Exercise – Life According to TJ

It’s not OK, I’m not ‘just fit’

April 13, 2022 Steph TJ

Recently, whilst at a Nordic Walking class a fellow walker was commenting on how much the Nordic Walking was hurting their arms. So we discussed why that might be. Then they said ‘It’s OK for you, you’re fit’.

I suppose compared to the average person I am quite fit. On the scale of fit people, I’d put myself towards the lower end. But that’s not the bit that struck me. It was the whole ‘It’s OK for you, you’re fit’. Is that generally what people think – that fitter people are just fit? Do they not realise the level of effort involved in being ‘just fit’? Do they not understand the choices that fit people make on a daily basis? There is no fit person I know that is ‘just fit’. I can’t imagine that there are many people who are and is this generally a myth that people believe, that some people find being fit and healthy an easy choice.

Taking myself as an example. Everyday I try to complete some form of exercise. Even if it’s a short walk and a bit of stretching, a short fitness class, or doing exercises from the physiotherapist. Because that’s what I need to do to keep the pain at bay, to manage a prolapse, to keep my body moving as best it can as I mature. I am (hopefully) doing the best that I can to enable me to continue to be fit and active for the next 20 years. This does not come easy to me and it never has, I am not a natural athlete. I would very much like to be able to sit all day and not have to bother with exercise. But I must. How I would love not to. I also make choices everyday about what to eat and drink. Again, these are not easy choices. How I would love to eat as many crisps, chocolate, cake as I liked. Or drink as much alcohol as I liked. But I can’t. It’s not good for my physical and mental health and impedes the exercise I need to do to keep me moving freely and keep my brain sane. These are not easy choices. They do not ‘just’ happen. I am not ‘just fit’. This is a daily commitment to my health and well-being.

During the past week I have carried out some very low-scale market research to find out if anyone would consider being fit to be an easy option.

Looking at my husband, he will be the first to admit that he is at the obese end of the weight scale. But what people don’t see is he is currently at the lowest weight he has been for over 20 years. What people also don’t see is the 12,000 steps he takes every day. They don’t see the food choices he makes every day. They don’t see the level of effort he puts in to make sure he doesn’t move further towards the obese end of the scale. They make judgements based on his appearance and assume that he must be fat and lazy – he is neither. He is currently struggling with a problem with his hip which has impeded his ability to complete his steps. This has been devastating for him, both mentally and physically. Not being able to achieve his daily step count has knocked his mental health and he is becoming increasingly frustrated at his inability to maintain what fitness he had. Like me he makes daily choices around food, exercise and drink. This does not ‘just’ happen.

For the last 6 months or so I have been doing online fitness sessions with Fitter Food Lover. Slowly I have increased the weights that I use and am seeing improvements in my strength, fitness and general well-being. I asked the personal trainer and other members of the group if they would consider being fit an easy choice. Not one said that it was. Each one makes a daily choice around diet and exercise and each one has their own reasons for doing so: to maintain fitness and flexibility as they mature, to be fit and active parents to their family, to feel better about themselves generally.

I asked members of the Nordic Walking group that I belong to. I even asked two women who had just finished a run and were heading to the café for a well earned cup of tea if they found being fit easy or enjoyable. It was a resounding ‘no’.

I also asked my sister if she would consider herself just fit. She is a physiotherapist and works alongside Help the Aged running fitness groups for the elderly, enabling them to maintain their mobility, and therefore, their independence as they age. She cited many reasons for maintaining fitness including building core strength and keeping your pelvic floor as healthy as it can be. But no, she agreed that it’s not easy. It’s a choice people make and a commitment they make to themselves – to be the fittest version of themselves they can be – for as long as they can.

I asked each of these people five questions:

Do you consider yourself to be ‘just fit’?
Do you look forward to exercising?
Do you enjoy exercise?
Do you enjoy the benefits of exercise?
Do you find any aspect of diet and fitness easy?

No one really considered themselves to be ‘just fit’.

Some did look forward to exercising. Some less so. Personally, I rarely look forward to exercise. It’s always a challenge for me to drag myself to classes, to the swimming pool, or out for a walk. I would always choose staying at home and doing nothing. It helps me if I know there are other people expecting me to turn up and it also helps if I have paid for the sessions in advance as that forces me to go along.

