for those who don't like to exercise

Hey Kelly,
I'm with you on this! I HATE exercising! Alllllllways have. Even back in High school when we'd have to run track - I hated it!
I get that intense burning in my chest. It could be that I don't know how to pace myself? Or that my parents smoked like a chiminey my whole life so I have crappy lungs? I don't know.

But now, as a slender 130 lb 28 year old adult, I feel horrible about myself that I don't LOVE exercising. What gives?!

I do enjoy going for walks when it's nice out like you said.
I do enjoy yoga if I have the right instructor.

I MIGHT like swimming? But having gone in so long.
I MIGHT like riding a bike, but my butt is so boney I'm nervous to try (and I don't have a bike).

I guess we all just have to find out grooves and what fits and works for us.
I know I DONT like running. I don't like going to the gym and just being left to my own devices and having people look at me.  Guess that stems from my years as a big girl? Who knows!

But when I read your post it made me feel a little better that I'm not the only person out there that doesn't love to exercise.

Thanks for sharing.

Kelly, you really touched something inside me when you posted your query. I think you are right that exercise, or the lack of motivation to exercise, is part of a very old old pattern within us. As I've been thinking about what you wrote, I remembered being a child and feeling frozen...afraid to do something or I would get criticized or mocked. Feeling I could never do anything right. I didn't t have much physical abuse in my childhood but there was sexual abuse which gave me a very messed up concept of what who I was, and wasn't. As I've gotten older, I find myself doing something sort of physical like playing with the dog in the yard and I think, my mother would have never done something like this. She was and still is very frozen. I can only assume that this is caused by the same patterns I have, fear of being mocked, berated, whatever, so becoming introverted in this aspect is the only was we can feel any sort of control. I now like to revert back to my childhood any time I exercise, before I had so much conditioning that took all the fun out of it. When I'm walking outside and the wind is in my ears, it takes me right back to the farm we lived on when I was born and I would be outside playing. I loved being outside then.

So I guess for me, my challenge will be to work on seeing beyond the layers of stuff that prevent me from enjoying being physical and enjoying my body. As I wrote this, I had an image come into my head of almost like lots and lots of gauzy white sheets fluttering around me constantly moving to keep me from finding my way through them. What I think we all need to remember is whatever is holding us back has been a coping device for a very long time and our challenge it to allow ourselves to let it go. To remember that we are safe now. And the little scared children who live inside us in particular are safe.

I'm so glad you posted this. It's been a very interspective thing for me. I hope some it resonates with you.

Barb

Kelly I hate exercise and find every excuse not to do it.  I am pretty successful at making excuses too.

I just wanted to add one thing.  I have read in other posts that you struggle with depression.  Walking is supposed to be helpful in dealing with depression.

Just a thought.

I am a survivor of childhood abuse. While I don’t feel about exercise the way you do, I can say that I think you might be onto something in identifying how you feel.

 

But I also want to point out two things. My apologies in advance if it seems I am overstating the obvious.

#1: You’ve lost the weight. So I think, generally speaking, living an active and healthy lifestyle is just as effective as exercising. I don’t want to put you in a box of “those skinny people who don’t need to exercise." I don’t believe that at all. I believe every body’s body needs movement, but formal exercise simply isn’t for everyone. Do you take walks and enjoy nature? Go hiking? Camping? Swimming for fun? Bowling? It doesn’t sound to me as if you’re sitting around on the couch so I don’t know that you have that much to worry about.

 

#2: I wonder if maybe you or others who hate exercise maybe make this into an issue of worthiness? (Do I deserve my weight loss since I don’t exercise?) I don’t know if you do or don’t. I just wonder. As much as I love exercise in my head, in my body it is another matter altogether. Had I been able to achieve the weight loss some of you have without exercising, I don’t know that I’d be quite as passionate about it, frankly! But I digress. I guess the bottom line question I have is, barring you being completely sedentary, at this point why do you NEED to get into formalized exercise? I don’t think you do.

I am pretty sedentary.  The most activity I get is walking to the mailbox on nice days, or cleaning my house (which I don't do all that often), or grocery shopping.  Stuff like that.  I don't think we all need formal exercise but it's not like I have a job where I'm on my feet a lot, or like I chase a couple kids around all day, or even go bowling on the weekends for fun.  I actually do spend a lot of time sitting on the couch.

I'm pretty sure I would be healthier in some ways if I got more activity.  My good cholesterol would be higher, it might help with my depression, the right exercise could help my back.

