Aches and Pains

This is NOT a post about raising children — I am referring to what you start feeling after a workout once you hit 50.  Yes, go ahead and smile.  You're either too young to understand and rolling your eyes right now, or you're right around that sweet spot and know exactly what I mean.

I am smart enough to know that my body has changed and that I can't do what I once could.  I lift still lift weights, but my mantra now is "it's not the weight, it's the reps."  Right.  I can still shoot baskets with my sons, but not if we're playing full court because I seem to have lost a step.  I can still jog through my neighborhood, but I don't because it scares the small children.

So why do we do it?  Why do we work so hard to stay in shape when as we age, it take greater effort just to maintain?  Pretty sure it's a combination of several things that can get any of us motivated:  wanting to be attractive to the opposite sex, or maybe wanting to be attractive to the same sex (you know who you are!), need of an ego boost, or maybe it's the result of meeting with your doctor and hearing the dreaded, "eat right, exercise and get in shape — or else!"  

We all know someone our age or older, who is in great shape, and you really start to feel it around age 45 or so — but there it is, it's out in the open.  The greatest motivator and what keeps us going to the gym, bench pressing, elliptical stepping, curling, standing flies, squats, lat pull-downs and more — peer pressure.  So to my friends, neighbors, work colleagues and family that are hovering right around 50 I say this:  get with it baby because I can still bench 235.  (Okay, it's more like 150 but if I have 2 spotters, a cup of coffee, and all the stars align …. then who knows!)

Now please send in the nurse.