Most people said did enjoy the exercise once they got going and once they got there and that the biggest battle was getting to the class, or stepping out to run in the first place.

Everyone that I asked said they did enjoy the benefits of exercise. They enjoyed the feeling that being fit and exercising gave them and it’s this that spurs them on. Personally I love that when I have exercised I feel tired in a ‘worked hard’ sort of way and not a ‘lethargic about life’ kind of way. I love the way I can feel my body toning up and that my core is getting stronger. I love that I am able to manage my prolapse through exercise and haven’t, as yet, had to resort to other more invasive methods. I like waking up having enough energy to make it through the day without having to have a ‘Nana Nap’. I really enjoy not being in pain and want to maintain that for as long as I possibly can.

Nobody really found it easy. Some found it easier than others, largely dependent on other commitments that they needed to fit around their exercise. Some found it easier the more consistent they were and if, for whatever reason, they had fallen off the exercise or diet wagon found it hard to get back up again. I know that this is true for me. The more consistent I am, the easier I do find exercising. I also find it easier if I have a specific goal, which is why I tend to like a challenge of some kind. My personal trainer did say something which I found really interesting. ‘If it was easy there wouldn’t be an obesity epidemic. It’s our nature as a species to conserve energy and take the easy route. Our ancestors were fitter and healthier because they had to do things to get food. Now all we need to do is press our phone screens and it’s there’.

I found this really thought provoking and it made me think about my own Grandmother. She didn’t drive. She lived a good 15 minute walk away from the nearest food shops. She walked far more than I have ever had to in order to complete basic chores throughout the day. The diet that she ate was generally healthier then the diets that people eat today and it took time for her to cook a meal every evening. Fast food and convenience food didn’t exist – there was not alternative choice. Even if I think about how things have changed during my life, I can see how much more I sit still every day than I did 20 years ago. There is increasingly no real reason to move and so it’s even more important to create times in the day when you do. This is not an easy choice. I recently listened to an episode of ‘Happy Place‘ podcast where Rangan Chattergee raised the point that people who do choose to make healthy choices are increasingly considered outcasts, the ‘not-normal’, despite the proven benefits of a healthy diet and daily exercise. Where along the line did it become unusual to live a healthy life-style? Or unusual to include exercise in our daily lives? We have more free time than our ancestors, so at which point did we choose to spend that time doing as little as possible? Apparently this is part of our genetic wiring, to conserve energy for when we need it. The problem is that nowadays we are conserving energy for a danger that we are unlikely to face and the consequence is a population that is becoming increasingly sedentary and finding exercise to be something for other, fit, people.

I concluded that being fit is a scale. Some people are naturally more predisposed to exercise and have a natural talent for different types of exercise. Some people do enjoy exercise more than others and find it easier to fit into their daily routine. Some families are more exposed to exercise than others – and an active family will more than likely produce children who enjoy exercising, or taking part in team sports. But I’m not sure than anyone would say that they find exercise easy, whatever their level of sporting prowess, nor would I say that anyone is ‘just fit’, it’s a daily choice they make to include fitness as a part of their lifestyle. The one thing they would all have in common is the benefits and rewards they enjoy in return for the effort spent in exercising.

Exercise, Happiness, Healthy living, Mindfulness, Well-being

The Wheels on my Wagon go Round and Round

March 15, 2022March 15, 2022 Steph TJ

It’s been a month since my last glass of wine, so it goes to follow that its also a month since my last wine induced migraine.

I cannot believe the difference one month has made. Not so much in how I feel physically, or look, and certainly not how much I weigh, but in terms of mental health the change has been huge.

The old me is making an appearance. The me that inhabited the world until c.2009. The me that twirls through life, is distracted by flowers and sparkles, sees hope in the worst of times and whose job it is to smile and make people laugh (mainly at me).

Before moving to Bristol (BB) I was alcohol free. I exercised. I wasn’t 100% healthy and struggled at time balancing my health and work but for the main part I was happy. I enjoyed my job and the school I worked at. I was in a small department with three fabulous men and the office was usually filled with inane boy banter: football, music, tv, what we had for tea last night. There was no gossiping, there was no keeping score, just a generally calm, supportive working environment.

