What my First Journey into Fitness Really Looked Like

By Jet Rupar, ACSM EP-C EIM2

Exercise is something I never really thought about when I was growing up. I was never really encouraged to be physically active by the adults in my life. And in school, well.. I was awkward and never seemed to fit in with the “fit, let’s do this sport” type of activities. And sure, we did various things during gym times, but I never seemed to find “my thing” during those years of my life. I just had no interest.

Things changed when I started college. I was introduced to a new sort of freedom where there wasn’t as much judgement going around about what you did and what you looked like. (Because lets face it, high school is full of that sort of thing). However, within that next year, I went to a place that had a trainer that did one on one coaching in an area that didn’t have a lot of people looking in on what was going on. This person over many weeks taught me how to properly do resistance training with hand weights. This slow progress allowed me to gain confidence in how to properly doing various things with this type of training, and allowed me to feel something I hadn’t really felt before… strong. I felt stronger by doing this resistance training thing, and it really got me interested in doing more for myself and my body. This new sensation of strength allowed me to think “If this weight training can me feel good, what can adding cardio to do my sense of health and well being???”

I started to go out to different places to walk. My favorite places tended to be on various walking paths, both within the woods and various other places outdoors. I loved the fresh air and sunshine, as they gave me a sense of peace. It was around this time that I also got into yoga, with a couple of videos that I had found. (This was just around the time YouTube was starting up, hence there wasn’t the selection of things there that it has now.)

And through it all, I found out what my body could do, and couldn’t do. Which really fascinated me, as how the body works has always fascinated me.

It was only a few short years later that I started to have some issues with my health, and I wasn’t sure how to navigate the chronic issues and my exercise routine. It took many years to figure out how to get myself comfortable within my chronic illness to continue on with my exercise journey. We did, however, start back on it. Today my routine varies from day to day and week to week so that I don’t get bored with what I have. I try to make it not only within what I can do, but fun so I am more willing to stick to it. Having others to check in with helps me as well because it keeps me honest to myself.

And I always remind myself that it’s one day at a time. I can change things on each day if needed, because what I can do on each day varies, as long as it’s something to improve the health of my body.