Every Wednesday evening I take this kick-butt cardio kick boxing class and every Wednesday I am very afraid. Our teacher is like a drill instructor and at 149 beats a minute without breaks, she tells us that we are her slowest class. Her class is HARD; let me put it this way – she trained in Tae Bo with Billy Blanks. She says she is a drill instructor and I am pretty sure she means literally as I certainly feel like I am in the army – and she definitely makes us drop and do push-ups.
I try to keep up by staying at the front of the room. I sweat, hop and pant my way through every step. We’re all moving and praying that she doesn’t see any one put their hands on their hips or we’ll all have to do 20 more of whatever we were doing. By the end of class I am literally stinking but I feel exhilarated. I feel proud that I once again made it through the class – it’s just not as easy as it used to be.
Last week I don’t know what I was doing or trying to prove but I think I jammed something – so much to the point that I felt like I was two inches shorter. I felt like I was in one of those Lifetime movies where “a freak accident leaves someone paralyzed” as I gingerly tried to maneuver around the next couple of days. Turning my head required turning my entire body in the desired direction; putting on shoes meant trying to retrieve them with my toes and tossing them up into my hands to put on rather than bending, and it felt better walking sideways rather than straight ahead. I felt really pathetic when Parker offered to help me walk! It has been a week and I am still walking tentatively and have not been to the gym since. I finally waved the white flag and made a doctor’s appointment for Friday. I thought this was something I could shake off with rest and taking it slow, but the old body doesn’t seem to recover like it used to.
In my 20s and 30s I lived on the Upper Eastside in New York. There used to be this gym called Living Well Lady right at 86th and Lexington where the instructors, all dancers, would smoke cigarettes, eat potato chips and sip soda while waiting for class to start – they were about a size 2. I was right along with them as I’d treat myself to a box of Entenmann’s chocolate chip cookies and a can of chocolate frosting as a treat for after step AND aerobics class. It was so easy to go from class to class, hopping, kicking and jumping and then eating a diet of chocolate, hamburgers and fries. I could do that with ease, stay a size 6, and hit repeat. Now I do a bad move in the ONE difficult class I take each week and feel like my body is broken!
What used to be cured with a quick rest now takes a week of monk like stillness to only slightly improve. Yesterday I made myself take a walk because you know at this age it takes one day to gain weight and one month to get it off. I was going so slow I felt like I was walking in reverse. But I trudged on – and I guess that’s the solution. Keep moving through it. I will never be that young girl flying through aerobics classes again – the veins on my hands and rings around my neck remind me of that. But I can meet myself where I am.
I’ll keep fighting the good fight, keep exercising and making doctor’s appointments so that I can recover from whatever trauma I inflict on my body and keep hoping that everything stays in place – at least until the next class.
No comments:
Post a Comment