If I don’t stretch every morning, which I don’t, my body will feel it’s age. On the days that I do stretch, like today, I can feel the difference. My body is more loose, more agile and ready to go. I can’t recall if this was true when I was in my 20’s, but I’m going to go ahead and assume it wasn’t. As much as I don’t want to believe it, my body is not what it once was. I was never totally ripped, well actually I was a bit chubby. It wasn’t necessarily easier for me back then to perform the same physical activity that I do now, but I get tired only after about 30 minutes. And my body feels is wore out after each workout. Maybe I’m pushing myself to hard or maybe I’m too inconsistent. I know that I need to increase my physical activity as I age. It’s just been difficult for me to find my ‘hit zone’.
I regret not taking care of myself like I should have during my early decades. I try to push my body in order to catch up but I think it’s too late. I’m too old now. It is taking longer for me to lose weight now. Yes, my weight fluctuates more because I’m working out more and my muscles mass is increasing. The fat that has been on my body since the 2000’s is refusing to vacate. It is melting away, but it is very slow. In my twenties, all I had to was drink more water for a week and workout a few times to lose weight. But not anymore.
Regardless of my impatience to get my body in an optimal state, I do see subtle improvements in other areas of my health. Specifically, nagging pains in my lower back and left knee are gone. The weight bearing workouts that I have recently incorporated have made those areas stronger and better able to handle my fluctuating weight. Examples like this show me the benefits of increasing my physical activity as I age. I need to figure out what my healthy mediums are so that I don’t injure myself.
When I try walk every day or run more than once a week, I get shin splints. Ever you had them, you know how annoyingly persistent they are. It usually takes a about a week for the pain to go away, which causes me to be inconsistent with my workouts. I can try after a few days, but I don’t want to cause any serious injury. So I wait. I try to disperse some home weight training to keep my body active, but that irritates the pinch nerve in my shoulder, so I have to tone it down.
With all that being said, I have only been working out like this for about four months, so maybe my body isn’t use to it yet. But how long is it supposed to take? I would suspect that being middle aged has something to do with it, and maybe I’m just refusing to accept it. I’m sure that I’ll figure out what my body needs sooner or later. It could be as simple as remembering to stretch every morning as a way to get started. I mean I did it today and I felt pretty good after. That is before the weight training that left me kind of exhausted.
So is the life of a middle aged man.
Jay Owens 