. . . to start working with me on a bodybuilding program. I've progressed at a very slow rate because I've been suffering from a chronic sleep disorder, which clearly is a disadvantage; but I've still become more muscular than I've ever been in my life. When I joined the health club (a 24 Hour Fitness, by the way), my pecs were shriveled and drooping. Today they're larger than they've ever been in my life; and my chest is packed with hard muscle. As far as my physique is concerned, I still have a long way to go; but I have made progress, and I love workouts!
I join Denninmi in saying that a vigorous exercise program is changing my life. It's also saving my life because I have type II diabetes and therefore must exercise to control my blood sugar levels. Needless to say, there are other health benefits as well.
For the first time in my life, I have begun to feel comfortable with my body (although my wife has said that she's always been comfortable with my body for the last 30-plus years). I love the feeling of strength in my body, a sensation I had never experienced before. I certainly have more self-confidence. I have to watch myself to not become too aggressive. High-school classmates who knew me as a passive guy who sought to avoid notice because he wanted to be left alone would be surprised if they saw me today. None of them would dare mess with me again. Were it not for my religious convictions, I'd be willing to punch one or more of them in the nose.
I wish that someone had introduced me to bodybuilding when I was a teenager. I could have used the self-confidence at a time when I had none. Of course, none of the mandatory P.E. classes I was forced to take offered bodybuilding, not to mention any other exercise program. I didn't even know what an exercise program was. After all, I was just an ignorant kid. But there was no education in "Physical Education." I even dare say that the President's Council on Physical Fitness has been a laughable fraud. I don't know of a single instance when remedial exercise programs were ever provided for any sedentary students, and that's because the emphasis has always been upon sports.
During my fourth- and fifth-grade years in elementary school, all the boys were required to take physical fitness tests (i.e., how fast could we run, how far could we jump, how many pushups and chin-ups could we do, etc.) Again, remedial exercise programs were never provided for the students who needed them the most. Today I wonder why those tests were even done. Hypocrisy on the part of policymakers and school officials who claimed to be concerned about physical fitness, but were only concerned about having a winning football team. Just like the unthinking people today who believe that all nonathletic students should be forced to participate in team sports in mandatory P.E. classes. But I digress. . . .
I must say for the sake of accuracy that I have actually worked with a succession of personal trainers because each trainer that I've worked with has eventually chosen to make a career change. But they all have appreciated me, and I have enjoyed working with them. I've been gratified as a guy who was sedentary for decades to receive compliments from young guys with athletic backgrounds. It's psychologically therapeutic.
My first trainer once inadvertently shed some light on the hateful mandatory P.E. experience of my youth. He would occasionally vary the workout routine by exposing me to a sport. One time he asked me if I knew how to shoot a basketball. I had assumed that shooting a basketball was simply a matter of thrusting the ball in the air toward the hoop. That's the way it had always appeared to me. I had no idea it was a physical skill that had to be taught and developed with practice. I discovered that day that I could have learned how to shoot a basketball. I even began to show progress that very day.
This is the point: None of my P.E. teachers or coaches ever taught the students in their classes how to shoot a basketball. Neither did they instruct us in how to properly throw a baseball or a football. But if a boy threw a baseball poorly, he was said to "throw like a girl." (Isn't it interesting how something that is deemed to be feminine is always used as an insult?) Never mind that a boy who thew a baseball poorly had never been shown how to do it! And they certainly never taught how the games of baseball, basketball, and football were played. As I said, there was no education in "Physical Education."
Of course, in mandatory P.E. the only students who mattered were the athletic kids. The nonathletes were treated like nonhumans or worse. Nonathletic boys were often bullied in those classes -- which were, in fact, of no benefit to them! (I suspect this still goes on in many school districts today, but who cares?) I got no exercise in mandatory P.E. I was scrawny on the very first day when I was introduced to the dreary reality of this pointless garbage, and I was still scrawny on the day when I left the school gym for the last time (thankfully and with much relief). However, I had learned something after all! I had learned to fear coaches and athlete classmates. A "gift" from the culture of school sports!
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