Elizabeth Drake

After visiting my grandmother and being reminded of my own mortality, one thing that stood out above all else is that mobility as you age is so important. After breaking her hip, my grandmother has struggled to do even basic things.

And osteoporosis doesn’t just run in my family, it gallops.

I had already done a lot of research on how to prevent osteoporosis, so I know that I need to do weight-bearing exercise. Walking versus swimming, for example, as the pressure of your feet on the pavement helps builds bones. Lifting weights will do even more.

Yeah, I know, I hate lifting weights, but I like the benefits. Being strong and fit is amazing.

I’ve known this for ages, and we even have a small home gym tucked in the corner of the basement because of it. A home gym that is dusty and neglected because who has another hour a day when they’re working full time, being a mother, wife, and trying to write books.

But that’s the “all or nothing” mentality I find myself caught in so often. I need to stop.

Fifteen minutes of squats, push-ups, and overhead presses will help. Something is better than nothing. I will never become a gym rat, but I don’t have to be to get some benefits.

So, we committed to spending twenty minutes a day in the basement getting it ready to use again. Moving furniture to get a play area for the kids, setting up a TV with Netflix, and rearranging the exercise equipment in such a manner than we can use it safely again. The girls got a gymnastics mat for Christmas, and we’re setting up a safe spot for that, too.

It’s been a lot of work. We haven’t always managed the twenty minutes a night. But we have tried. Once we do have the exercise area ready, the game plan is either to go down and use it, or keep spending that twenty minutes cleaning.

We’ll see how it goes.

I really need to get a plan together as to how we’re going to tackle lifting weights again. I’m not in my twenties anymore, so I  need to come up with a more gentle plan that lets me build back up to my former baseline. I’m a desk jockey by day and creator of words by night. While I can type pretty fast, even the forty-five pound bar is going to be too much for me to squat at first.

I may be a pantser in writing, but I’m a plotter in everything else. If you have some advice, let me know. If we are too stiff and sore to function, we’ll give up lifting altogether.

There has to be a middle ground, and I plan to find it.