After moving to Bristol (AB) my life fell apart pretty quickly and it’s not until I look back that I can appreciate that fact. I worked with challenging students on a daily basis with little by way of support and it took its toll – on my mental health, my husband’s mental health and our relationship. It was then that I first started to drink, not, I now realise to deaden the pain or to deal with the stress of the situation, but to try to find the spark, the part of me that I knew was still in there. The part of me that had gone into hibernation. It’s hard to function in the world when you know a significant part of yourself is missing. It’s like permanently wading through treacle, trying to present a version of yourself to the world, hoping they can’t see the cracks. More often than I would like to admit, the cracks became chasms and I did struggle with life.

Slowly over the past 12 months I have started to crawl back out of hibernation, to unfurl my wings and take tentative steps back into the world as me. Not the me that people think I should be, but the me that I used to be – Before Bristol. I like this version of me and feel sad that she has been hidden away from the world for such a long while. Giving up wine is the final step in this process.

I’ve rediscovered the delight of exercising with good friends and the feelgood feeling that it gives me. Once again my priority is my health. Eating healthily feels normal and natural, I’m not on the rollercoaster of ups and downs that comes from drinking, feeling bad, eating sweets to cope, feeling bad, and have stopped making consistently poor choices. I’m not perfect, but due to lent I am making further progress as I have given up chocolate, biscuits and cakes which is forcing me to pick healthy snacks – which, I’ll confess, are nothing like as tasty but I’m hoping it will be worth it in the long term.

I am starting to love socialising again. I do love going out. I love the banter and the energy of an evening out. Bizarrely, I prefer it sober. I found having to drink quite stressful as I knew that there was always going to be quite a severe consequence, despite drinking a minimal amount and to know that I can go out, have fun, and wake up headache free, filled with energy and ready to take on the day is amazing. I have re-found my love of life. I love life, everything about it and I’m starting to enjoy it again, to spot the flowers by the roadside, to hear the birds singing and I no longer feel like I am dragging myself from one day to the next. It feels like there is a purpose to my days again. I am laughing again.

The wheels are well and truly back on my wagon, they are well oiled and ready to trundle on their merry way, safe and secure. I might even get around to pimping my wagon!

Bristol, Exercise, reflection, Sustainable Living, Well-being

January 2022

February 1, 2022February 1, 2022 Steph TJ

Well, it would be fair to say that I have already failed on one of my 22 for 2022. That of writing a blog post once a week. January has passed me by in a blur. Here in Bristol it has been fairly mediocre! The weather hasn’t really added up to much and there have been some days when leaving the house felt like an effort too far. In a way it was good to have this list of challenges, because it did actually make me do something other than watch the month pass me by.

It felt like a mammoth achievement to make it to Christmas with daily covid testing, husband testing positive for covid over the Christmas period, cancelled Christmas plans and the quietest Christmas for many a year. Just making it as far as the New Year seemed enough and like many people we have pretty much hunkered down for January. It was nice not to go out, not to worry about going out, but to spend cosy evenings in front of the TV. Not helped by the weather – which has been particularly gloomy.

In addition to that we have been decorating our home. It’s only a one bedroom flat which means it has been impossible to empty a room, decorate and then move everything back in. It became quite wearing in the end, permanently living in some version of chaos. That too has come to an end as we had the deadline of the last week of January to get as much done as possible prior to having carpets fitted throughout.

I’ve also had a deadline for the Open University. Like buses. Everything came along in the last week of January! It’s a relief that everything is out of the way. I have concluded that there will never be a convenient time for an assignment deadline – that’s just the way these things work. I suppose it’s a relief that January is out of the way. For me February represents hope that spring is just around the corner and the worst of winter is behind me.

One thing I have really enjoyed about January this year is no resolutions. No self imposed restrictions that have become unrealistic 10 days into the new year. I have also continued to enjoy not being on Facebook. It has made such a difference to how I feel and has meant that I have engaged more fully with real people in real life, completed more crochet projects and generally felt more calm and grounded. It’s probably the most hopeful January I’ve had in many years.

I have made progress on some of the items on my list of 22:

#3 I haven’t bought any new clothes. I have bought a few things from my local charity shop, but they have been things to alter or to use the fabric for other projects. I’ve never been able to alter clothes and so have been using charity shop finds to practice on, rather than destroy pieces I already have in my wardrobe. So far, so good! The bigger achievement for me is not going shopping in the winter sales. I do love a bargain and so it’s huge for me to pass them by. It’s also made me realise just how much I do already have in my wardrobe and so shopping isn’t necessary at all. There is the obvious bonus of saving money too!

