Hello everyone!
I know. I know. I haven't blogged in a long time. Well, let's face it. There isn't much to laugh about right now. Even I am struggling to find humor in the dumpster fire that is 2020, what with the raging wildfires, the gigantic number of hurricanes and tropical storms, the protest/riots, the election where, if you're a casual observer, you're thinking the only two choices America has are an old racist white guy millionaire who treats women like second class citizens...or the other old racist white guy millionaire who treats women like second class citizens. (Not for nothing, but there are 5 legit presidential/VP pairings on the Wisconsin ballot...and you still have the choice to write in Kanye West...so there are plenty of choices. But between the lack of coverage on the other candidates and outright voter shaming for those of us who chose to vote FOR SOMEONE instead of AGAINST THE OTHER PARTY, well...)
And, thanks to Covid, we're all stuck at home with nothing else to do but watch the news and obsess about it all.
Wait...what was I saying?
Oh, right. There hasn't been much to laugh about, even for me. UNTIL LAST WEEK!
That's right. Once again, Sarah got to take on another fitness professional and once again, she walked away a winner while the fitness guy sat weeping at his desk. (Probably. I don't know. I managed to battle this one on the phone.)
Just to refresh your memories...back some ten years ago, I managed to get a personal trainer at Golds' Gym fired because during our introductory meetings he stood around chatting with another trainer and eating a donut. Readers know him as "Crumb Blowing Steve." Later, I got a trainer fired at Experience Fitness because he lured me in with a phone call telling me "he was concerned about me" because "he hadn't seen me in a while." I said, "Look, I come to this gym because people leave me alone and no one has tried to pressure sell me into sessions with a personal trainer. That's not what you're going to do, right?" He swore up and down it was not.
Except, it totally was.
While that guy didn't blow donut crumbs at me, he did make me weigh myself with my winter books and coat on. He did make me sit for half an hour and listen to him tell me I was lying to myself and to him about not having $900 a month lying around for personal training sessions. And he made me run on a treadmill for several minutes. I allowed him to abuse me in this way because...well...I'm a blogger and my material comes from living life in the 21st century.
After a well worded email to the corporate office, that guy was never heard from again.
Now, it's not that I'm against personal trainers or fitness in general. I'm not. I've had some good experiences with personal trainers in the past. (Gold's Gym made up for the Crumb Blowing Steve episode and gave me KRAM who featured in several blogs. Experience Fitness...well...they didn't do crap. So there's that.) I have a very good friend who spent years with a personal trainer, lost a bunch of weight and is now a personal trainer herself. And if I ever do decide that's the way I want to do, I'll have her train me, thank you very much.
I am, instead, a crusader against high pressure body shaming by anyone. I am what I am. I am taking steps to be better, and I think anyone in the health and fitness industry worth their salt will understand the importance of encouragement. It takes a village to get a fluffy girl off the couch and into her walking shoes. It takes one tiny,. thoughtless comment to slap her right back on that couch with a bucket of fried chicken and a gallon of marshmallow ripple ice cream.
Which brings us to the phone call last week.
See, Hubby's insurance requires us, if we want to save significant bucks on our premiums each year, to go through an annual physical, report the results of said physical to our insurance and then suffer through...I mean, participate in, a couple health coaching phones calls. This happens every Autumn. 2 phone calls to pinpoint and coach on any health issue...any one at all...doesn't have to be about weight.
Okay, it's always about weight. At least with me.
The last two years have been fine. We pinpointed the problem, I'm fat. We came up with a couple solutions: Eat smaller portions, don't eat after 10 PM. And, for two years, I've been reasonably good at that, but with no real weight loss. So this year the random health coach person and I decided I need to eat breakfast every day. I need to eat something in the morning to get my engines going and then to maybe lighten the giantgantor lunches I put together for myself because I'm starving. Phone call one: Set the goal. Phone call two should have been a quick follow up, and then a hearty, "See you next year!"
But no. The cheerful, chirpy girl, Cindy (Although I imagine she spells it SYNDEE) scheduled a third phone call for me. Not a big deal, I figured this was something new for the 2020 COVID era. So fine, I'll be available 15 minutes before and 15 minutes after my scheduled phone call time.
The day of Call 3 I weighed myself. I believe I've well documented how much I hate weighing myself. More so now because Hubby got us a scale that syncs with our fitbits, which means I weigh myself and then that number shoots itself into the memory banks of my fitbit dashboard and there's no hiding from it then. There's no walking away from the scale and forgetting the number. Sigh. So on day 3 I weighed myself, and look at that...I lost 3 pounds in 10 days! All from eating breakfast! WOW! I was on cloud nine! I announced it by text to my family. I realized 3 pounds isn't a big number, but it was a positive number...the first of its kind for me in a long time! 3 pounds! I could NOT WAIT for SYNDEE to call me and rejoice with me.
Except...Syndee didn't call me. Nope, at precisely 14 minutes AFTER our scheduled time, a dour, grumpy, pissed off, unhappy, generally negative guy named John called my number.
