Body Journey: February

My February focus was set to be about self-reflection and yoga. But after my January discoveries of using an exploratory mindset and doing meditation, I found myself poised and ready for a new challenge that came my way.

photo by Adji Teoudoussia

In February I joined a very different kind of fitness center where health at any size, body type, or age is the core idea. At TASH Wellness for Women I found a leader and a community who are now guiding and trekking along with me on this body journey. I am no longer a sole wanderer exploring at random. I am now a purposeful hiker in a group of explorers headed toward a summit. Last month on my own, I had my hiking boots and a curious eye. Now I have a whole crew, climbing equipment, and a map that leads up a mountain. 

photo by Frantisek Duris

And I am eager to scale this mountain. Already I have discovered that my body can do planks, squats, jumping jacks (with two bras on), and kickbox. My body is flexible, strong, and balanced. My body can wake up early without dread and smile at the incoming day.

       California

This is how I got here: If you read January’s post, you know I couldn’t wait for February to try different yoga. The restorative nidra gong yoga was just perfect for the hibernating month of January. And it led me to try some other yoga classes, including a Plus Size Yoga class. It was liberating to see what big bodies are capable of. Mainstream media had firmly wedged an idea in my head that a body my size could not/should not do certain things. That doing such things can only start once I lose weight. This yoga class busted that myth to smithereens.

Mexico

Before: I join a weight management program with determination to go and go and go until I am fixed. I have a little booklet full of empty boxes. Each week the first thing we do is step on the scale. A little sticker with my weight goes into the booklet every week. The number on the scale goes into that booklet every single week. One number. Every week. One number. I obsess over that number all week long. That number makes me cry.

Artist: Jim Nutt
Art exhibited at the Hairy Who? 1966-1969 show at The Art Institute of Chicago
photo by Honor Teoudoussia

All week I count, track, measure, calculate, tally points instead of eating. I actually do eat. Only it doesn’t feel like I eat. It’s just points and numbers, points and numbers all week long. Go back, get on the scale, get my sticker, stare at my number during the meeting, hate that number. I am reduced to a number but actually fattened to a number. 

I go to a gym. Everyone has headphones. Everyone is plugged into the machines. There are at least 50 isolated people in the cavernous space. We watch our screens and try to get through the strain of exercise. No one wants to feel it. We just want to get it over with. Though some people watch themselves in mirrors, with serious scrutiny of their never-good-enough bodies. I don’t look in the mirror. I don’t see me. I input minutes, age, and weight in a machine. I pedal over and over until the minutes are up. On other machines, I count the bland repetitions until it’s over.

Illinois

California

I fail this way for years. Even when I lose weight, it’s a fail because a message soon pops in my head: “You can’t keep this up. Next week the number on the scale will be higher. It happens every time—the number goes down then it goes up. You’re not working hard enough. Who do you think you’re fooling that this is ‘a whole new you’?” I believe the voice so quickly because it’s true that I can’t do this. I can’t do it because I don’t want to. I don’t want a new me who lives and dies by these numbers.

Iowa

So I build a suit of armor around me to protect from incoming criticism—mostly my own. My protectors are distractions like work, books, writing, house projects, and always attending to my children’s needs before mine (I would be the worst in a plane crash because I would definitely put their oxygen masks on before my own). My biggest “protector” though is never allowing myself to be in the moment. Why would I want to be in the crappy moment where I am not enough? Instead I am constantly in my head, in my future perfect life. In my future perfect life, the To Do list is done, the numbers are all right, and everything is set from here on out. 

Three years ago, I celebrated my 50^th birthday by going on a solo island writing retreat.

St. Barth's

I did a lot of thinking and writing about this vicious cycle of trying so hard to change my body. (https://travelwritingaway.blogspot.com/2016/05/a-swimsuit-for-me.html) I read Jes Baker, Roxane Gay, Lindy West. I counted pictures of big bodies in magazines (0). I tried to recall movies with fat women main characters that were not based on the fat being a problem or being funny (0). I thought of all the times people said, “Oh you look great! You lost weight!” And how many times they said, “Oh you look great!” (0)* And all those meaningless numbers on scales and exercise machines swam in my head, taking up way too much of my life.

