Making the Cut: The One with the Girl Who Hates Exercise

I was one of those girls growing up that I would tear out pages from magazines with workouts on it. I had decided I wanted to be one of those girls who loved working out. But seeing as tigers can't change their stripes, I did maybe one of seven workouts on the page before promptly giving up, putting the page into a box and pushing the box under my bed. I just couldn't get into it. It wasn't for me.

So for years I never worked out. Then I would get the desire to do it again and before I knew it I was running. Except I hate running....

Then more years of not working out.

I just kept telling myself that I was going to be one of those people that liked working out. But the thing is, I don't like working out. I never have. I never will.

But every single day I get up early, put on my workout clothes and start sweating. Sounds crazy. Trust me, I get how crazy it sounds that a girl who hates working out does it every single day.

A few months after Addie was born I made the decision to start working out and I did great. Five days a week, every week for about five months I got up and I exercised. Then I stopped. And just like that I lost my momentum and I never really got back into it. I remembered how much I hated exercise so I didn't care enough to start again. Once 2014 started I tried getting back to it again. I worked out off and on until we decided to start trying to get pregnant. It was then that I made the decision to not start any programs because I didn't want to start something just to stop when I got pregnant. I made more excuses.

Except I didn't get pregnant. But I kept putting it off. I kept delaying and was excited when I actually got pregnant. And when that ended with a heartbreak, I needed something to concentrate on. I felt horrible all the time. I didn't feel like me. I was sad all the time. Things were not right with me. So I made the decision to start a workout program. I needed something to hold on to. Something that I could focus on. I needed something to aim for.

I started Jillian Michaels' Body Revolution. (Read about it here, here, and here.) It kicked my butt but it was a well-spent 12 weeks of exercise. I lost 8 pounds, just 2 pounds shy of my weight goal. But I didn't care. I was starting to feel better. My heart still was sad from the miscarriage, especially since I had a second miscarriage in the middle of doing this program. But I just kept pushing through and I was able to finish the program. I was able to finish something I never thought I could do. I had a sense of achievement I hadn't had in a long time.

I started my next program, Moms Into Fitness: Pretty Fierce Weight Loss (read about it here), and within the first two weeks I lost my last two pounds. I hit my weight goal, which is exactly what I needed. I needed something to go my way. And losing ten pounds was exactly what I needed after having such a hard year.

After all of this, I still don't like working out. I don't like exercise. Plain and simple. But I have learned that it helps clear my head every day. It helps focus me. It helps straighten out my head at the start of the day. I feel like I have a more productive day and a better day all around when I exercise first thing in the morning. It is truly the one and only thing I do for myself. And it's my guaranteed me time.  I'm not really sure when I became the girl who needed exercise to make her day. But I have.

So I don't plan to stop anytime soon. I have no idea where I would be right now without it. We are still trying to get pregnant but that hasn't stopped me from exercising everyday. In fact when we do finally get pregnant, that won't stop me from exercising. In a way exercise has helped heal me. It has helped me feel normal again. It has given me something to hold on to.

So maybe I hate it a little less than I say after all...