Gaining Self Worth Again

Boot camp – the word itself conjures up a million horrendous images to me, and no one is more surprised than I that I have willingly paid money to join AK Fit and do a serious work out three times a week, in addition to one-on-one personal training. All of this conjures up some serious junior and high school issues for me - memories of being the last to finish the 500 yard dash, collapsing in pain and holding back the tears from the slings and arrows shot at me from my peers.  I was the “husky” kid – shopping in a store ironically called “Anderson Little” for pants that would fit over my enormous thighs. 

What caused this change in me? Since I’ve dropped the excess weight a few years back, I knew I needed to jump over the exercise plateau I’ve reached. I’ve watched my roommate transform his body over the last two years and that inspiration combined with a reflective weekend spent in my desert oasis a few weekends ago gave me the kick in the ass that I needed. I had three days to hang out with my very best friend – me. And unlike so many people, I enjoy time by myself. Being uncomfortable at happy hour alone has never been an issue. Sitting at a table for one or hanging out at the bar of my favorite restaurant is easy.  I had no commitments, no drama, nothing to distract me from taking a long look at myself and the past few years.  And thinking long and hard was just what I did that weekend. I’ve accomplished a lot these past few years and I took that holiday to pat myself on the back. In 2011, I paid off an enormous debt – no small accomplishment-  and took back the control of my life. 

It was years ago, in San Francisco, when I had a trainer named Sev – an ex-Navy Seal who kicked my ass two times a week (and of course, added to my enormous debt), but I never forgot the feeling of self-worth his sessions gave me. He was the hottest and straightest man I ever knew and I think my being the complete opposite amused him at every turn.

He looked at my calves one day and said, “Damn, Jim, I want legs like that.” 

“It’s the pump exercise,” I groaned through my pain.

“What is that? I’ve never heard of that one.”

 I smiled and simply said, “It’s wearing four inch heels and performing on a stage.”

 He doubled over in laughter, but still kicked my ass.

Sev took no prisoners, never held back and he transformed my mind and my body. Over the years, I lost that feeling. So, that weekend as I sat at the bar of one of my favorite restaurants and chatted with the people around me – I knew that the only thing missing was my feeling good about myself again and being truly happy at what I see reflected back at me in the mirror.  

Eating right has never been an issue – I know when I order fries and a hamburger that it’s bad, and that that milkshake I want so bad will only cause me grief. So, now I consciously make the right choices and I’ve kicked up my work outs with AK Fit and a trainer who reminds me of Sev in so many ways. 

This morning, as Aaron, our trainer instructed us to run five laps around the basketball court and jump rope to warm up, those childhood memories came flooding back. I saw the little fat kid wheezing and puffing as he tried to make it around the fence to finish the dash and I heard the taunts as the jump rope hit me around the shoulders. But, I pushed them down with every sit up and push up that followed. When time was called, I finished the last of my bar raises, determined to say that I completed all four areas of the circuit. I hear the taunts of my childhood, but the encouragement of my workout partners and new trainer are stronger and louder. 

Aaron says he’ll take my enormous thighs and turn them into steel and I believe that together we will do just that. I am the sum of all the phases of me that have come before, and in the end, I will be as comfortable with what I see in the mirror as I am walking into a crowded restaurant and asking for a table for one. My goal is to be in the best shape of my life when I return to Boston for my parents’ Golden Anniversary in May. And who knows, maybe I’ll run around the park on the block where I grew up and where the taunts are still as vivid today as they were then. But the memory of their insults will be silenced and simply be a memory. Replaced by the self-worth I will have regained.

Never Too Old To Want Your Mother

I’ve been getting over a head cold and it’s made me realize even more the little something I’ve always known – the single thing I miss most from my move across the country is my mother.

Long before it became fashionable, Rosemarie was always a stay-at-home-mom. No matter what, she was always in the kitchen when my brother and I got home from school and when we were sick, she was the perfect nursemaid.   

There were times though when I didn’t want her care – especially when she was making me drink penicillin from one of my many bouts of strep throat (more on that later),yet,  I would have been lost without her. One time, I remember, that despite the intense flame that my throat had become and being unable to swallow, I still managed to scream as I hid under the kitchen table when she forced down the antibiotic. The doctor told her my tonsils would have to be removed and both my parents nixed that idea as they did not want to go anywhere near hospitals. Alas, it was a decision that would come back to haunt us all.

Once, I had an incredibly high fever and I screamed out in the middle of the night, “I can’t see! I’m blind! I can’t see!” And there my mother was, handing me a glass of water and aspirin that I clearly could make out  - but she laid that cold compress on my head and soothed me back to sleep.

“I’m sick,” I said once years later when I lived in Boston. And she gave me just the right amount of sympathy and was over at my apartment with food and orange juice. She stayed all day and watched television with me and yes, even cleaned my apartment.

Back then, the boys came and went in my life. Some with the hope of being forever, while others, I knew were just passing cars on a traffic free highway. But my mom was always there and when I moved in 1990, I somehow didn’t give it a second thought. She stood at the airport gate – back when people were allowed to accompany you to the boarding area - silent, shivering with tears she would not let flow in front of me and I got on board that United flight to a new life.

Along the way, there were more sore throats, more fevers and I called her every time – as if just hearing her voice would break the fever. And when I moved back ten years later for a short interim, she was over again whenever I felt under the weather. It was as if I’d never left and had never grown up. For a thirty something man, it was comforting and brought me back to when I would run home to find her at the top of the stairs.

In 2003, I left again – but this time, she was used to my never ending wanderlust.  And sometimes, I think I should have stayed just one year longer - for the night I woke up in the spring of 2004 unable to breathe was the scariest time of my life. I bolted upright in bed, gasping for air – my throat on fire.  I cried out only to be shocked by the muffled sound of my own voice. Somehow, I made it to the bathroom, looked at my throat to find one giant tonsil where there should have been two. I was alone – nobody to help me and I thought strangely, this will get better and stumbled back to bed, only to wake up shortly after with no air. What if I collapse here, I thought? There’s no one next to me to help and my mother can’t run in from the next room with a cold compress and healing touch. I strangely, drove myself to the Emergency Room and was admitted to the hospital with a temperature that spiked to 104 degrees as my body tried to fight this throat infection that trumped all those dating back to my youth.

My mother was on the phone every day with my friends – getting my progress reports as I couldn’t speak for several days and just hearing her voice put me at ease. And then, it was decided that that infection was the last straw. My tonsils had to come out at the ripe old age of 40. That summer, laid off from my job and still collecting benefits, I went into the hospital for the first time. It was cold in that operating room – and I missed my mother more than anything. The anesthesiologist asked me how many cocktails I wanted and before I answered two, I was awake in the recovery room looking at my friend Georgia– a woman who is my West Coast mom and best friend all rolled into one. She let my mom know my status every step of the way and that night, after I was discharged, she was in the next room – just like my mom was all those years ago. If I couldn’t have the real thing then I had the next best replacement.

Getting your tonsils out when your 40 is no picnic and the 20 pound two week weight loss was a bonus, though it was a shame that I was unfortunately unable to maintain it. 

But it was my mom’s voice over the phone and her cards that put me at ease. Even though I knew she couldn’t just hop on a plane by herself and get to me as quickly as she could when she was in the next room, it’s still comforting to give her a call these days to feel instantly better when I simply say,

“I’m sick.”