#4 Reduce single use plastics. I am in awe of just how many toiletries I have stashed in my cupboards – particularly shampoo. I seem to have a never ending supply of shampoo which I am determined to use prior to replacing them with plastic free versions. Whilst any plastic isn’t great, recycling empty plastic is preferable to throwing away filled plastic containers. So, as yet all I have replaced is one handwash, and one shower gel – both with a good old fashioned bar of soap.

#7 Walk 1000 miles. I am currently 202.1 miles having started on 14th December. I suspect I might have to amend the challenge at some point in the year, in order to make it more of a challenge than it currently is.

#8 Eat one piece of fruit a day. Another fail! I have been increasing the amount of fruit I have been eating, but haven’t quite managed that one extra piece per day. But it’s a target to aim for. I’ve recently been reading ‘Quite Like a Woman’ by Holly Whitaker and taking on more than one thing at once isn’t advisable, better to change things one at a time – so I shall keep this as a target and hopefully by the end of 2022 this will be a daily habit.

#9 Read 12 Fiction books. I have achieved this. In fact, during January I have read several books, although only two were fiction books. The books I have read are:

‘The Couple at Number 9’ by Clare Douglas – a Crime book. I enjoyed the read and finished it (which is unusual for me) but not outstanding. I didn’t put it down and think I must go and read her other books.
‘Mother Loves Me’ – a psychological thriller and for the first half of the book there were times where I was scared to turn the page, but then it sort of fizzled out towards the end, which was disappointing.
‘Spectacles’ by Sue Perkins. I love Sue Perkins and so when I saw this on the shelf at the local charity shop I had to buy it. A great, entertaining read.
‘The Wrong Knickers’ by Bryony Gordon. Again, I love Bryony Gordon and her posts on Instagram showing a real down to earth approach to life. So this was a delight to read and a real honest insight into the reality of life as a twenty-something in London.
‘Once Upon a Time in The West Country’ by Tony Hawks. A gentle story chronically Tony’s move to the West Country. The best part without doubt is when he takes a pig for a cycle ride across Devon.

#11 Make a dress that fits. The items of clothing I have altered have helped me with this as I am starting to get a better understanding of the shape of clothes and how they fit together. I usually just follow the pattern, but my body is a bit of a queer shape, so understanding the construction of clothing is probably going to be as helpful as following a pattern. That way I can work out what to adjust rather than just blindly follow along.

#16 365 days of writing. I have tried. This is another habit that I have found to be a struggle, especially on days when I have been studying. The thought of spending more time at my laptop blows my mind a bit. I did try writing by hand, but find that I think more clearly when I am typing. I also found some of the prompts a little un-inspiring and so ended up writing waffle. There was one day that I wrote a poem, which I did quite enjoy and came as quite a surprise to me. This is another habit that I hope to have incorporated in to my life on a daily basis come the end of 2022. Especially as I hope to have started a module on Creative Writing by then!

#17 Listen to 12 New Albums. My album choice for January was ‘Hand Cannot Erase’ by Steven Wilson. Which I have quite enjoyed and is certainly different to anything that I would normally choose to listen to. What has been most interesting has been finding out from different people which albums they recommend. I’m still on the hunt for about 6 months worth of recommendations, so please do feel free to share your favourites. If there was one album you think I should listen to, what would it be?

That’s all of the progress for now! I’m hoping that during February I make a start on some of the other items on the list, specifically cycling from Albufeira to Vilamoura and I am going to try again with the daily fruit and creative writing habits.

Exercise, Healthy living, reflection, Well-being

March in Review

March 31, 2021March 31, 2021 Steph TJ

Another month closer to 50! Two more months to go.

At the beginning of March I set myself three goals:

Not drink alcohol
Cut out sweet treats
Try to increase activity levels

It would be fair to say that I achieved mixed results!

