Fresh Start

It’s kind of funny—in my first post I prattled on about girding myself for war and preparing for the big fight that getting healthy entails. I forgot that when my mind is really made up and I’ve committed to a course of action, and taken the necessary preparatory steps (like stocking the fridge with healthy food), the beginning of the lifestyle change process is kind of easy—as long as I’m being reasonable and not overzealous from the get-go. It’s after the newness and initial resolve fades that the struggle becomes more of an issue. Thinking I should just enjoy this and ride the momentum as long as I can.

One of the few good things about having a lot of weight to lose is that diet can be pretty forgiving at first. If you focus on nutritional food quality and macronutrient balance and on not eating TOO much, you’re going to lose some weight—maybe not at a rocket clip, but that’s not desirable either.

The orientation at the health club went well yesterday.  I really liked the fitness manager and the club is very nice.  Now I have to wait for the trainer (Justin) to give me a call and set up some sessions.  I’ve already decided that if I like working with him I am going to keep the training going for as long as I can.

Found out my old trainer has set up his own facility and that his wife does some work for this club.  The fitness manager (Liz) asked me if I’d rather work with him instead of the club’s trainers.  I said no, even though he was a great trainer in a lot of ways.

Reasons why: 

1)       I felt abandoned when he left my previous gym (four years ago this week, in fact) to start his own facility (which didn’t work out at the time). It’s unreasonable to feel that way, but I had been working with him for 11 months and had just begun to experience a recurrence of the binging issues I’d struggled with for so long. He had promised to help me and then POOF!  Gone.  It happened really suddenly and there was no transition between trainers, and the new trainer couldn’t work with me at the same time I had gotten used to (Saturdays at 10). It sort of exploded my routine at a time I needed it the most. It made me feel anxious, unsupported.  I seized any excuse I could find to justify getting off track.

The next trainer was great—but he was right out of college and had no clue how to deal with someone like me, whose emotional issues were (are)such a  big part of my weight problem.  And in any event, he only lasted there a couple of months before leaving, too. At which point I decided going to therapy was what I needed, after all—since the binging problem wouldn’t go away and was just getting worse and I was at a complete loss on what to do about it. So I started seeing my current personal therapist, JoAnne, who specializes in treating people with eating disorders. That was the beginning of a long process of healing from the inside out, which is still ongoing.

2)      I just plain got too attached to him, and I treated him like the therapist I desperately needed. He wasn’t trained to perform that kind of function, though he tried. But I definitely know I don’t want that dynamic again. It was very unhealthy for me and exacerbated other mental health issues I have, particularly with men. (At the same time this was going on, I had a work friend bail on our friendship because his wife thought we were having an emotional affair.  It was not a good winter.)

 

 Wow.  So much has happened since then.  I hope this time I'm ready for the long haul, and if not, that I now have friends and other people to help me get through the really rough spots.

And I hope my next trainer-trainee relationship is a long, healthy and productive one.