I started going to the gym when I was 16. Always did lots of cardio and weights. As I got busier with work and family sometimes I stopped exercising. Now I find that I can’t work out the way I did in my 20’s and the weight is sticking on me. If I over do it my knees and ankles hurt. At the same time in the back of my mind I keep reminding myself that exercise is better than having to visit the doctor and take prescription medications. I should be more consistent then I have been recently due to health issues. I am hoping as it gets warmer I will be more dedicated to working out several times a week. My goal is to be healthy and have stamina as I get older and avoid doctors as much as possible. I think if I had a workout buddy who had the same goals it would make it easier.
Oh, how I hate to sweat! Even as a kid I didn’t like it because it made/makes me itchy. Then there are the chronic knee and hip pains, the soreness the next day and so on. Give me a good book and a comfy chair any day!
I know that’s a terrible attitude and I’ve been an on-again/off-again exerciser most of my adult life. Got to get on it again!
I had a running partner from November, 2006 to November, 2015. She’s 65 now, though, and has serious arthritis problems. She can still walk with me, but I doubt she’ll ever run much again. 
It’s a big loss, because we would run together three times a week. That’s why I’m relying more on internet stats/graphs/games to keep me going. It would be hard for me to find another person who runs as slowly as I do!!
Very interested in this thread. I grew up in the 1970s in a part of the country where there were no competitive sports for girls…just cheerleading for the boys. No early opportunities to speak of for establishing good habits or for making fitness “fun.” I never had significant weight issues until the babies came and then never really could figure how to work personal fitness into the craziness of parenthood. Besides, I hate sweating, get exercise headaches, dislike being around gym rat types, swimming (which I’m good at) involves the whole shower/blow dry routine, etc. In my 40s, the weight began to be a bigger issue and I had time to try in earnest to address it. I hired a trainer 3x a week. Tore groin muscle. Physical therapy for 8 weeks but it still bothers me to this day. Back to another trainer (under guidance of PT). In two months, tore meniscus. Surgery and more PT. Started having really sore hips and knees. MRI found moderate to severe arthritis and bursitis and diagnosed with fibromyalgia. Doctor suggests biking and cortisone injections. After one week retear repaired meniscus. Begin having issues with ankle. Big lump forms over 8 months or so. Long story short, have to have major surgery to rebuild shredded achilles, using graft from another tendon. Months of PT. I start walking again. Things are OK but can’t lose weight. Try the pool. Then tear rotator cuff Gardening…gardening!. More physical therapy. Out in yard a month ago, stepped wrong and fell in a little hole. Tore other meniscus. Now I have a recumbent bike in my family room which I ride like an old lady about 45 minutes a day.
Bottom line. I want to cry when I think about how often I’ve tried and failed to “do something” about fitness. My husband and family don’t get it. I don’t really either. Gastric sleeve surgery scheduled.
@hilldweller if you can find a swimming opportunity in the evening you can avoid the blow dry (just going home to bed anyway). I just rinse off the chlorine in the shower, throw on sweats, and go home.
I was terrible at sports. One of the most UN athletic persons in my school. But my BFF was a great athlete; she was good at EVERYTHING. All those horrible choosing team experiences went well for me. My BFF always chose me first. She loved me, and didn’t care about winning at the expense of seeing her friend chosen last. I never had to experience the humiliation of seeing person after person chosen until someone finally was forced to call my name.
My friend remains one of the most beautiful people (inside and out) that I’ve ever known. I was so shy and reserved; I don’t know why she decided she wanted to be my friend, but I have always felt like the luckiest girl in the world because of it.
Okay, I’m going to go off and cry now…
I did. Every day for three years, whenever we were doing a team sport in PE, which was most of the time. Those of you who can’t understand why everyone doesn’t love to exercise need to understand that this is the association that some of us have with physical activity. It’s not easy to get over, that kind of humiliation.
@intparent I could never go to sleep with wet, unshampood hair. Have to do the whole wash and blow-dry thing. Fortunately I can get to the pool during the daytime. Also, hard as it may be to believe, I do not own sweats! No t-shirts either. Only yoga clothes. Hopeless…I’m hopeless.
This brings back a memory for me. Back in the days when I used to jog regularly, our family had a crisis I never could have ever imagined would have happened. It was the worst time in my life and something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. The only thing that saved my sanity during that time was my treadmill. I didn’t jog outside during that time, though looking back, I’m not sure why. But I would get on my treadmill and RUN, whereas I’d always just jogged before. I ran like a fiend every single day, and afterwards that horrible anxiety would be gone. I’d be calm. I’d be reflective. I’d see the good things that were happening instead of just fixating about the horrible things that were going on. The next day I’d be tortured again by our circumstances. And again, I’d run on that treadmill, doing high intensity intervals interspaced with slow walking.
