How I Got Back Into Fitness After Being Sedentary

When I was in the thick of my binge eating and at my highest weight, when I had gained about 65 pounds in 2 years, I was also at my least physically active.

I knew I needed to start exercising again, because I had all but stopped. But I was uncomfortable in my body at the size I was, I felt uncomfortable in fitness clothing, and I felt so out of shape and easily fatigued. I was intimidated.

Most of all though, I was really ashamed.

Previous to gaining the weight, I had been an accomplished athlete. I had 12 state medals in competitive swimming, I had won state meets and tournaments with my varsity swimming and water polo teams. I trained intensely, 14-20+ hours per week.

Because of how active I'd been all my life as an athlete, when I became totally sedentary, I was always expecting myself to get back into fitness through similar intensity. I'd been on athletic teams since I was 8 years old, and long, hard training had been the norm all my life.

I felt so intimidated by the pressure of my athletic history, and I felt so ashamed that I wasn't doing the amount of exercise I always had before I gained the weight.

What ended up happening is I was always intending to exercise again but never really started and kept it up. I'd do a long workout one day and then nothing for another two weeks.

So one day after realizing this intimidation and shame, I had an honest chat with myself:

"OK, I know that consistency is going to be needed if I'm going to start moving my body. This insistence that I exercise hard and long is not working. So if I'm really honest, what amount of exercise, if I had to do it every day, or maybe six days a week, do I honestly think I could commit to?"

Without thinking, an answer came back instantly:

"8 minutes."

I cried.

I had a long, deep cry about how ashamed I was of being a person who used to train for as much as 5 hours in one day, who could now only do 8 minutes.

I felt sad about what I'd done to myself with binge eating, how clogged and stuffed up my body felt, and just heartbroken about everything that had happened with me and my eating and body and health.

After I let myself have this cry, I felt gentler with myself and more optimistic (which often happens when we have sincere cries, by the way!).

And lo and behold, I started doing 8 minutes of exercise per day. I usually biked, but sometimes I hiked. I'd go 4 minutes out, then I'd turn around and come 4 minutes back. I didn't trick myself into doing more, and I tried to not beat myself up for only doing 8 minutes.

Because I was now moving consistently, I began to feel a little more in shape. So I increased it slowly: 12 min per day, then 15 min per day, then 20 min per day, and so on.

The exercise, paired with the most important work of emotionally addressing the underlying root causes of my overeating, helped me to get back into shape and enjoy being fit again.

I've never gone back to exercising as much as I did when I was a competitive athlete, but I've fallen in love with my particular favorite kinds of movement again (which for me are hiking, dancing, swimming, biking and rock climbing).

So if you're wanting to get back into some healthy fitness again -- or any other kind of health practice -- and you feel stuck, please just start where you're at, and most of all, stay consistent, even if the changes are small.

Don't be cruel to yourself about what you can't do, rather be patient and kind as you work up what you can do.

You can do this!