How Has The Gym Changed Your Life

yh8syh8crd · March 31

Hi all,

I have been trying for a few years now with some long absences due to life circumstances ect but I was just wondering how the gym has changed your life?

I know for me it gives me some personal time to think whilst improving my fitness and body

AnnPT77 · March 31

In my case, it wasn't a gym, mostly. It was a coach, and a river.

At 45, I was in truly woeful physical condition from a stressful long-hours IT job and a sedentary, sad life (was also recently a cancer widow). I had just started 6 months of chemotherapy for locally-advanced (stage III) breast cancer. That put me instantly in menopause. After the surgery-chemo-radiation, I was diagnosed as severely hypothyroid and began treatment for that. I was completely physically depleted.

I realized I need to do something if I ever wanted to feel strong, healthy or even happy ever again. So I started being more active, beginning with yoga classes a couple of times a week at the local middle school (community education class). At age 46, a local NCAA division 1 women's rowing coach started a rowing program for breast cancer survivors as a university outreach program. Walking up the stairs to the first gathering, totally out of breath from just the stairs, I wondered if I'd lost my mind.

I hadn't. I had gotten back my life, but a new and different (better) life. Within a couple of years, I was competing in races, on-water and machine rowing, and even winning some age group medals. After watching my first race, a long-time friend hugged me and said "Ann a jock? Who would've thought!" (Not me, for sure.) I got addicted to rowing, was rowing several times a week, began doing other things to support my rowing: Adult swim lessons, weight training, aerobics videos during off-season (until they got too easy, then spin classes), more.

I'm now 68, lost from class 1 obese to a healthy weight along the way using MFP (at age 59-60), have stayed at a healthy weight since.

Honestly, I'm not sure I'd be alive today if not for that coach and that river. (Recent research has shown that regular exercise can reduce mortality from metastatic breast cancer.) For sure, I wouldn't be fitter than average for a 68 y/o woman, and at a healthy weight.

My social life is rowing-centric. Many of my friends now are fellow rowers. I'm active in my local rowing club, spent years on the board of directors, was even board president for a couple of terms. Unlike many of my age peers, this gives me a way to interact with people of all ages, which I love. (I can even keep up with people much younger, including rowing recreationally sometimes with competitive collegiate rowers.) I've gone to rowing camps on vacation many times. I own 2 rowing shells of my own.

If you had told 45 y/o me what 68 y/o me's life would be like, she absolutely would not have believed you for even a microsecond. I'd been one of those "chosen last in gym class" kids, then became a sedentary, sluggish, overweight/obese adult. No way I would've thought I could be here at this point . . . but I kept an open mind, had fun, and surprised myself.

So, not a gym: A coach (my hero), and a river. Below is the river, me in bow of the double (wearing yellow), my 70-something y/o rowing buddy in stroke (wearing pink).

Leo_King84 · April 3

I've been in and out of gyms for nearly 20 years. I absolutely love going to the gym. You feel so good for it, it gives you goals to work towards that make you feel great when you hit them. It's boosts your confidence and you can meet some really interesting people there.

springlering62 · April 3

I started yoga about twelve years ago, while still obese.

I could do the basic stuff, but envied the lithe women and men who could do things I couldn’t even dream of.

I resolved to lose weight in late 2018, ultimately losing 97 pounds. I was able to do a few more yoga poses, but still……I wanted to do what others were doing.

I decided what I need was upper body strength. Talked to a neighbor who suggested talking to the woman who owned the local competitive gym. She took me under her wing and trained me herself.

With the strength I developed in the gym, I not only accomplished the yoga goals I had, but surpassed them. I did a headstand for the first time at 58. I can “fly” (yoga-speak for balancing your entire body weight on your hands and arms). No longer did I plonk down and enviously watch others when something new was presented. I’ll try anything. Right now I’m working on a complex transition from three different arm balances in a row to a jump-back. I’m almost there.

The gym gave me strength and confidence. I also learned I really enjoy being in the gym because I like challenging myself.

Like Ann, I was the kid in school who was always, without fail, picked last, even for freaking Red Rover. 🤦🏻‍♀️

nossmf · April 3

Was a runner in my school days, not elite but could hold my own in both sprints and distances up to 5km. Joined the military to see the world, ended up working in a tiny room deep underground without any room to move beyond sit and breathe. Combined with starting a family and all the sleep deprivation that came with, and my weight skyrocketed to the point that running was no longer an option for my joints or breathing.

After leaving the military, the job I thought I had lined up fell through, and I was suddenly unemployed with hungry kids, borderline obese and angry at myself, the world, everybody. Rather than take out my anger on my family, I spent money I didn't have to spare on a membership to the gym up the road where I began lifting weights. Man, talk about therapeutic! Slabs of iron moving because I WANT IT TO, the super satisfying bang of weights hitting the floor after a set, and immediate progress in increasing the weights used, all served to improve my mental state enormously. Perhaps not coincidentally, I got hired soon after to a job which paid DOUBLE the one which fell through, actually used my college degree and skills acquired in the military, and the rest is history.

Still have the job 15 years later, still lifting 15 years later. Traded 60+lbs of fat for 40+lbs of muscle, and the man in the mirror is 100% different than before. The iron room still serves as therapy, my "me time" where I can focus on myself rather than being an employee, spouse or father. Seeing my sons grow into fit, strong young men I needed to keep up with was a motivator to BE strong; watching my daughters grow and start to talk about boys is a far different motivator to LOOK strong, also. lol

At age 46, I am stronger than at any point in my life (recent tests prove it), and even my son's Army drill sergeant said I looked fit enough to give most of the recruits a run for their money, so missions accomplished.

I sometimes look longingly at people running and think about rejoining that world, maybe even running that marathon I dreamt of as a young man. But running and lifting are not typically friends with each other's goals, so for now, running will remain on the outside of the iron room looking in.

How Has The Gym Changed Your Life

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