Girls in the Weight Room

When I very first stepped into a weight room a couple years ago, I have to admit that I was totally and completely intimidated.

First off, I was fat. FAT. I know what happens in my head about myself, at least what use to happen in my head about my former fatter self. My huge fear was that it was happening in everyone else's heads too.

• Oh look at that. The fat chick thinks she's gonna lift some weights. Hahahaha. Whatever fatty, might as well just perfect lifting that burger to your lips.
• I have no idea what I'm doing in here, and everyone else is going to see it too.
• Everyone's looking at me, everyone's looking at me, everyone's looking at me...

I know, I'm a total bitch. I'm more of a bitch to myself though. Well, I'm working on that. I don't talk to myself like that anymore. No wonder why I was fat and unhappy, right?

I think others talk to themselves like this too, to an extent at least. There are two ways that people can respond to this kind of taunting though: 1. They can cower and shy away from it and hide from the world behind their burger and bucket of french fries. 2. They can tell the world (and the bitch in their head) to piss off and do the damn thing anyway. I've never been one to shy away and cower so of course I curled my tiny little carnie fingers in to the palm of my hand, leaving one popular finger flying high for all to see. Then I marched my fat ass right into the weight room and did what I needed to do.

I'm sure there were some rhoided out freaks judging me all up and down and round my perimeter but I didn't care, judge away gentlemen. I'm sure they were all watching me to see what I was doing and what I was doing all wrong, but their fascination with me doesn't have to have any influence on what I do for myself. I'm sure they could all tell just how clueless and scared I was but I'm sure they got over it when they saw me come back over and over again. There were a couple times that some douchebag bitches tried to push me off a bench I was using or bully me away from a squat bar by asking me in mid lift if I was almost done (with a look of contempt in their beaty little eyes). My response was always the same and will always remain the same.

"I'm using that and NO I'm not done yet".

Girls have just as much right to be in the weight room as any of the muscle head retards grunting and groaning and posing in the mirror for themselves. Fat girls, skinny girls, short girls, tall girls, girly girls, old girls, new girls, clueless girls, and all other kinds of girls have every right to be in the weight room.

If you ever go to a gym where the inflated Ken Doll wannabes are mean mugging you when you walk into their territory, throw one right back at them with a snarly little smile just to tell them to Fuck Off. If they try to encroach on your little work out area, tell them to move. If they take a bench that you were just on, tell them you're still using it. You don't have to take that shit, you know. On the other end of the coin, if you don't know what you're doing and you want to learn, they're a great resource and typically willing to give advice too. Most of them can be really helpful and supportive if you give them the opportunity.

Weight training is really good for your body, for your metabolism, for your mind, and for your emotional well being. It feels oh so good to march into a weight room with confidence, knowing that you overcame your fears about it, knowing that you're doing good things for yourself and no one and nothing is going to get in your way...including yourself.

Happy lifting.

Weight training and stuff like that

The first week of April activity is well underway. Weight training is the winner and I've got two workouts taken care of already. First thing first. I'm a planner through and through so I don't dare dive into my goals without first having an idea of the path I intend to follow. I've gotten into the habit of creating a monthly exercise calendar so I can be sure to get enough exercise in as well as the proper amount of rest for my muscles in between my workouts. So, without further distraction. Here is my revised exercise calendar.

You'll see on the calendar that I took care of a lower body weight training workout and an upper body workout already this week. It's true. That's what I did. Correction: That's what we did. We meaning Accountabilibuddy and I. Yes, I'm her trainer this month.

Here are the exercises we did. The weights referenced are what I did. Accountabilibuddy took it a little easier than that though. Especially for her first time in the weight room.

Lower Body Exercises

Upper Body Exercises

I've had this schedule of alternating upper and lower body weight training every other day for quite a while now. Of course, there have been plenty of weeks when I didn't follow it as planned for whatever reasons but for the most part, it works well for me. This schedule tends to give me just enough time for my damaged muscles to recover and rest before I engage them again and it allows me to focus my workouts so I don't feel scatter-brained in the gym.

I know that on lower body weight days, I'll be working quads, hammies, inner and outer thighs, calves, butt, and abs. I never find myself standing in the middle of the gym spinning around in circles wondering which direction I should go because I have a plan. Some days I do choose to spend more time on the machines and less in the weight room or vise versa but that's about the extent to my wondering around the gym. And even that has a purpose. Depending on the day, the time of day, and the time of year the weight room can be over filled with the idiot muscle heads who insist on grunting when they do 40lb barbell curls.

What's the deal with that by the way? I mean, I can do 30lb barbell curls with normal SILENT breathing, why does a rhoided out freak need to grunt out loud then drop the weights and pace back and forth in front of them like he's trying to psych out his opponent? Why? Why? WHY? I'll tell you why. There is absolutely no good reason for it. NONE! The reason they do it is because they're partially retarded. I'm sure of it. Perhaps instead of choosing to grunt while lifting, they should focus more on controlling their breath so they can get more oxygen to their tiny little deprived brains. Just a thought.

