This past 2 months I’ve felt quite often the difference between being fit&strong and not being able to lift a few pounds. I have the same weight as 7 years ago, but back then I wasn’t as fit and surely not as strong as today.
A couple of weeks after we’ve got married, the paperwork was finalized and we finally got the apartment. It was a project, so we’ve started refurbishing it. We had skilled workers, my in-laws came to help too. I felt I can’t do a lot of things blaming, obviously, the fact that I’m a woman, so I shouldn’t have to be able to lift something heavier than 10 pounds anyway.
It was hard for a couple of reasons. I couldn’t help hubby move things around the house so it took longer. I was able to do some projects and I was (still am) very proud of what I’ve done. I’m not happy with manual labour, but doing things to make our home look better gives me an amazing feeling. I couldn’t imagine 15 years ago that I will fit tiles in the cupboard and that I’ll be proud of it. Funny how life changes a person.
A couple of years later I started my journey to loose weight, because I’ve gained 40 pounds due to changing the job and gaining with that a lot of nasty habits (no food during the day, only 6-8 cups of coffee. and a big meal for dinner). I felt poorly all the time, with no energy or strength. Loosing weight by eating properly, a few times a day was not enough to get me to where I wanted, so I’ve started exercising. As I’m not a cardio person, lifting weights was the way for me and it had such a major change in my life.
Now we are in the process of refurbishing the house (we’ve almost done it) and the things couldn’t be more different. I can lift up to 35 pounds and it’s pretty odd how many things weight around 25-30 pounds. I could help hubby move the furniture. I can go up and down the stairs with a door or big pieces of furniture. I loved the look some guys from B&Q had when they saw me manoeuvring a trolley with some drywall sheets, some concrete floor sheets and a few more bits and pieces. Hubby had his own trolley, much heavier than mine.
I could even lift our inflatable kayak so hubby can put it the loft…it weights 35 pounds and it was impossible for hubby to carry it on the ladder, as it’s so big. If I didn’t have enough strength to lift it, right now it would eat away space in the cupboard or we would have to ask a friend over to help us.
Looking back at the last 10 years and how I’ve evolved and changed, I’m so happy with my journey. Gaining all that extra weight put me on a different path. I can do things for myself, things that I didn’t believe I can do years ago. It’s not that just now I’m able to do more than 100 push-ups per workout and 7 years ago I wasn’t able to do 1. It’s about all the things I can do now, real things that help me in my real life.
I want to do even more things in the future. I want to go beyond my current limits, to be a better me.
