There are things, when I started this whole moving-my-body nonsense, that I hadn’t considered.
Such as:
- The human body has a lot of muscles. Some that we rarely use when we’re sitting at a desk for hours every day. Like the crazy one under your armpits that, let me assure you, will remind you of its existence very sharply and with much gusto if you overuse it.
- Some muscles require time to heal between workouts. This, however, may be a completely different timetable than, say, the schedule on which your copious plant-killing weeds may be using. So while that fancy armpit muscle might not quite be ready for Round III, your weeds, who speak quietly in a voice like Snidely Whiplash, will cackle uproariously and grow double-quick, just to annoy you.
- Muscles weigh more than flubber. This means that, when you are hauling your sorry and sore carcass from home to the garden location, you’re actually carrying more weight. Nice. Nice, that. Thanks, biology.
Moreover, brand new fears erupt when these things come to light.
Radical fears. Fears like:
- If I work that armpit muscle too much, am I going to get that creepy female body builder thing going on? You know the one. The one where it looks like skeletons wrapped in lumpy-yet-hard sausage are wearing concrete deodorant and can’t ever really put their arms down?
- If I heed to Snidely Weedlash’s ploys for attention, am I going to do some crazy muscle damage that’ll land me in the ER with a broken armpit? Because, really, this is a small town. And I will die of embarrassment if I am forever known as Broken Armpit Girl.
- Is it possible to gain so much muscle that my muscles can’t lift themselves? Like, will I one day be throwing a bag of manure over my shoulder and find that my arms have become too dense to move?
I didn’t say it was rational, just that these are the things that go through my brain once in a while.
(Except the Broken Armpit Girl thing. That actually scares the pants off me, and is entirely possible. It really is a small town with not a lot to talk about. A broken armpit would be big news.)
This is where you come in, dear reader.
While I’m still hammering away at the caloric stockpile residing near my love pontoons, I’m realizing that I know a whole lot about a whole lot of things…but the human body ain’t one of ‘em.
I’d love to interview a trainer or expert about what beginners can expect when they’re going from couch-surfing slothmeat to buff gardening superbabe. (Fair warning: There may be an abundance of armpit muscle questions.)
Are you that expert? Do you know a trainer? Is there someone you think knows a lot about this kind of stuff that I could talk to?
Leave me a comment or drop me a note. I’m ALL OVER anyone who can stop the concrete deodorant nightmares….and teach us a thing or two in the process.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I would love to have expert advice, too! How about a nutritionist? Perhaps there are certain foods to avoid before hitting the machines?
I just wanted to say that don’t worry you will never look like a female body builder, even if you trained like one, to look like that takes an incredible amount of effort. It is very difficult for the vast majority of women to grow and then maintain bulky muscle (this does not mean you won’t get stronger, a bigger muscle is not necessarily a stronger muscle), but unless you spent years trying to look like that, and ALSO took some “special vitamins” it aint going to happen, so please don’t be afraid of building muscle and if you go back to the gym in the future lifting weights. Maintaining (or increasing) muscle tone is what prevents us from becoming fragile as we age.