walk in the mornings, every now and again, but then life happened and I lost my "healthy" work-life balance. These days I mostly just work. There was a time when I was more consistent with my walking I had my friend who accompanied me in the evenings but then she moved away and I seem to be suffering from separation issues. In the meantime my body is growing and I fear outgrowing my clothes. It doesn't help that I also enjoy food.
I did the gym life for a while and I got in shape and lost some weight. That was some time in 2016. It started off rocky as I got trapped on one of those abs benches with the stirrups on the first day. I caused some alarm and anxiety among fellow gym goers who were not sure they should intervene especially as I cursed the equipment. I soon got the hang of mounting and dismounting. I landed a few times on the floor attempting the tricep dip and had to roll over on my belly to get up. The instructor in his frustration then sent me to the aerobics class to get in some cardio but while attempting to keep up with the class I made the mistake of looking at the wall of mirrors and realized I appeared to be assaulting my belly when doing the leg raises. I knew there had to be a reason I felt nauseous - the puzzle was solved. I left the gym early that evening as I was convinced it was not a safe environment. However, I am not one to give up so quickly so I stuck with it for 3 months.
If you don't know, Caribbean people are some of the most caring people in the world and so, as long as you are a little plump or too skinny the concern and guidance starts. I have a problem with unsolicited weight loss advice. I have unpleasant thoughts about people who call me or write to me with exercise tips and dietary recommendations without me asking for it. In this regard I continue to ask the Lord to adjust my attitude and allow me to be grateful that I have people who care about me. I can't blame them because they are not aware of my plan to start walking tomorrow.