The first couple workouts went well I think. Well, I got good workouts from them. I burned a ton of calories and felt really good about working all the major muscles. And, I was/am really proud of Accountabilibuddy for hanging in there too. She was not in the mood to do much of anything this week. There may have even been a bit of whining. Just a bit. Nothing I can't handle. But, I'm very happy to say that she sucked it up and did the damn thing.

Toward the end of the lower body workout, we ended up over on the mats to do abs. Right next to the mats are a couple cardio machines. There were a couple women on the stationary bikes there while Accountabilibuddy was trying to get out of having to do any more abs than she wanted. While I was pushing her to do more, the onlookers seemed to get a little entertainment value from it. While they were up there on their little pedestals, peddling their feet oh so gently so as not to break a sweat, WE were down on the mat kicking our abs into high gear.

So you think that's entertaining do you, Unexercisers? I must say that I had the thought run through my head of confronting these unexercisers and challenging them to drop and show us how it's done if they enjoyed watching so much. I didn't though. I just looked up at them and chuckled. I behaved myself. That doesn't mean I'll be holding it together if/when it happens again though. I just love poking people. How very sociopathic of me I know. I just can't help it. When I see buttons, I instinctively want to push them.

Then we did upper body weights. Oh it was good. Accountabilibuddy actually hurt her knee again. She's got a meniscus problem. Little bugger. So I made sure to do all activities that would not put any pressure or strain on her knee. You know what that means? Bench press time! Ya baby! I love doing bench presses. We did bench presses and dumbbell flyes for chest work. I wanted to make her do pushups but that couldn't happen this week. Perhaps after her knee is healed. There's just something about doing upper body weight training that makes me feel powerful. You'd think I would get that feeling doing any kind of weight training but I don't.

What kind of exercise makes you feel powerful?

I have so much more to say about this and more but I think I should cut it off here for now.

Sneak peak on future topics
Other entertaining gym goers
Annoying gym habits
Not all cardio is created equal
Fear in the weight room
Motivation
Muscle soreness and recovery
Which exercises work and which ones suck
La la la, I can't hear you with my ear buds in and music cranked to 11


What other topics are you interested in knowing about my weight training adventures?

Liar Liar Hot Yoga Pants on Fire

Yes, I lied. And it was to you. It wasn't an intentional lie though. I was telling the truth as I knew it at the time. It slowly became a lie. So now I'm here to confess my sins and beg forgiveness. Ok, not really but you get the idea, right?

My last post, I showed you all a picture of my calendar for the month of April and I had a clever title and everything. Hot hot hot hot Yoga. Sound familiar?

Bad news folks. Change of plans here. No hot yoga this month. Sad face: GO!

It's true, I'm sorry to say. Accountabilibuddy and I purchased our yoga passes together and she has run into a bit of scheduling difficulty. I just can't understand why. I mean someone should be able to manage their schedules with perfect efficiency when they have a full time job, two rental properties, an emotionally needy husband, and a house full of kids. Let's not talk about any possibility of a social life or personal interests on top of that lovely list of responsibilities. **Sarcasm in case you couldn't tell**

Being the wonderful Accountabilibuddy that I am, I offered to hold off on doing it myself until she was able to find a way to fit it into the schedule. We're shooting for May instead so I'm sorry but you're just going to have to wait for my fabulous hot yoga adventures until then. I know, I know you were looking forward to it. On the edge of your seats, constantly refreshing my blog page just waiting and watching and hoping that with each refresh, you will be given the key to your own fitness entertainment destiny...my misadventures of hot yoga. Practice in patience is good for the soul. I suggest you try it now. **Sarcasm again. Seriously you should be getting the hint by now that I can tend to be slighly sarcastic at times.**

Go ahead, you can ask me what I know is just burning a hole in your brain waiting to get out. Go ahead...
hehum...Salina? Yeeeessssss? If you're not doing hot yoga this month because your hot yoga pants are on fire, what are you going to do instead? WONDERFUL QUESTION. Allow me to answer.


MEMORANDUM

Date:     April
Topic:   April Activity
To:       Bloggerville
From:   Salina the big fat liar pants

Announcement to all! The activity for the month of April will be..................................................................... WEIGHT TRAINING! Ta da!


What? No good? Well, let me tell you why and perhaps that will get you a little more interested and excited for this month's activity.

Reason #1 - I have slacked on my own weight training in the past few weeks. I thought it would be good to focus on it again because weight training is a critical element to a complete weight loss and fitness program and I seriously want to make the scale start moving again.

Reason #2 - When I was studying struggling with the ACSM exam prep material, my lovely and wonderful Accountabilibuddy decided to make me a little deal. She said she wanted to motivate me to get through it so the deal she offered was to allow me to "practice" my new skills and knowledge on her for an entire month. Yes, that's right, the deal was that if/when I passed my ACSM exam, she would let me kick her butt all around the weight room. I've tried to get her to join me in the weight room before and she wouldn't for whatever reason. But this was my chance. I passed so I WIN.

So what do you think about that? Makes things a little more interesting I think.

My first weight training intallment for the month will come tomorrow since our first session was actually a little earlier today.