Killing my Best Friend.

“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience by which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.”
-- Eleanor Roosevelt


"Good writing is about telling the truth." -- Anne Lamott

*****

I did forty minutes of cardio today, and, as Lamott suggests, I'll tell the truth.

It sucked.

As is the tricky case with most exercise, I felt fabulous afterwards.

But it still sucked.

I'm now two weeks into the "move my body everyday" pact that I have with myself, and it is getting easier.

But it still (mostly) sucks.

I've developed a strange little routine to my workouts. I get up in the morning, make sure the kids have eaten something, and then force myself to exercise before I've done anything else. I don't even brush my teeth first. I know. Gross. But I don't care. If it doesn't get done first thing in the morning, it won't get done. On the days when I allow myself to get distracted by something (like the beckoning computer, for example) or, since complete honesty is my aim here, when I'm really just DREADING the exercise, it's just that much harder to start, so I've been trying to get my body moving FIRST thing.

I put on socks and shoes, get out the iPod, and get on the albatross. There is exactly one song on my iPod, "How You Live" by Point of Grace. It's exactly 4 minutes and 25 seconds long, so I force myself to just KEEP MOVING through at least five repeats.

By two minutes into it, I'm sweating from every pore of my body. By the third repeat, I'm exhausted but, mentally, feeling pretty good, a little cocky even. By repeat number five, I'm usually sobbing.

He would never admit this, but I can tell that my husband worries when he sees me go through this strange, emotionally draining process. I assure him that I'm fine, even though he knows not to ask. And then I tell him there's a reason I don't exercise in public or within sight of anyone except him and our kids.

There comes a point in the workout when my legs are throbbing, and my heart feels like its ready to explode, and there are tears streaming down my face. I'm convinced, at the very core of my being, that I can't go on. But I do. Often, almost involuntarily, I find myself muttering "just one more" under my breath. One more step. One more breath. One more second.

Sometimes I'll even implore the women singing to keep me going, "Come on, girls. Just one more."

And gradually, all the "one mores" add up. And the five repeats of my theme song are over. The endorphins kick in. I wobble, weak kneed and light headed, off the albatross, and I take a long, deep drink of water.

And I feel, in a way I have rarely experienced, truly fantastic. This has to be what keeps fanatical workout divas coming back. This feeling that I have, at least for today, beat back the demons and, to manipulate (slightly) another quote from Eleanor Roosevelt, "done the thing I think I cannot do."

Now, I'm sure there are those out there thinking, "What's the big deal? It's only a little over twenty minutes??" I've had many a well-meaning, athletic, fitness minded friend offer me advice on how to REALLY get a workout, and I can hear them snickering as I type this. But, let's remember here, that I weigh almost 300 pounds.

I used to marvel at the stories my brother, a national title winning wrestler in the early 1980s, would tell me about their training. It seems that while attending practices with the Iowa Hawkeye Wrestling Team, Coach Dan Gable would have the atletes run the stairs of Carver-Hawkey Arena while carrying another wrestler on their backs. It strikes me, as I write this, that this is akin to what a 300 lb person is doing when they exercise. They are hauling with them, essentially, the weight of two fully grown adults. It also strikes me that, having never been an athlete in ANY sense of the word, my attempting to workout AT ALL is a little ludicrous. To employ a metaphor closer to my own area of expertise, my efforts at exercise seem as ridiculous a proposition as my asking a functionally illiterate or a non-English speaking adult to write a critical analysis of Tolstoy's War and Peace. Well, maybe that's a bit dramatic, but, I'm confident the point has been made.

Most of this workout process seems reasonable to me. Except the tears. I don't have those completely figured out yet. They truly come out of nowhere, and I can no more summon them voluntarily than I can stop them once they arrive. They really just happen.

And I don't really know why.

I've been wrestling with that question lately. Why, when I am doing something I KNOW is good for me, does some deep, nameless part of myself that I rarely reveal to ANYONE, suddenly hurt so much? Of course my legs hurt, of course my muscles strain. But where are the tears coming from?

