I to Q: My Fitness Journey
Part 2 on my fitness journey
Thank you so much for all the support I received from my first blog. A lot has happened since we last spoke on this subject. I hope this blog finds you and your loved ones safe and sound during this time. Until we meet again in person.
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I is for insomnia
Whenever life gets the best of me, I find it hard to sleep. Sometimes I can be up late crying myself to sleep. My brain finds it so hard to switch off. Insomnia is a bitch.
Leaves me irritated, unproductive, anxious, defensive not my best self. Poor sleeping habits such as staying on your phone too late can have immense effects on sleeping patterns. I have tried to implement measures such as app timer limits. But recently, I have been so restless with the world around me. I’ve found it soo hard to sleep.
J is for junk food
Junk food my favourite guilty pleasure. Pictured here is my childhood fridge.
My mum would always avoid buying junk food. Whenever we would go passed Macdonalds she would say there is rice at home. When I started earning money from paper-round, I would run at any opportunity to get a big Cadbury bar and eat it all in one go. Over time I have stopped relying on junk food and started looking in the fridge to cook food.
Junk food is designed to be for fast consumption. So much of eating is about coming together in communion with the nutrients and with friends and family. Doughnuts are so pleasurable but leaving a hole in the social-communicative aspects of eating meals together.
K is for Knees
One day I will have knees like Meghan Thee Stallion until then I will squat in my house. My health journey is centred around longevity and when I’m grey and golden my knees don’t give way.
One trainer who inspires me is Joe holder, I remember listening to a podcast about injuries he experienced from playing American Football. Joe had to stop and re-invent his career due to his injuries. Joe became a fitness and wellness guru.
During this quarantine, you might have noticed the proliferation of IG live. You need to check out Joe Holder’s and Naomi Cambell’s PT sessions on IG live. You can see the way Joe’s training practice is centred around movement and not the act of just doing an exercise routine.
L is for Laziness
Before this pandemic, I had an effective exercise routine. Three to four days a week, I would go to the gym and workout. Laziness crept in because the incentive to work out now is so much harder, especially in my small family flat.
To combat laziness I have done two main things:
- Joined my workplaces actve8 challenge: different teams compete to see who has done the most exercise.
- Started taking “Joy walks” with my sister. We walk around our area and play music on my sister’s portable speaker. On a rare occasion, we have dance battles on the road.
M is for money
Money provides access, resources and opportunity. I used to believe the myth of “healthy food is more expensive than unhealthy food”. But other factors can come into play to prevent investing in healthy eating; time, nutritional knowledge, housing status and plenty more.
You might opt for fast food or processed food because its quick and easy to make, whilst balancing multiple jobs.
You might lack nutritional knowledge, and are not empowered to make the right choices.
You might be in temporary accommodation and not having the financial freedom to even afford food.
You might be furloughed and not have money to spend so you choose to limit the amount of food you eat daily.
Especially during this time if you do have the privileges of secure finances please donate to your local food bank, or community charity to support families, individuals.
O is for old habits
I love ketchup, it’s my nicotine. Ever since the first day I knew you could use ketchup on chips, rice and chapati. I’ve been in love.
I love how sweet and tomatoey ketchup tastes. But the amount of sugar in ketchup is way too much. Sometimes I think, my fitness changes are an only temporary fix. Like a relapsing contestant from the world’s biggest loser.
P is for performance
“ It’s a marathon, not a sprint”, but marathons are hard? I know with my asthma, I would rather sprint so it’s over and done with.
All bad jokes aside, this quote is about having the big picture in mind. A marathon is about pacing and endurance.
In the famous race of “the tortoise and the hare”, the tortoise won with patience and wisdom.
Where are my pit-stops to help me carry on this marathon?
Q is for questioning
I have gained kg during this physical distancing period. My mood and happiness have swung like a pendulum.
If you see my IG you may think I’m “Image Gang”, to be honest, I can be. At my heaviest, I despised taking photos and being in photos. That’s why a lot of my early IG photos and archives were photos of places, people and my body hidden.
Why? Being a big black woman is either a comedy trope on-screen or perceived as “unattractive”.
I remember vividly a prolific tweet of a photo of two young black women, one woman with a fupa, next to a smaller friend. Someone quote retweeted it saying you should have cropped the photo to hide her fupa.
When I become surrounded by confident queens, I began to flourish.
My feed is for me, it’s my vogue and it helps me to reclaim the lost years of hating my body.