With regards to the alcohol, I did manage to cut down the amount of wine that I was drinking. As I’ve mentioned before I’m not a great wine guzzler, but I don’t handle it particularly well. I wanted to see if it did have that much of a difference on my general health and pain levels. It does definitely have an impact. Does it cause my pain? I don’t think so. But if I am in pain, it really doesn’t make things better – it makes painful days more painful but it’s not the sole cause of the pain. It also makes hot flushes hotter! During the two weeks that I had no wine at all the hot flushes didn’t stop – but they were noticeably less intense. We are also heading into summer here in Albufeira and I do know that I don’t manage wine with the heat, I get very dehydrated very quickly and so would say that from here on in, I am unlikely to drink much by way of wine. Equally, if I am going out for an evening for a meal with friends, I won’t totally avoid wine, but drinking wine for drinking’s sake is at an end. One thing that I have realise is how much sitting still causes pain, particularly through the night. I suspect in the past I have blamed the wine – but in actual fact it is sitting still for prolonged periods that is the main culprit.

Cutting out sweet treats was an epic fail. There is no other way to describe it! On top of the odd twix here and there, I also did some baking during March. I do love baking but find eating it all a bit overwhelming. This month, however, I had the opportunity to bake and share my offerings which made it all a bit more manageable. As we leave lockdown, I expect the opportunities to bake will stop – but having said that, the fabulous cake shop in Albufeira may well re-open and it would be a shame not to partake! So, I am going to try a bit harder this month to cut down on the number of sweet treats I eat. Obviously, it is Easter this weekend and so I will have a chocolate egg to savour, but once that has gone, I will try really hard not to snack on chocolate so much and save it for special occasions.

Increasing exercise was a bit of a mixed bag. I did complete the 500 sun salutation challenge, which was a real plus considering I only managed 10 last year. I’d like to say I enjoyed it, but that would be a lie! I’m not even that sure I learned all that much about myself either. By the end of the month, I was finding breathing with the moves easier and I am definitely a bit more flexible, but that’s pretty much where the benefits have ended. Having said that, I may well carry on doing 10 a day for the next while just to see if there is a difference over time. I did find that doing 10 sun salutations in the afternoon is a great energy boost and lifts you out of the post lunch slump really effectively.

I’ve also maintained 15 to 30 minutes a day of yoga and started doing the Lift Program for prolapse with Fem Fusion Fitness. I have had a prolapse for about 3 years or so and am in a bit of a cycle. I do the exercises and get to the point where I feel really well, then don’t bother with the exercises, the prolapse gets worse again and so I return to the exercises! I should just learn to carry on doing the exercises! It does also really help my back as it also strengthens my core. Not in the six-pack version of core exercises, but the deep core muscles that help to keep the pelvis stable. I’ve reached the point where I am doing 30 to 60 minutes of exercise a day, including the yoga.

Earlier in the month, I did have a bit of a set-back. A week where I just wasn’t really able to motivate myself, much beyond the sun salutations and the 15 minutes of yoga in the morning. It wasn’t until I started to come out of the slump that I realised quite how bad it had been. But I did keep on going with the sun salutations, which I am quite proud of and I didn’t totally give up. However, my daily walks did go out of the window and I haven’t started them back up as yet. Hopefully, during April I will be able to reintroduce those and get back to achieving 11,000 steps per day on top of my other exercise. It’s taken me a long time to reach the point that I am able to accept set-backs and to listen to my body rather than force it to complete things that it just isn’t well enough to do. I suspect many of the problems I have with my back are exacerbated by running in the past, as I forced my body to compete in a sport it wasn’t really capable of!

Besides that, I have made progress in other areas and as I leave lockdown, I am very excited about what lies ahead of me. In the past I often said I would just like the world to stop so that I could get off and rest for a while. Covid has allowed that to happen and I feel in a much stronger place mentally as the world opens up again and I have a better understanding of what matters to me.

I have started another degree with the Open University. I’m currently doing an introductory module with a view to studying Classical Studies, however, I might change that to English Literature as I am enjoying that aspect of the course far more than I anticipated

I have also just started Portuguese lessons. My language skills are fairly ropey, but I am quite determined to learn and hope that hearing the language on a daily basis will help me to pick it up sooner rather than later.

Finally, I am hoping to start doing some voluntary work at a local charity shop. It’s taken quite a while for me to reach this point but finally I am starting to regain the zest for life that has been missing. There is so much I want to try and get involved with and slowly I am making steps in the right direction.

I am very excited to see where I am by the end of April!