The only thing I can figure so far is that this journey is, and will be, as much a spiritual and personal transformation as a physical one. I know that I am challenging some notions about myself and my place in this world that are firmly rooted in 34 years of habit and self-image. I was, after all, first diagnosed as "mildly obese" at just nine months of age. So, my fat has been with me from the beginning.

And, in many ways, as ironic as this may sound, my fat has been my best friend. A manipulative, co-dependent, ultimately bad-for-me best friend, but a best friend nonetheless. My fat has NEVER left me for someone or something more interesting or more advantageous, as other friends and lovers have. It has put up with my mood swings and irrational behavior, as other friends and lovers have not. It has stood faithfully by my side, despite the cussing and the hatred and the pure, deep loathing I've showed it in return. This is not a trait easily found in a friend.

My fat has, without question, helped shaped my identity. I was the cute, chubby kid who made friends and family members smile or giggle, especially in times of trial. I was the funny fat girl in high school and college whose quick wit and sarcastic cynicism helped her separate smart, loyal friends from dull, shallow acquaintences and enemies. I was the big, strong, vociferous English teacher who could wrestle a classroom under control through sheer bulk and attitude. I am, now, the paunchy middle-aged wife and mother of two, whose harried life and hectic schedule give her an excuse to find solace in cheesecake and sanity in the McDonald's drive-thru.

On the other hand, my fat has caused me deep sorrow and self-loathing. It's undermined my confidence and circumscribed my life in a way nothing and no one else ever has. It has made me rule out countless goals and activities I might truly have enjoyed by insisting that its mere presence disqualified me from aspiration and participation. My fat is the reason I don't take my kids to the swimming pool on a regular basis. It's the reason I don't dance in public or feel at ease in any room of more than five occupants. It's the reason I gave up the stage and no longer find pleasure in singing at public events. There are countless, tiny ways in which I've allowed my fat to control my life, and I am not one that is easily controlled.

My fat has caused me obvious health problems and serious self-image issues as well, but it has, strangely, been my protector, too. My fat allows me to explain away the rejection of others, to place the blame at their feet for their inability to look past my appearance and get to know the "real me." My fat has made me really unattractive, which has, at times, acted as a filter for those whose motives I presumed shallow or dishonest. My fat has been a physical barrier against the cold, a cushion for my many falls, and an emotional shield in times of sorrow and pain.

Now, with each new step and drop of sweat, it feels as though I am trying to kill that friend. It's as if I am purposely trying to rid myself of something that has been a central part of my identity since infancy. And this is incredibly draining spiritual work.

My relationship to my own body has been a complicated one, to be sure. I have, for most of my life, hated the vessel that houses my soul. I've mistreated and abused it, accordingly. At times, though, I've been completely astounded at its capability and resilience. I've admired it's willingness to heal from illness and marvelled at its ability to grow and birth and nurture two living, breathing, miraculous human beings.

So, I suppose it stands to reason that an aggressive endeavor to rid myself of between 1/3 and 1/2 of this place my soul calls home might be fraught with some degree of angst. Hence, the tears.

I will continue to workout, of course, and it's quite likely the sobbing will stick around for a while. But I'm confident it will get better. As Roosevelt suggests, I will look this fear in the face, and I will gain strength, confidence, and courage in return. I will live through this "horror" and, emerge, ready and able to "take the next thing that comes along." As this process continues in the months and years ahead, I will adapt to a shifting sense of self that is sure to challenge a few of the notions central to my current identity. I will do the physical, mental, and, perhaps most importantly, the spiritual work, and I am confident that, in the end, this journey will leave me a stronger, healthier, more resilient person, in body, mind, and spirit.

But for now, I'll take the tears. And the throbbing legs, and the sweat.

I'll take them all just one more

just one more

just one more

step

at

a

time.