Today’s workout with with Melaine has left me fatigued and in misery; So I thought I share some appropriate wisdom that May, Mickey, and I picked up in the Sauna.
I’ll admit it; I find Health Club Saunas a bit awkward. You sit in the dry heat or steam next to a red faced, sweaty, seemingly uncomfortable guy or gal that keeps sighing and groaning out load as they fight the heat. Let’s face it, if this was a city bus you wouldn’t sit next to the guy, right?
And what are the rules? Are you supposed to make conversation? Should you keep quiet? I walk in and say something like, “Whew, it’s like a sauna in here, huh?” It never gets the laugh I expect. However, on Tuesday, in the sauna, May, Mickey, and I got a pep talk from Tito.
We had just finished our workout with Melanie and decided to try the Sauna. We went to the wet sauna (steam room) first. The steam was thick and I immediately learned that people who wear glasses should not wear them in a steam room. As I stumbled to find my seat, May started to giggle. Mickey made a wisecrack and May started to laugh out loud. May’s laugh is quite contagious so pretty soon we were all laughing and a sweating.
Evidently, you’re supposed to be quiet in the steam room, because one woman that had entered while we were cutting up, shushed us. May tried to stop laughing by covering her face with a towel but her convulsions just made Mickey and I laugh harder. So we left so we wouldn’t get shushhhhed again. We went to the dry sauna.
The rules in the dry sauna must be different because almost as soon as we sat down Tito started talking to us.“Where did you get those shirts? Do they sell them here?, he asked.
Mickey explained that we were part of the “Biggest Loser” competition on WOAI TV and immediately Tito went into his pep talk (which is why I wrote this blog).
“Are y’ll following the plan? You’re going to do great!”, he said. “I had this friend who was…like…a size 60”, he continued, “he worked with the guys here at the Spectrum and in two and half month was down to a 38.” “Oh, he complained to me that he was in misery the first few weeks till he hit his groove”
At this point he’s yelling and his hands are emphasizing every point, “So I tell him, ‘Look you can be miserably here while you getting thin or you can be miserable at home feeling bad about the condition you’re in! What do you want to do?” He said that this hit his friend hard and it inspired him to continue his workouts.
Tito was quite proud of his advice. And there was a certain “tough love” logic to what he said. We left Tito in the dry sauna after that speech but as I suffer in misery I know that at least it’s misery that comes from action. And I can feel good about that! At least until the Advil wears off!
