Beating Around the Bush

A column with Cathy Stubbs

It's enough to make you sick

It was with some deep seated concern that I allowed one of my colleagues to convince me to join her at the local gym for an early morning circuit class recently.

She had been urging me to join her in this endeavour for some time, but I had always declined, believing that sweating, panting and heaving were best left to women in child birth or rugby league players who don’t know any better.

I have to admit, however, that part of my concern was the thought of being the lone fat lady amongst a class of slim young women next to whom I was going to look like the yeti.

It is one of life’s great paradoxes that so often yeti-women like myself who need the exercise, avoid the very activities that could help them solve the problem, all for fear of meeting up with someone who looks better than they do.

There is one answer, of course: Make it illegal for slim people to exercise, and then, when they can’t help themselves, lock them all up where we can’t see them!

The first class for me was a sort of half crazed blur of activities which reaquainted me with parts of my body I had long since forgotten. This was interspersed with bouts of riding exercise bikes, running on the spot and skipping which all combined to give me a near death experience.

It was only stubborn pride that allowed me to complete that first class, pressing valiantly on rather than suffering the indignity of falling dead from the treadmill.

I did not wish to be remembered ever after as that poor woman who should have tried the water aerobics instead.

It was the longest 45 minutes of my life, made much worse by my inability to stop looking desperately at the clock, praying and pleading for it to end. When it was finally over, my face was crimson, my knees were shaking, it was hard to talk.

Strangely though, as the day wore on, I began to experience a pleasant sense of well being. My muscles didn’t hurt too much if I didn’t attempt to take a deep breath or make any sudden movements.

So I went back a second time and found that it was ever so slightly better than the first day.

Inspired by this small success, I ventured to get my bike shorts out of mothballs telling myself that the time would eventually arrive when I would no longer look like a sumo wrestler wearing a tractor inner tube.

Filled with enthusiasm, I arrived at the next class ready to "pump it up" with every ounce of my being. When that man at the front urged us to even greater feats of excursion, I went hell for leather.

It was about this time that I began to feel, first giddy, then nauseous, then both. Somewhere between the skipping station and the treadmill, I was forced to make a dash for the exit where I stood doubled over feeling as though I could disgrace myself at any moment.

It was just as I had always known, secretly, deep down. Exercise really does make me sick!

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