On filling the tank

As Florence says: my arms emptied, the sky emptied

“So tell me where to put my love, do I wait for time to do what it does?”

—Florence + The Machine

It’s Saturday at 5:30 am and I’m sitting up in bed, watching my laptop that I have balanced on my bended knees.

“Ugh, why am I up this early?” I say to my spouse Janyce who has just walked into the bedroom, handing me a blueberry kale smoothie.

“Because you have a 7:00 am workout scheduled and you are doing what you said you would do,” she says.

“Hey, I want to show you Mel’s second video, come sit here and watch it with me before I get dressed to go,” I say.

We both settle back into the pillows and Janyce leans over to pet the dog while Mel’s excited voice blares through the computer speaker.

“Did you do the fill the tank exercise in video one? Were you surprised by what you found out?” she says. “Because I sure was.”

Mel goes on to relate a personal story, which is why her videos are always worth watching, in my opinion. I don’t want someone to preach to me about what to do. I want to hear how what they are telling me made a difference in their life. I’m trying a new gym this month because a close friend told me a story about the change it made in her life. And then she answered all my texts about it for several weeks while I was deciding what to do.

Selene thinks I look just fine to take her for a walk

This is not new to me. I’ve been dieting off and on my entire life and I’m about to be 56 in less than two months. I’m tired of it. I’ve hired personal trainers, sought out the advice of nutritionists, I’ve run 5Ks, joined many different gyms over the years, have taken up hiking and walking programs, practiced yoga, tried shake cleanses, whole 30, meditative movement classes—all of it in the service of trying to make my body into some version of what I think it should be, what the culture thinks it should be. Oh yeah, and my body picture keeps changing as time goes by and age does what it does.

My friend Roger once gave me his own no-nonsense advice about weight maintenance: He said (in his Roger way) “No diet. No numbers. Don’t count calories. Don’t weigh yourself. Don’t have goals about size or weight. Sound easy? Not so fast. All the above causes obsession, guilt and disappointment. And we are all different. You seem to have food as a reward, I view it as a necessity. At this age, I just do and eat what and how much I want, but it still takes a week to eat a chocolate bar. It annoys everyone.” 

Another friend of mine, whose partner has used a doctor-supervised weight loss program multiple times, said to me, “Everyone has their own demons and struggles and they are all hidden from the world. But with body issues, it’s just out there for everyone to see and judge.”

She’s right and it’s true. One time, when I was about 33-years-old and a good 40 pounds lighter, I made an insensitive comment about needing to lose weight right in earshot of a colleague who was living in a much larger body than mine. I saw her wince and look away. This was over 20 years ago now and I still think about it all the time. I also still do it! Having thoroughly internalized body shaming and diet culture, I make comments all the time and they cause harm. I’m working on it every day.

Still, I’m excited about the new gym. It feels different. Although it really isn’t different. It’s a little bit of all the things I’ve tried before all rolled into one program and it’s beautiful. Something that I’m finding out in midlife is very important to me. Beauty is key. I don’t really like to exercise. So if I’m going to do it three times a week, I want everything to be clean and aesthetically pleasing, and I want the music to be good, the equipment plentiful, and natural light in the yoga room. I’ll drive 40 minutes each way for it, too, because I can finally afford it.

Here’s the thing about midlife— I may not have mastered body positivity, but I have made progress. There was a time when I never would have let this picture of me live a minute in my camera, let alone post it in my blog for all to see. I’m never going to wear spanks again. I will eat the cake and the cookies and have the cocktails. I will enjoy my moments. But I’m also going to keep trying to better myself and take care of this body. I want it to keep up with me as I get older. I’ve got things I want to do.