Bear with me, dear reader, and I’ll explain. Alternatively: TLDR? – ok then, skip ahead to the last paragraph … I’ll just assume you’re not a Guinness drinker.
Years ago, not long after I’d quit teaching full time, I bought a (humiliating admission time … deep breath …) fitness DVD. I just needed my mojo back, y’know? (I mean mojo in its broadest sense.) I used to have pretty good mojo, at one stage; but then I poured it all into late night lesson planning and homework marking. Anyway, the fitness DVD did the trick and I regained my balance, confidence and sense of self. I kept that going pretty well for a few years – after the initial kickstart, as I’m sure you know, it’s easy to maintain those things, because your body’s happiness chemicals kick in and keep you on track.
Then, suddenly: endo. Boom. Then pandemic and being a carer: boom again. Then struggling with the social care system, then hospital, then struggling with synthetic hormones: BOOM. I’ve dragged myself back on to my feet a few times in the past couple of years, but it gets a little harder every time.
These synthetic hormones are the biggest b*tch yet. (Disclaimer: for some people, they work really well – they control the pain of endometriosis with minimal side effects. I’m just not one of those people, it seems.) At the moment, I’m not only battling my body (the pains haven’t gone away, they’ve just shifted), but also my mind. I need my mojo more than ever (apart from anything, I have to be fit for further surgery); but that first step has been almost impossible to take.
Until today. I put that fitness DVD back on, reminded myself that ‘ownendo’ was an aspiration for me, not just an available domain name, and went for it.
It (the incredibly easy, couch potato level, first DVD in the pack) was very hard work! I feel like I’ve just run up Rice Krispie Hill. (For those of you who have never trained at Tulliallan, or who can’t figure out why it’s called that: try going out for a very long run, supervised by Sgt Gorilla McSadist, who is relentlessly yelling ‘motivational’ slogans to make you go faster, and you’ll soon see what I mean.) But, as with Rice Krispie Hill, it didn’t last forever and it felt good to have completed it.
To return to my original question: how do you know when you’ve married the right man? This is how: 1) he walks into the living room when you’re redder, sweatier and clumsier than a boiling lobster, you’re surrounded by exercise paraphernalia, and you’re trying to mimic that embarrassing fitness DVD you pretend you don’t have; and 2) he quietly says, “I’ll leave now,” and walks right back out. That, dear reader, is a Grade A+ husband.
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