How can you picture him best? Hmmmm....oh here:
Well, okay. So I got a grumpy guy on the phone. Didn't matter, I LOST 3 POUNDS! Which is what I said to him. I said, "JOHN! I LOST 3 POUNDS!"
To which John said, "Well, now let me look here. You weigh...XXX...and you lost 3 pounds? That's a good thing, you think?"
Well, now okay, granted, in the pantheon of weight loss, 3 pounds on a body like mine is...you know...3 pounds on a body like mine. Still...
"What kind of exercise are you doing?"
Hey, I feel pretty confident on this one. Syndee was over the moon when we talked about this. So I started chirping cheerfully. "I make sure I get 10,000 steps in at least six times a week. I make sure I get 45 active minutes or more each day. I get up in the morning and I walk for 15-20 minutes just to kick off the day. I am working on drinking more water than just the 64 ounces too!"
"hm. And yet, you're still obese, is that right? So what new steps do you need to take?"
Wow. That was cold. Still, I plowed on. "We decided I should eat something for breakfast every day and I worked on that and I lost 3 pounds!"
"And what did you eat for breakfast?" Asks Grumpy John.
Now, let's be honest. We all know what a good, nutritious breakfast should look like. Just like we all know we're supposed to eat more veggies than bread and more veggies than meat and just eat more veggies. BUT...and this is key...SYNDEE did not tell me WHAT to eat for breakfast. She just told me TO eat breakfast. So I ate what I had at hand.
"Let's see, a couple toaster waffles. Maybe a yogurt. Sometimes a bowl of cereal."
And that's when it got...rude. Like, Crumb Blowing Steve rude. Grumpy John says, "Well, I see we need to work on your eating then. What, do you think, were your mistakes with your breakfast?"
Not sure about that...but I know my mistake was taking your call.
"Well," says I, "I'm sure cereal and waffles aren't the best selection but hey, the goal was to eat something for breakfast which I did and I lost weight."
"Yes, and 3 pounds is a small move in the right direction. Although I see, you're quite morbidly overweight, so that's really not a big number, is it? So, what other mistakes did you make with your breakfast choices?"
Now, at this point, he's using a tone on me like I'm seven and I've just peed outside the toilet bowl because I thought it was funny. And this is when Sarah the Fitness Professional Killer rose up within me.
"Look, John," says I. "I know what a good breakfast should look like."
"Then why didn't you eat one? It could have been so simple. You just make a whole grain waffle...then boil an egg, cut up some tomatoes, and add some, oh I don't know, lettuce or cucumbers for fun. Then you have a proper breakfast."
"Yes. And you also have me late for work...because I made a lunch instead of a breakfast and it took me twenty minutes to make."
John says, "Well, I know you're busy..."
"Do you, John? Do you? I just told you I lost 3 pounds in 10 days because I worked on something you people told me I needed to work on and I did it and it was successful and you're treating me like a child, like a stupid child. I know what a healthy breakfast looks like. I know what I should be doing. This is not about knowing what is right. This is about coaching me and being supportive and being happy for me when I SUCCEED!"
Boy I thought I'd won the day with that.
Nope.
"Yes, but if you made a whole grain waffle instead of one you just get out of the freezer, that's so much better for you. Maybe sprinkle some flax over it all. Or you could make just the boiled egg and the tomatoes and other veggies. That would actually be better than piling on carbs."
Never in my life have I wanted to be on a recorded line as much as I did for this phone call. "I doubt I'll ever have time in the morning to make the kind of breakfast you're suggesting, John. But I'll try and do better with my choices."
"Well there, see, now you're making a little better progress."
I had no words. I'd been so unbelievably excited...and then this.
There was a pause, then Grumpy John says, "Do you have any questions for me?"
"Not at the moment, no." I respond, trying really hard not to cry.
"Okay, so when do we want our next call to be?"
And this is when I really lost it. Hubby only had to do two calls. It's always only been two calls. Now he wants a fourth call?
"Look, John, why are we scheduling another call? I mean, it's always only been two, and this one right now is my third this year and you want another one? Why are you treating me like a special case?"
"Oh, well, I mean, if you think you can handle this on your own, then we don't need to schedule another call."
He probably should not have left me open like that. But he wounded me. All I wanted was a little bit of cheering. I would have scheduled another call with Syndee. Instead, I said this. "Well, if it were with any other person I've ever talked to from your company, then I would do a fourth call. But since it would be with you...then no thank you. I'm good."
There was another short pause. Clearly, neither of us were finished with this.
"Well, okay. I mean, if you're sure you have a good support system around you."
"Oh I do, John. I do."
"Do you? Are you sure?"
"Well, John, I'm pretty sure they're more supportive than you've been." And at that, I hung up.
It's so clear to me how much a word of encouragement does and a word of discouragement destroys. I'm still plugging away, but John's general tone of disapproval lingers in my brain. Oh if only I could have sent an email to his superiors. I'm really good at scathing emails. Alas...I don't have a direct line to that management team.
Meanwhile, I have 50 more weeks before my next health coaching call. So there's that.
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