I am generally regarded by my nearest and dearest, and sometimes by people I meet for the first time, as a stressed
and anxious person. I have learned to
accept this – most of the time. I cope and cope and cope, take on more and more until I get that 'oh oh' feeling, realise I am over stressed and over anxious and have a small-medium meltdown. Occasionally these are witnessed, but usually I have them on my own because that's how stoic copers are meant to be. I never have a nervous breakdown - I prefer to think of them as perfectly calm breakdowns.
Every New Year’s eve, my
New Year’s resolution is to 'be serene'. And every year, I fail miserably at being
able to relax and take things easy. Usually by January 3rd.
The
physical consequences of being a stress bunny is that my body reacts to this by
tightening all the muscles in my neck and shoulders, which builds up to the point
where the referred pain from my neck turns into a migraine headache of massive
proportion resulting in me taking handfuls of large pills, usually downed with
alcohol in an attempt to get away from the pain.
I have tried many things over the
years to learn how to relax. I once went
to a relaxation class and had such a bad panic attack when my body actually
started to go into relaxation mode that I had to run away and never go back.
I have tried acupuncture, massage,
meditation and a variety of other things, but the simple fact of the matter is
this is who I am, and I generally just have to try and deal with it.
A very dear friend of mine came up
with a brilliant suggestion recently of a way I could both relax and stretch
all my muscles so that I would not be 'in so much pain'. 'Have
you tried yoga?' she asked me. I had
in fact tried yoga once a long time ago and enjoyed it. And lost three kilos without much effort. She invited me to go with her to her Bikram
yoga class. I did not know what Bikram
yoga was. She said it was a yoga class
done in a room heated to 37°; the
theory being that the heat in the room allows you to stretch muscles more. Seriously, another problem of mine is that if
I decide to take something on, I generally take on the most difficult way of
doing something to prove I can do it. So
Bikram yoga it was.
I bought my special yoga mat, dressed
in specially purchased yoga pants and crop top and took my water bottle with me. In hindsight, I should have taken three water
bottles with me.
I went in with my friend, who
explained to the person at the counter that I was new and was just wanting to
try out the class casually that first time. I was smiled at beatifically, in that 'I'm a relaxed yoga aficionado' kind of way. I noticed an odd smell and mentioned this to her. She said that is one of the downsides of yoga
being done in, effectively, a sauna, was that people sweated a lot, and that
the room was carpeted, so it did smell of body odour and sweat. 'But
you get used to it' she said.
Great. So into the room we
went. It was so hot. I thought I was going to faint even before
the class started. Just from the stench alone. However, I am not a
quitter. I am NOT a quitter.
The other thing I did not realise
apart from the smell is that the class went for 90 minutes, not an hour. I took my watch off – I did not want to look at it. I did manage to do the class quite 'easily' for the first 45
minutes. Then my head started to spin. My heart started to race and I thought I was
going to throw up. I looked around at all the seemingly calm, sweating lithe and loose class members who all seemed to be coping just fine, even though half naked and dripping with sweat. Apparently, it is
frowned upon to leave the room during the class as it disturbs other people who are in some sort of sauna zen zone. The instructor was not happy when I put my
hand up to ask if I could leave the room, and indicated that it was best to try
and breathe through the discomfort.
‘Really, would you rather I vomited in here or in the
bathroom?' Subtlety is not one of my strengths, especially when told I can't do something.
I opened the door to leave the room
and the relief of the cool air outside was overwhelming. But I had a brief rest outside the room and
went back in and finished the class. Just. I managed the half moon pose, the awkward pose, camel, rabbit, cobra and locust. The tree, the triangle and the balancing stick pose. Amongst others.
When I came home and got on the
scales, I had lost 600 grams, which I thought was just terrific. Forgetting about my neck pain, I thought it
was worth doing Bikram yoga just for the weight loss benefit. However of course that 600 grams went back on
as I drank my own body weight in water during the course of the rest of the day. Unfortunately, one of the side effects of
Bikram yoga is that because I became so dehydrated after 90 minutes of
exercising in a sauna, I developed a migraine headache in the early afternoon
and was a complete write-off for the rest of the day. Even with the gallons of water after the class.
I rang my friend and said I did not
think Bikram yoga was for me. She asked
me to give it a go one more time, because it was so good and she loved it so
much that she was sure I would learn love it, and it would be SO good for me.
So back I went the next week, with two
bottles of water.
I managed to last the distance
without having to leave the room this time.
That was mainly because the male instructor that week was a very
attractive young man wearing tight red swimming trunks, which as the class progressed
and as he got sweatier and sweatier meant that the contents of his red swimming
trunks were very obvious for all to see – shape,
colour, size and texture.
Where was I? Sorry – I just
got sidetracked.
But once again, after I got home, and
got on the scales and got excited about the immediate weight loss benefits, my
head started pounding, and I was in bed for the rest of the day with a migraine
headache.
So Bikram yoga is not for me. I just have to work on that 'being serene' thing myself. Just as soon as I get through that long list of things to do for other people.
AMFYOYO
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