The joy of exercise

As an overweight woman over 55 with a major family history of diabetes, heart disease and high cholesterol, exercise is a necessary evil. Most people hate exercise. I find that the hardest part for me is just getting started. Once I'm at the gym, I often quite enjoy it. With the exception of a year or two just prior to and just after retirement, I have been a member of a gym since late 1998. That doesn't always mean I WENT to the gym regularly; I generally went through phases of going and not going.

When I lived in Virginia, I joined a gym next to my office building. I tried working out before work and at lunchtime, but found both provided inadequate time to get in a full workout plus the shower, hair and makeup routine that follow, and still get to work (or back to work) on time. Eventually, I mostly went to the gym on days I wasn't working. This gave me the freedom to take classes (like the hellaciously-demanding step aerobics class I used to take on Saturdays) and stay at the gym as long as I liked.

Here in Delaware, I work out at a small community gym. It isn't fancy like my previous gym--it doesn't have a pool, sauna, hot tub or shower room--but it has plenty of equipment and a huge free weight room as well, so it meets my needs for now.

In my experience, I am unusual in that I am a woman (especially a woman over 55) who enjoys weightlifting. I love the sense of accomplishment it gives me when I can lift more than last year, the definition in my muscles and the feeling of being powerful.

Most women seem to be afraid of weights. They worry about building muscle--looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger. I have tried to explain to many women over the years that we, as women, do not have the testosterone needed to build massive muscles (not to mention that many men with bulky muscles have taken steroids to help them build that mass). I frankly find muscle definition sexy and am happy to find more definition in my upper arms, etc.

It's not all about the gym, though. From 2003 to 2008, I was big into doing workouts on DVD at home. I did kickboxing, tai chi, Pilates, ballet, weightlifting, hula dancing, belly dancing--just about anything you can think of that doesn't require much (or any) equipment. I still own a nice library of exercise DVDs and I rent others from the online DVD rental company, Netflix. Netflix has a great selection and renting is a wonderful way to determine whether a workout is right for you before you invest in buying it. Trust me, I learned the hard way!

I'm also a walker of many years. I think that is the exercise that gives me the most enjoyment. On a beautiful, sunny day, I used to regularly walk for an hour or more, including a pretty daunting hill in my old Virginia neighborhood. Sadly, the area of Delaware where I live now is flat as a pancake, so there just isn't the challenge with walking that there was in Virginia.

I have a dog now, so most of my walking these days is at the other end of a little white fluffy thing. Thankfully, she loves to walk as much as I do so, when the weather is nice, we take some nice long walks. I do miss walking on my own, though. I'm thinking that, when the weather gets nicer in the spring, I may start shortening my walks with the dog to allow me to start walking on my own again. When I'm out there with my iPod and the breeze in my hair, I am in the zone.

Kind of like my favorite new piece of exercise equipment--the water rower. I'd never seen one before I joined my new gym in Delaware. Instead of pulling weights, you're pulling against the force of water. As you'll hear in the video below, it sounds like you're actually rowing a boat. When I turn on a fan and close my eyes, I can almost think I'm outside rowing.