Exercise, Healthy living, Well-being, Women's Health

Getting fit for free

September 11, 2020September 11, 2020 Steph TJ

This past week or so I’ve been getting a bit deflated, I’m not going to lie! There seems to be a price for everything.

My inbox and Facebook feed has recently been filled with sale after sale after sale. Buy a mindfulness course, buy a neuro-science course, buy a spirituality course, buy a yoga course, buy a Qi Gong course, buy a meditation course. But then it suddenly hit me, why do I have to pay for all of this stuff, surely there has to be enough out there for free. And so, I set off on my google search and sure enough there is plenty that is available that’s free of charge.

As you know, I have this mad fool dream of paddling across the sea on my paddle board, and there has been some progress as I have had a swimming lesson in the sea. Sadly, since the aforementioned lesson I have been without a car, so have been unable to go for a second one, but believe you me, as soon as I can I will be going for a second swimming lesson in the sea as I progress towards my goal. The other thing that really needs to be improved in order to achieve my goal is to strengthen was is currently a very weak core, in a safe manner appropriate for a woman of a certain age!

You Tube is always a great place to start if you are looking for anything. I already follow:

Yoga with Adriene
Yoga with Kassandra
FemFusion Fitness

After a short while searching I also came across:

Videos by Women’s Health Magazine
Walk at Home by Leslie Sansone
PopSugar fitness
The Body Coach – although some of his workouts are a bit beyond me at the moment

And since when did you need to pay money to meditate or pray, at the end of the day it involves sitting quietly on a chair or a school with a timer going, dependent on how long you wish to sit there. You don’t have to download a fancy app with a million different types of meditations. I’ve been reading ‘Untamed’ by Glennon Doyle and I read recently that Adele accredits the book for her dramatic recent shift in outlook on life. Glennon herself says she started meditating by just sitting in her closet for 10 minutes a day, and after a while it became easier and she could sit for longer. No fancy app, just sit.

Another quote I read in ‘Untamed’ was ‘This life is mine alone’. I am the only person on this planet with these skills, these talents, these people. I am the only person living this experience, in this body, that’s this shape, with these health problems – so what is the point in trying to be like someone else? Of trying to make an exercise programme that’s designed for somebody completely different fit me as best as it can. There is absolutely no point at all, because I am not the same as everyone else and they aren’t the same as me – what suits one person is not going to suit another and a one size fits all really just doesn’t work that well. Obviously, I am prone to over thinking and this set me off thinking about that old saying ‘keeping up with the Jones’. You could have exactly the same things as your neighbours, same car, same house, same tv – but you can never be the same. Ever.

You can apply this to everything – social media, marketing, exercise, everything. The whole kit and kaboodle is based on us all being the same! Where’s the point in that!

I found this to be incredibly refreshing!

So, I have decided that I am going to try and get on to my paddle board for free! Just by using free apps, or programmes, or pins on Pinterest and rather than just pay someone to tell me what to do I’m going to try to put together a programme that works for me. A diet that works for me. Not doing what someone else tells me I should be doing, especially as I am mindful of a weak pelvic floor, a need to build up my core and the ever-present fibromyalgia. There are also so many opportunities for exercising free of charge in Portugal, walking, cycling, swimming, exercise equipment in the parks and I don’t have to worry about poor weather stopping me getting outside into the fresh air.

Having said that, I will still pay for swimming lessons in the sea – they are a need to get me on the paddle board, and I will still pay for yoga lessons, as this is also a social activity for me and having contact with the other members of the class is beneficial to my mental health. I am sociable by nature, so I do need to have some human interaction. I also appreciate that I am in a fortunate situation in that I already have trainers, a good sports bra, a bike and access to technology to do the online exercises, so don’t have to spend money on bits of equipment to get going. Beyond that, I am going to reward myself with a €1 a day for exercising and will spend that money on equipment should I need to replace anything during the course of the challenge. In an ideal world I would complete a Personal Trainer instructor course so that I can safely advise other women of a certain age, how they could add exercise in to their lives in a safe and consistent manner, but that’s just out there for the universe to decide at the moment so in the meantime, I shall just share what I’m doing and the progress I am making.I’m just off to unsubscribe from all of the sales emails in my inbox and am quite excited by the challenge of finding new and different ways to improve my fitness, without creating a huge hole in my bank balance.