Something else just occurred to me.  One reason I don't like exercise may be because I'm not good at it,  I don't like to do things I'm not good at.  So I don't wanna go bowling on the weekends for fun because it's not fun for me because I'm not good at it.

 I think you may have hit the nail on the head when you mentioned that perhaps you associate exercise with unpleasantness, because that's what it was when you were heavier. 

I know for me, my weight and the accompanying fatigue is 100% the entire reason I don't exercise now. It IS very unpleasant. 

However, your new body is capable of SO much more, and it's definitely worth giving it a shot. Are you the daring type? Bold? If there's something you've always wanted to try but never felt you could before, maybe now is the time. Something just fun, not hardcore. 

You said you like to walk if it's an interesting place. Many of us don't know the cities in which we live very well. We have our rotuine spots we tend to go, and ignore everything else. Perhaps you could get a tourist map and pick a place, then take a hike and see what's out there. If you have a GPS, you can drive out somewhere you've never been and walk til you get lost, then use the GPS to find your way back. I do that with my kids sometimes. We'll drive to parts of town we've never been and loop around in the backstreets until we have no idea where we are. My son calls them our "Townie Adventures".  Could be very fun on foot in the open air. 

I hated exercise. I hated going out in public because of my weight. It was much more inviting to plop my blob of a self into a piece of furniture with a remote and a bowl of ice cream (and whatever else I was into eating at the moment). I had cable. I had things to watch in HD, on DVD, in Blue Ray. 

My WL doctor kept riding me about getting off the couch, and how the weight would drop once I did. Seriously, I made a half-assed attempt at going. Then in September I got all impulsive and hired a trainer. But I was only going to the gym to meet with him for our three 30 minute sessions a week. I'd still not go to the gym the other days.

At six weeks we retook measurements and I almost fell out of the trainers office. 17 inches total lost and 25 pounds. 

So I made a little more than a half assed attempt at going, but it wasn't anything substantial. I was still glued to other "stuff". But I liked working with the trainer, then I started getting compliments from the staff at the gym (and other places). I ran out of clothes (well, almost...). I became a picture ***** I dumped cable (still have the DVD's). 

I still hate going. I can come up with novels filled with excuses and reasons why I can't go.  I like the results more.

 Kelly, I envy those who thrive on exercise videos, feel completely at home in a gym or have the money for personal training & classes. But even if money/time weren't a consideration, there are still very few things I enjoy about exercise. So I gotta trick myself. Other than walking outside (which I see as about as formal exercise as I'll ever do), I like to dance. Granted, haven't gone out in a LOOOOONG time - but even preop I would sweat it out on the dance floor. And once my husband & I took a salsa/merengue class offered by our county - 6 classes for $70! It always helped me to take the focus off of how I looked to know that anyone else around me was either too drunk to notice me or much more into whoever they were dancing with.

Body image issues, whether caused by abuse or internal issues, are something that is gonna take a lot of work (and not just in session). If I knew the magic technique to help you, I'd be a much richer therapist! Just know you're not alone....

My first support group meeting this year was motivate to move.  Little did I know it was a 20 minute work out session from a chair.  Had I known I would have not worn my work clothes.
The instructor went through the list of excuses we all make or have made to not exercise.  Then she tried to conquer them with the work out.
Her point was you can exercise without a gym and you can still get a good work out.  And she was right.  We ran while sitting in our seats, did squats up and off the chair and then did the twist.  Also did some stretching/yoga type things.

It was intersting watching everyone at different levels do her work out.  You got out of it what you wanted.  I got sore legs for a week.  And I work out.

I hate to work out BUT it makes me feel good.  Being lazy is what got me fat in the first place.  And eating too much.  I don't want to be lazy again.


Sarah

 When I started my 6 months pre-op diet I knew I had to exercise so I contacted an exercise physiologist at The University of Michigan.  I was following her facebook page and won a Mother's Day prize that included me working with her.  She taught me that we just need to move our bodies.  It doesn't have to be in a gym for 45 minutes.  Cleaning your house is exercise.  When I mop my floors, I sweat like a pig and my heart rate is up - that is exercise.  I personally like hiking but in the winter, it is too cold/snowy, etc.  I had an ah-ha moment when a friend of mine from college who was always a runner and I were discussing exercise.  I asked her how she loves exercise.  She said "I don't love to exercise, I hate it.  I hate running.  I love wings.  If I am going to eat wings and drink beer, I need to exercise."  I always thought everyone else loved to exercise and I was a freak b/c I hated it.