Making my way back to fitness

rcheesley

Hi folks,

Just posting to say hello really, I'm on the slow road back to fitness having been knocked off my feet a few years ago by a bout of severe fatigue and problems with unstable joints due to hypermobility syndrome, and am just at the stage where I'm able to get back in the gym and doing some physical activity.

My biggest struggle is expecting myself to be able to do what I could before - I used to train regularly, play hockey, was in the process of becoming a mountain leader - and I push myself too hard too quickly, resulting in crashing and burning. I'm a very driven person and find it very hard not to let myself push,push,push. I might be able to do it there and then, but either collapse in a heap in the car park or am left unable to move for days afterwards - an inconvenience when you run your own business and don't therefore have sick pay!

At the moment I'm on a very low level programme at the gym, a 30-40 minute cardio & weights workout, and have just this week started cycling the 1.5 miles to/from work to see how that goes. I'm really glad to be doing something, really frustrated to not be able to push myself harder and get fitter quicker, but also realising that slow and steady is more likely to actually get me there!

My aims are to get back into my mountain leaders training, get back into playing hockey, and I've got around 4-5 stone to lose in the process. Baby steps!

Ruth

capperboy

Hi Ruth,
keep at it. In the 90's I was very fit, then work got in the way.
Took me about 2 years but have clawed most of it back now.
Suffered in year one with over confidence then took myself back to basics and built a firm base, became more realistic
with my expectations of myself.