gym progress

my hands ache from the gym. we've been going inconsistently the past couple weeks due to travel and whatever else. my fiancé is sick with a bit of a cold, so he wasn't going to go hard in the gym, but i still wanted to go. actually, that's interesting that i say that, because when i suggested we go, i expressly said i don't want to go. part of me did and part of me didn't. it's a lot harder to get up the gumption when you're doing it inconsistently; this would be our first time back since returning home, and i had my membership paused, and yadda yadda yadda. just several more sources of friction than usual. 

anyway, we went to the gym. partially i felt motivated because i'm started to see the subtle shades of visual changes in my body, and i'm excited to see how that continues to develop. i've been thin all my life, but never because i've been fit or active or toned, just because i was naturally that way. people used to ask me how much i had to work out to look like i did. i'm pretty sure i felt a lot of satisfaction in admitting that it was in fact zero. 

but now i'm putting in effort, and it feels good! i'm discovering what if feels like to use my body to do hard things. according to my fiancé, who functions as my own private personal trainer, i still have more strength to explore, since i'm moving the weights pretty quickly still, but i am starting to hit the point where i'm truly working hard to do so. 

i'm no longer reporting several new body sensations to him every set, like a twinge in my left thigh or my hands hurting gripping the bar or lightheadedness, just to make sure they're in normal range. i know the movements now, even if i still need help correcting my form here and there and double-checking my work—are my hands wide enough? did i go deep enough? does my stance look weird? 

today my accomplishment was bracing appropriately during my deadlift sets. when i first tried deadlifts, i got lightheaded and dizzy, so i transitioned to romanian deadlifts instead (starting from a standing position and lowering the bar past my knees and back up again, rather than lifting the bar from the floor) and breathed through the reps rather than taking a big breath and bracing. that helped a lot, and gradually the lightheadedness has been decreasing. so today i tried bracing again—though still doing the romanian variation—and managed to make it through without getting significantly dizzy. i was shocked at the difference in made in my ability to move the weight. i had started to have difficulty lifting the weight into the starting position, but when i braced, suddenly it was so much easier. it was so cool to access a new level of strength, and feel the difference so clearly. 

one silly thing i'm still doing is putting the bar down strangely afterwards. since i'm doing romanian deadlifts, sometimes i start with the bar elevated at about shin/knee height and grab it from there, rather than having to lift it off the ground in order to get to my starting position. so then after each set, when i go to place the bar back on the shin height rack, somehow i make strange unnecessary movements, like suddenly my knees are going out to both sides to make way for the lowering bar, or i start using my arms more than i should, or i start collapsing my chest rather than keeping it raised. my fiancé has tried a few different cues to get me to set it down better, but we haven't yet found one that works. he tried telling me to just treat it like another rep, which i tried, but somehow still did it weird. 

i realized i'm subconsciously trying to do Setting The Bar Down rather than just...setting the bar down. no matter how good my form was for the deadlift set i just completed, when it comes time to set the bar down, i go into Setting The Bar Down mode, and my brain is convinced that means i need to add in a bunch of extra physical effort—which manifests in weird and unnecessary movements. 

i do feel a bit silly that i'm doing that. but i've also gotten so much more accustomed to receiving feedback and attempting to change my form based on it. it's still emotionally hard to fail, or do a movement wrong, or feel stupid for still not getting things right. but by now, i've learned to trust in my handy dandy handsome fiancé personal trainer, and also trust in myself. i've seen the improvement i've achieved by following his guidance, and i know if i keep going, i can keep improving even more.