Mental Health Monday: Get Moving!
Alright, one month of quarantine down. The curve must be starting to flatten, right? I’ll tell you something that’s NOT starting to flatten, though. My abs. Or what’s left of them. I’m getting a little pudgy being in my home for all this time.
During normal times, I have a pretty good regimen. At least three days a week of going to the gym for an hour, most of those are sessions with a fantastic trainer. I know that’s not a financial reality for everyone, but I needed the guidance. And I REALLY needed the accountability. I’m good at getting myself to do things that I convince myself I have to do. Gotta get up and go to work. Gotta get up and go to the gym. I said I’d cook breakfast for me and Liz, so I as much as I’d like to sleep in, I gotta get outta bed.
The problem I have is motivating myself while I’m here in my comfy house. Getting myself to go downstairs to the basement, put on a podcast and do a workout is no easy task. I don’t know why my mindset is like this, but I just don’t feel obligated to. Which is a shame, because I actually like working out. I like the way it makes me look, I like the way it makes me feel and I like that when I’m more active I can have a bit more freedom with my eating habits.
Not only am I not getting my thrice-weekly gym sessions, I’m also not at work. As anyone that works in a kitchen can tell you, it’s a physically demanding job. You’re on your feet for 8, 10, 12 or more hours a day, very rarely taking a break to sit down, unless you’re going to the bathroom (all male cooks sit down to pee, if you say you don’t, you’re a liar). It’s not just standing, either. It’s constant walking from your station to the pot drop or dish pit, bending down to get into your reach-in for more mise-en-place, pivoting and turning in place from burner to pass, lifting stock pots to simmer or strain, the repetitive motion of the sauté flip, taking the stairs to dry storage for the 4735th time today, the scrub down at the end of the night with aching hands and on aching feet. And the constant sweats. Especially in the summertime, even a healthy cook will schvitz off a pound or more over the course of a dinner rush.
All of which is to say, between my visits to the gym, my walking to and from work and the rigors of the work itself, as long as I managed my caloric intake and maintained just a slight deficit, it was actually pretty easy to lose a couple pounds every couple of weeks and at the very least maintain my weight, all while still eating the things I wanted to eat. But the new normal just isn’t working like that for me. I’m still trying to maintain a calorie deficit, to varying degrees of success each week, but I’m finding it hard to get active.
Today is the start of a new week and I woke up with the mindset that I’d do something. That something is always better than nothing. So, I got out of bed, had a healthy-ish breakfast of skyr, frozen berries and a polyphenol-packed granola and then got right to the business of moving, at least a bit. I did a good 10-15 minutes of stretching and then some exercises recommended by my trainer for another 40 or so minutes. It got my heart rate up, made me sweat a bit and I felt better about things as soon as I was done. Plus, working up a sweat gave me an excuse to shower and shave, so it’s a great start to a new week.
If you’re a cook who’s stuck at home, or even if you’re not (stuck at home or a cook or both) I encourage you to get a little physically active each day if you can. Yes, we’re social distancing and yes, we’re sort of on lockdown, but we’re not in a gulag, we’re at home. Even if you’ve got a tiny studio apartment, there’s plenty of helpful people on the internet that are streaming videos showing workouts tailored to whatever your living situation is. Go check out YouTube. They’re on there. Doing even a little bit of exercise every day will make you feel better, both about yourself and about the situation we’re all in. Just get up and move a bit, something is always better than nothing.
Take good care of yourself, everybody. This won’t go on forever, so don’t let yourself or your health take too much of a hit before we can get back out there. I’m rooting for you.