*This is not quite true. My best friend always tells me I look great no matter how much I weigh. But my memory is twisted to just focus on the negative.

So ever since then I have been searching for alternatives to programs that want to change me. Programs that want to reduce me to a number. I searched for something that would acknowledge my goodness now and build on that. I don’t want to be programmed. I want to be seen.

When I was looking into TASH Wellness for Women (https://tashfitness.com/), Sharan Tash led our initial conversation with “We don’t focus on the scale here.” A little piece of my armor chipped off. At the end of the first class, we stood in front of the mirror and repeated, “I’m perfect just the way I am. I deserve to see, really see myself. I’m honored to be inside this amazing human vessel. Today I will take care of my body with love.” And more armor broke off, fell to the floor with a definitive thump. With each day that I am a member of this community, the armor chips off, breaks off, falls off in chunks. I’m beginning to see myself underneath it all.

Iowa (abandoned creamery)

After: First I observe a class. I see a small group of women of different ages and body types working out like Marines. They are smiling, sweating, laughing through the intensity. I have a personal conversation with Sharan in which I tell her how discouraged I am by gyms, weight loss programs, diets, doctors telling me to try pills and stomach surgery. She does a body assessment that goes way beyond stepping on the scale. It is a Styku body scan that results in a complete analysis of my body’s percentages of fat and non-fat and measurements of every part of my body.

The report tells me precise health risks but also tells me that if I drop 34 pounds of fat, I will move to a lower category of risk. That sounds attainable and purposeful.

The body scan is one small part. Sharan also does other tests of my arm reach, balance, mobility, and so forth. I have a customized plan. I go a little early before classes and roll my right hip on a tube thing to loosen the fascia. There was damage during the birth of my first child. This is something I suspected but never cared enough about my body to put into words. Now I do and I feel more important, more self-respected.

Most of the classes are at 6:15AM, which means me leaving my house at 5:50AM. At first that voice pops in my head: “Uh yeah no. Waking at 5AM is wretched, and you will dread it and never be able to keep it up.” But the initial challenge at TASH is six weeks so I decide to give it a try, thinking six weeks would be it for me. I am now in my fifth week and there is no way I’m stopping.

There are many reasons getting up this early to work out like a Marine is not wretched.

1. Community The workouts are the polar opposite of lonely plugging into a machine. You are greeted at the door and there is chatting as you put on your gym shoes. There is a lounge with couches. During the workout with the small group of women, there are jokes, words of support, connection. After class, there are conversations in which you learn about parenting, neighborhoods, work, life. We learn each other’s names and jobs. Sharan has us introduce ourselves after class if there is a new person in the group. 

Mexico

2. Accountability You have to sign up for each class online. So people are expecting you. If you don’t come, Sharan calls you. At a gym, no one cares if I show up or not. That makes it really easy to not show up, to make excuses. Once I emailed in sick for a class and Sharan emailed back right away saying she was glad I was taking care of myself. She released me from the guilt and shame of missing a class and legitimized my self-care.

Mexico

3. Affirmations At first, when we talked to ourselves in the mirror, I fidgeted and fixed my hair, little bits of judgement sizzling the edges of my face. But the minute I heard all the women affirm their beauty, worth, strength, health, I spoke up loud and proud. This is what I had been looking for.

“I love how my body looks and I reject any negativity society puts on this wonderful body of mine. I reject any notion that this glorious body of mine is unacceptable because of my clothing size, body shape, skin color, height, or the number on the scale. I am perfect just the way I am.”

 In January when I started this 8-month body journey, I very deliberately stated that I was not trying to change my body. I was trying new things to see what my body can do.  I can meditate away from toxic messages and into calm satisfying present moments. I can drop 12 pounds. I can cook and get lost in luxurious moments of eating Portuguese kale soup, ricotta parfaits, chicken curry, Thai shrimp salad. I can wake up at the crack of dawn with anticipation of pushing my body to stretch, lift, flex, strain, sweat. I can wipe the toxins off my face with that hot lemony towel at the end of the workout, chatting with new friends. I can tell my reflection she is enough without giggling or fixing my hair. I can kickbox.