My mom jio-ed me for this morning’s run. And my mom was never a “fitness” person. She somehow raised my brother and me to be quite active people, but she was always able to find some reason to excuse herself from physical activities. She’ll say stuff like:
“I need to do housework, no time”, when I asked her to join me in random weekend workouts,
“I need to sleep soon, need to wake up early for work tomorrow”, when I invited her to try video workouts with me after work,
“So many people!”, when I asked her along for mass public workouts, or
“I’m old and stiff!”, when I suggested lighter workouts like yoga and Pilates.
Recently she had to undergo a surgery, and the doctor said the root cause was muscle degeneration with age. A week of lying in the hospital slimmed her down quite a fair bit, and she had to dig out some old clothes to wear.
And that turned out to be a good thing! She was glad to lose some pounds (not that she was anywhere near plump to begin with) and wanted to keep her shape and at the same time prevent further muscle degeneration. It probably also felt good that now she could borrow her daughter’s size S or XS dri-fit tees when she used to need size M. So, she started brisk walking in the morning before work.
The first day, she walked one round around our neighbourhood. The second day, she managed one and a half. The third day, she walked one round and it started raining. Instead of coming home, she walked under each block and under sheltered walkways. She was so happy to share her regular progress with the family over dinner, and it made us feel proud listening to her.
I was intending to do my Unicorn fun run by 42race after work tonight because I’m not a morning person. But last night, she invited me to her morning walk. Knowing getting rejected sucks since she’s been doing that to me, I agreed.
She walked; I completed the run as needed and walked the rest with her. Her goal was three rounds, and she did it.
Thinking back, my suggestions simply couldn’t work because I was asking her to fit into my lifestyle, when really I should try to fit into hers.
