'I wish I could say that I got into lifting weights because I wanted to be strong. I wish I could say I had reached ultimate enlightenment and detachment from my corporeal form, that weight and size were nothing but numbers.' caseyjohnston writes
Photo: Elena Mudd I wish I could say that I got into lifting weights because I wanted to be strong. I wish I could say I had reached ultimate enlightenment and detachment from my corporeal form, that weight and size were nothing but numbers. I wish I could say that I not only didn’t fear being bulky but embraced and desired it; that I wanted to enter the room shoulders and biceps first because I only fit through the door sideways. In truth, I just wanted abs. I wanted to be a size small.
I had kept digging the hole thinking I’d eventually unlock both “balance” and confidence. But I had finally outstripped my body’s biological capacity to do any more. I never reached a place where I delighted in constantly pushing through sweaty workouts and eating raw vegetables. Instead, I was left with only the meager set of “good” foods I was allowed to eat and miles of cardio that kept unraveling forever, like a clown unspooling silk scarves from its mouth.
I ran my own stats through an “energy expenditure calculator” I found on the sub-Reddit, which churned out a figure for how much food I’d need to do a strength-building program. I boggled at the results. It was fully 50 percent more than I had been eating for most of my adult life. Nothing about it computed for my low-calorie, high-cardio brain.
And then … nothing happened. Nothing happened except that I got stronger. As instructed, I added a few pounds of weight to every lift every session, I ate my food, and I rested. The little muscle I’d had and accidentally destroyed with dieting was rising from its disordered eating grave. I was no longer gripped by cold. I ran hot, even. And moving around had become easier: bending down, carrying groceries, moving boxes around in the storage crawl space beneath my apartment.
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