Resistance is not Futile! (reblog)

As I continue to reblog posts from my previous site, here’s one I originally posted May 20, 2023

Exercise. Pre-op it was something I sort of thought about. Most of the time walking up a flight of stairs left me feeling like I’d just run a 5k race.

I joined a gym. Years ago. Cripes, six or so years ago now? I went for awhile. I had a couple friends I would go with here and there. But ya know, doing the weight machines is boring. And when you’re 350+ pounds, and can only handle the elliptical machine for about two minutes, while there are people next to you that have been on there for almost an hour. Well, it’s not only discouraging, it’s embarrassing.

I never canceled my gym membership though, so they’ve been yanking $25 a month from my checking account all this time. I was hoping that knowing I was paying for it, I would start going again.

Well, last November I did, I even had to pay another $10 for a new membership card! I was going three to five times a week in December, January and February. When I first starting going I couldn’t use the scale in the locker room, it only went to 350. I mostly did walking around the track, and and a bit of work on the weight machines. Now that it is getting nice out though, I would much rather just go walking around the neighborhood.

I’ve been to the gym once since I got out of surgery. My arms have definitely lost some mass. I was pumping about 3/4th the weight I was in March. I have to work the arms, but I don’t need to do huge amounts of weight. I want to tone for now, then maybe later build them back up. And at my five week check up Monday, the nurse told me lots of guys do tend to see muscle loss during the first six months, then they start building it back up again. Probably a protein thing.

I spent some time wondering how I can get some upper body type exercise action, without going to the Gym. Then a few weeks back I was at a local sporting goods retailer, and saw a display with resistance bands. I bet you were just waiting to see how I was going to tie this in to the wording of the title!

After only a few moments of consideration, I picked one up, it was about $10 I think. But hell if I knew what to do with it. I toyed around with some basic arm curls and lifts, but beyond that? I had no clue?

I decided to check out what they had for info over on SparkPeople.com and I found some help there. This is just one of a number of videos they have for exercises to do with resistance bands. This upper body workout is a nice quick one, just seven minutes including some stretching. They have a couple longer ones as well, but I’m going to try and do this one at least every other day.

If it gets to be “too easy”, I’ll move on to some longer ones or something. And you don’t have to follow the video, you could do the same routine for more reps and extend the whole workout.

This reblog was originally posted on one of my previous blogs/websites. Some will be about my personal experiences with my decision to have bariatric surgery, others are about other relevant issues that I feel are worth still having available for discussion. Minor editing may have been done for clarity.