Getting Strong at 55: Don’t Forget the Recovery
Hitting the gym….and taking the rest.
As I wake up in the morning, my arms talk to me. There’s an ache and sometimes a twinge. As I curl to the side and my foot tries to find the floor, a new ache says hello at the back of my legs. I had this vision of myself always being fairly active and doing yoga regularly, but I realized I was basically a weakling once I started at a local gym.
Brittina, in her solid 5-foot frame, could lift weights far heavier than I saw men do. She effortlessly jump-roped, deadlifted, bench-pressed, and back-squatted HEAVY weights, and did pull-ups, burpees, and so much more. Then there was Alexa, a young woman who, in her curvy, trim frame, shocked me as she pulled a 100-pound load around the gym. Tina was an older woman, but she was right there, disciplined in the game like the rest of them, as her body turned from peach to red. These badass women of all ages were moving in ways that I didn’t think were humanly possible.
Inspiration. Yes, in its most awesome sense. The gym is unconventional in that the husband-and-wife team of instructors writes a tailored workout on a dry-erase board that varies each day. There’s a warm-up, then a couple of sequences with various reps. They monitor like personal trainers, making sure form and technique are good. As a kid, I played tennis and swam — being a Floridian and all — but as an adult, my “exercise” was yoga or a walk/jog with my dog. I had never been a weightlifter.
As yoga sculpt started showing up in my yoga studios and my younger son found jujitsu, I began to be exposed to the world of lifting weights. Nicholas would tell me, “Mom, you can do yoga all you want, but if you want to build muscle — which is what you really need to keep yourself truly fit — you need to get some weights and start with barbell training.” From the mouth of babes. He’s not exactly a baby, being 22 and all, but he’s a solid rock, just like many of the chiseled bodies of the young gym-goers. But it’s the super cool middle-aged and older men and women who show up week after week and sweat it out that I feel a deep-seated connection with — a type of tribe as they call it at The Kor. We nod, give each other high-fives, and smile knowingly.
As I saw my father lose so much of his muscle mass while he beat prostate cancer and had to take Lupron, and as I watched my mother develop osteoporosis, I wanted to start a program of weight training to preserve and enhance my muscle mass and keep my bone density solid. I started with just showing up and getting in the sauna, then doing some of the warm-up. Then one day, Brittina was working as a staff member at the gym, and I was the only one obviously needing guidance. She did the warm-up with me and then moved on to the “main workout” — the whole part of the board that I had conveniently ignored, literally blanked out of my vision. With a workout partner not letting me cheat, she was my coach and cheerleader simultaneously. That day, I walked out of the gym and swaggered to my car with a post-gym high that would keep me showing up.
But as per usual with me, the idea of “appropriate recovery” time battled with my concept of habit and routine every day. “But Kris at work goes to her gym every day,” I pleaded with my friend Scott. “Yes, but Nadia, she’s been doing that practically her whole life.” Oh, the details.
Having paid for monthly memberships at both the yoga studio and the gym, I had this misguided notion that I needed to make the most of my membership with a daily ritual. So on it went, with my back hurting and my arms sore. It actually took me struggling in a simple yoga class — a class that I used to do so easily and that made me feel amazing before, during, and after — for it to dawn on me that I wasn’t letting my body recover enough. I was trying to sprint instead of planning for the marathon, typical of my Type A personality with no patience. I was taxing my body. My mind was there, but my body wasn’t. It seems probably so obvious to most, especially those “athletic types” that spend their life keenly aware fo their limits and how to make sure you give time to rest as integral to muscle building. I’m even a doctor, but making rookie mistakes in the drive that are like blinders.
I’m still figuring out how to rein myself in and am still deeply committed to incorporating weights, but I’m trying to listen to my body more. The identity of a physically strong woman had never been an iconic symbol for me before — beauty was defined by being slim, having nice hair, nails, and dress. But now I have a different image: strong and agile, solidly peaceful and confident.
So I’ve put myself on a two-day-a-week gym schedule and a five-day-a-week yoga schedule, trying to incorporate a little dance and swimming for fun. There’s still some “good ache” hanging around — still figuring that out — but the good news is, I’m staying in the game.
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