My first day at the gym was interesting one to say the least. When I woke up that morning I just knew my first day at the gym was going to be amazing. Your boy had the intention of lifting all things and getting a six-pack or at least 24 inch guns after the first workout. I had to the intentions of doing great things at the gym. That‘s all I could think of while I was at work.
So it’s 4:30pm and It’s time to go to the gym. I pulled up to the gym parking lot and couldn’t find a spot…. But that’s OK because when I get in there I’m going to lift all things. So after driving around for 15 minutes I finally get a parking spot. Now I’m really hype because this gym doesn’t know what the got in store. Shit, I’m 300 Pounds and Running I’m going to tear this gym up!!
As soon as I walk through the gym doors, I instantly feel small. The smell of humid sweat and steel punches my in the nose. My ears hurt from the sound of grunting and weights hitting the ground. I am also overwhelmed on how pack it is in the gym. It felt like every bench, every treadmill, and every elliptical machine was being used.
I felt out-of-place.
I felt like I did not belong even though the signed one-year contract said I did. I don’t know if it’s because I haven’t been to a gym in a while or that I didn’t have anything planned but the feeling made me just want to go home and eat a tub of buttered pecan ice cream. At that point I understood what people meant when they said the gym was just too much for them and they just quit because I wanted to quit too. I found this to be odd because in a point in my life, I used to be a gym rat, hell I played college football and I was a strength and conditioning coach at a high school so I don’t know how this gym could make me feel out-of-place but it did.
It took me about 15 or so minutes of wandering aimlessly for me to snap out of it. I gave myself an internal pep talk.
“Ok Martinus, you are here now, you payed the money and you’re not getting that back, plus one of you degrees is in Exercise Science… You are 300 Pounds and Running! You’re the shit! You ran a marathon at 300 pounds for god sake! I need you get you shit together and do what you came her to do… Lift all things!”
I looked around to see what was open and I decided that today would be an upper body day. So I did flat bench press, incline bench press, decline bench press, lat pull down’s, seated rows, upright rows, chest fly’s, bicep curls, and triceps pull down’s. I might have over did it but once I got into a groove, all logic kind of went out of the window and I did what felt right. After the work out I still felt out-of-place but I guess I need to get used to the new environment.
If I had to do this again I would have had a workout planned, found a group of people and tried to jump in with workout or hire a trainer just to alleviate some of the stress of the new environment, because it can be overwhelming.
The gym offers two free trainer sessions so the next day I opted to use one of them. Before the workout with the trainer I had to fill out this packet filled with what I felt was endless questions. Some of them included my first week goal, three-week goals, three-month goals, and one-year goals. It also asked about my commitment level, my motivation level and etc. Lastly it asked what are the three things I hoped to accomplish. I answered to get back in the marathon shape and to run the Hartford marathon, to do an unassisted pull-up and to get down to a 36 waist. All of which are solid goals and I think those could happen within the next year.
Then the trainer took my blood pressure, height, weight, and body mass index. He told me all the things I already knew, that I was fat as hell and I need to get this weight off of me. This was followed by a very simple workout that kicked my ass… Air squats, mountain climbers, planks, and bridges. Afterwards he tried to sell me a training package. I knew it was coming because nothing in this world is truly “free”. But what are you going to do about it? I am just happy to be active again.
How was your first day at the gym? Can you relate to my experience? Did you feel like a person in a foreign land? What did you do to cope with that feeling? Leave a comment below.
Until next time.
