Fuck exercise! I’m so sick of people framing my movement as exercise and praising me like I’m a three year old.
I move for pleasure. My fatness is forever; I am unconditionally fat. No amount of movement will unfat me, thank God.
I’m not moving my body to lose weight or do health on anyone else’s terms. Any guilt-driven exercise compulsions you might have about movement, I do not share.
I’ve worked hard to heal my relationship with my body. I love myself unconditionally–guilt and shame aren’t helpful to me. I don’t use movement to feel ok about myself–I’m ok with myself no matter what.
trike
Lately Ming and I are going for trike / bike rides almost every morning. It helps to be consistent because it’s not a pain in the ass to pump the tires and check everything over. When the trike and bike sit a while, maintenance to restart is work.
But when we just went yesterday, chances are there’s nothing that needs doing at all. Ming unlocks our trike and bike, which are locked together. I put on my helmet. We cycle to the parking lot of the Mormon church across the street.
For a long time we just cycled around the parking lot. It’s very clean / neat and has almost zero trash. Nonetheless, I love it.
There’s a big tree in the parking lot. There’s a brick shed in the back near something like Italian cypress. And a locked dumpster, and a strip of concrete down the middle for drainage purposes which gives some texture to the ride as I cycle back and forth over the concrete strip with its slight water-channeling angles.
further
One day, we cycled into the Mormon parking lot. Suddenly an event got out. All at the same time, a buncha white people exited the building, got into their cars, and suddenly the lot we had circled and circled seemed treacherous from motor vehicles. So we exited the lot.
We had cycled out of the lot before, to visit the gorgeous mimosa tree that’s in a neighbor’s front yard. In fact, we’ve visited the tree many times to admire it. Ming tells me once we alarmed the people who live there in that house.
But for the first time, I took off down the street. It felt good to be free and explore the neighborhood.
encouraging
Then it feels crappy when neighbors think they’re encouraging me by seeing me on my trike or afterward and saying, “That’s great exercise! Keep it up!”
They think they’re encouraging me, but I feel like I’m going to cry. I’m hurt or frustrated or enraged by their infantilizing misunderstanding of what it means to be Laura-Marie
Probably they have good hearts and are only trying to help. But my body and what I do with it is my life! I didn’t ask for comments about my huge tummy, wide ass, or the fat on my upper arms.
Likewise, I didn’t ask for comments about my movements. Yes, I stim–I’m much more open to comments about that.
fuck exercise
What motivates you to move?
Are your ideas of health grounded in reality?
Where do you get your information about health?
Do you exercise out of fear, guilt, a sense of responsibility?
Do you associate movement with PE classes as a kid?
Is there a combination of pleasure and guilt about movement?
Do you love your body?
How does movement make you feel?
Do the words you use about movement affect how you feel about it?
words
I have trauma around the word “diet” and can’t use that word. I’ll contort my sentence around to say “food choices,” “food preferences,” “nutritional needs,” any day.
Likewise, I have a strong feeling of “fuck exercise” because the word exercise hurts me. I associate it with torture, basically. As a kid at school, I didn’t have control over what I did with my body. PE classes were painful and humiliating. I had unaddressed health issues and was considered just clumsy–true, I am clumsy, but my countless injuries were more than that. In fifth and sixth grade I was forced to play volleyball and injured myself over and over again. PE is why I started hiding in the bathroom.
Hiding in the bathroom can be an autism thing. My injuries pertain to hypermobility and other joint muscle health issues that are just now being addressed by any medical professional, now that I’m middle aged. Fifth grade was a long time ago, and I’m sorry for the trauma that is so much work to tackle as an adult.
fuck exercise
These days I enjoy movement as pleasure. While I have this body, I want to use it. Also it might help me sleep better, and I need all the tricks I can find to overcome insomnia.
Riding trike makes me feel alive and is a fun way to be with Ming and explore the world. Looking at plants is my favorite.
Fat yoga is a joy, to move in community with other fat people in a space where I never doubt that I belong. The teacher and other students don’t think I’m lesser than for my fatness.
Swimming is a joy too, if I can endure the sensory problems of being wet, and survive the locker room overwhelm if I go to the YMCA.
I like slow walks sometimes. But dancing is probably my favorite. It’s like stimming but with music. It moves stuck energy and helps me learn about my own body and what it needs.
self-love
Culture lies to us about our responsibilities. Capitalism intentionally tries to poison our self-love so it can sell us what takes the place of self-love. I find that abusive. I don’t want capitalism, culture, or any system or person to attempt to poison my self-love.
Movement isn’t something I owe to anyone. I do it because Mother God gave me a body, and I’m here to learn lessons I can only learn in this body.
Movement is a specialty of bodies. When I’m a soul floating around, I’ll have all different priorities.