It was the best thing I’ve ever done for myself and I think it LITERALLY saved my sanity. I agree with you, @MomofWildChild. Exercise is a great stress reliever. It doesn’t solve your problems for you, but it can give you the strength to weather the storm, both physically and mentally/emotionally.
Let’s be nice, people. I mean, really.
I too am a charter member of the Gym Class Scarred Me for Life team. Just horrible. Public humiliation in being picked near the end, proficiency measured by ability to kick / hit / catch a ball, ugh. Dodgeball was the best invention ever – oh, god, please make sure the ball hits me so I can sit down and be done with this already. (How dumb were these teachers, to think that would motivate the un-athletic among us?)
I swam, but more for fun as opposed to true exercise or laps. I didn’t ride a bike - my parents tried to teach me how, and I’m ashamed to say I threw a temper tantrum and they figured the heck with it.
It is only in the last few years that I’ve started to actually enjoy exercise; I started running in 2012 and ran a few 5K’s in the past few years. For me, I find what works is going to classes - that’s what gives me accountability. I like weights / strength training, yoga and pilates. My downfall is cardio; I am supposed to do a 5k in a week and I am woefully undertrained and know already I’ll have to walk / run / walk. I guess I just absolutely hate the feeling of having a pounding heart and being out of breath.
I get it. Even though I was spared, I knew that it was only because of my good fortune.
But that may be why I have always done activities that are not group oriented. Anyone with an able body can walk; it doesn’t require any particular skill. I can ride my bike and not be in competition with anyone. I can go to the fitness center in my neighborhood and put on my headphones, ride the recumbent bicycle and ignore the world.
For those that grew up unathletic, there are still many options to move your body without having to relive those feelings of having no skills. Heck, you can put on a Dancing to the Oldies DVD in your house when no one’s around.
The payoff is immense. As a nurse, I see it every day. Whether or not I live a long life, I just don’t want to end up disabled if I can avoid it. Exercise doesn’t guarantee you won’t get a disease that will knock you on your rear; but to the degree that I can influence the quality of my life, I’m going to give it my best shot.
The funny thing was, I was a superstar in PE-class track because I got my height early and had very long legs. But as you say, that’s not a team sport, and it didn’t involve balls.
I do work out now, for the last year, and you’re right, the benefits are enormous. But the very first hurdle I had to get over was that stomach-seizing fear that I’d carried around for 40 years.
My wife is an exercise physiologist and she tells her clients that getting fit is more than the exercise they do. Limit tv or and computer time, do chores, park further away, take the steps and get outside and garden or walk the dog.
@Nrdsb4, I couldn’t agree with you more. I see people younger than I who can’t work, can’t walk, can barely take care of themselves. That’s not gonna be me. Never. No way.
Glad so many of you are enjoying this thread.
Now that exercise is as much a part of my routine as meal planning and taking care of the house, I find myself quite addictive to the routine and worry about what I would do if my exercise was restricted due to an injury or health issue. Really, the exercise routine has changed my life that I NEVER want my routine to include anything differently. It is a release and the results - better feeling about myself, better view in the mirror, better stamina, better sleep, etc. - are SO worth the effort for me.
Are we products of what we know around us or before us? Look at your family in your home, your neighbors or your siblings or parents - are they active? Are you a product of what has been modeled around you?
My mom is 83, still works part time at her local Y (go figure!) and swims several times a week and walks outside daily for 30 minutes - an hour. I mean, if she doing it, what’s my excuse?!!!
I am more of a lurker than a poster but I’ve learned two things that I’ve applied from reading the exercise thread:
–From MOWC I learned to not make exercise a choice. Everyday since December I have exercised because I don’t say “should I” instead I say “when will I?” I have exercised outdoors everyday despite sideways rain, snow, ice, etc.
– From abasket I learned to track my calories everyday in Myfitnesspal and I have lost 10 pounds.
At this stage, I am more about exercise consistency than quality-- building habits. I hope to increase the variety and intensity of my work-outs soon as I feel that I have built the habit. Like many of you, I am motivated by wanting as much mobility and physical good health as I can control in my later years. I agree with what Nrdsb4 has observed about people aging better when they exercise.
My grandparents used to go dancing several times a week. They were awesome. My grandfather was stricken with multiple myeloma, but he danced with Grandma until he just couldn’t take a step anymore. Grandma stayed active until just a few months before she died at age 92.
DH’s grandma lived to be 102. She did jazzercise at the assisted living place until she was about 101.
@peacefulmom, wow, so, so proud of you! More importantly, I can tell you are proud of yourself - keep at it girl!
I’m a product of nagging doctors. 
No but seriously, my dad had a heart attack at age 39, and could be seen jogging in our neighborhood in the late 60s, long before anyone else was doing it. He continued going to the gym, mostly stationary biking, until his early 80s. Mom swam at the gym until her mid 80s.