RESISTANCE TRAINING = BETTER LIFE

I believe in resistance training for a better life.

Call it a core belief for one and all.

Does everyone benefit from resistance?

Yes they do, but there is resistance out there.

People who do enough already don’t need more to do. At least that’s their story.

They don’t need more until they can’t do what they want to do, what they need to do.

Then what? Here’s what:

 

Eight years ago I started getting the results from resistance training I’d hoped for.

At one time public gyms had headgear you put on that connected to a weight stack.

Move your head around with extra weight to build a thicker neck.

Did I get a thicker neck? I thought so. My wife not so much.

Turns out it wasn’t muscle. It was a lump that, from one check after another, revealed itself as cancer, the BIG C.

It was hard to take the news like it was nothing since the word cancer is drenched in death, but what are you gonna do?

I said to my wife, “Since it’s cancer we have a chance to change history, to push the boundaries of medical science beyond chemo and radiation.”

She told me about some guys in her field who did the same thing, who had the same idea.

They treated themselves.

When the plan to cure the cancer growing in their body failed, they turned to traditional treatment, but the chemo and radiation would be so harsh in their depleted condition that the side effect would be death.

And that’s how I signed up for three rounds of chemo complimented by thirty-five rounds of radiation.

Eight years ago.

I started near inauguration day, January, 2017. I was nervous.

 

Gym Return Sooner Than Later

I went from this ^^^.

To this:

 

 

It took two months.

I returned to the gym on a rebuilding program like never before that felt like I was reclaiming my vitality and life force through resistance training.

One day I loaded the bench rack with the plates I’d use going up the ladder and back down when a young knock-kneed fat fuck came over and removed some plates he wanted to use.

He smiled and said, “You don’t need these. You’ll never be as strong as you were.”

I was focused on the task at hand, had plenty of other weights, and didn’t take the time to deal with that rude boy.

He wasn’t wrong, but that’s not what you tell someone just off the cancer wagon.

A lady came to me, middle-aged, worried looking, and said, “I’d like you to talk to my husband. He just found out he has what you had.”

This is what to say to someone coming off cancer treatment, and in that moment I became a cancer counselor.

Without further clarification or question I said, “Send him over.”

 

Me: Here’s the plan: you get that cancer cured and tell your wife everything is fine. You’ll be lying, though. Have you ever lied to your wife? No? Good. You may feel like death warmed over, but tell your wife you feel fine, otherwise you’ll have her so worked up she may have a breakdown. Ok? Now, wave your wife over.

Man: Okay.

Wife: Thank you.

Me: He’s going to get treated and come through in great shape. That’s what he’s going to tell you, right?

Wife: Right.

Me: He’ll be lying and you’ll believe it. Right?

Lady: Right.

 

That’s all there is to it at the core.

Once you work out your response with your loved one the cancer team can get to work and you won’t freakout, your loved ones won’t freakout, and you’ll have the freedom to face your own sense of mortality without distractions.

 

From Resistance Training To Better Life

My dad was a Marine, a Korean War Marine.

He was a Marine other Marines wanted to be.

I never understood what that meant until I joined the Army and met a Marine vet who came back from Vietnam, tried normal life, and decided the Army life was the life for him.

He was no different than the odd assortment of goofballs joining the first wave of the all-volunteer Army. Or so I thought.

That he was older than nineteen didn’t matter. We had one guy who was thirty-four.

But the drill sergeants recognized something with the former Marine.

Maybe they read his file and realized he could chew them up and spit them out?

They treated him with a sense of reverence that no one else got.

In short time he was gone, transferred because he was prior service and didn’t need more boot camp.

 

Marching Onward With Shared History 

I asked my dad about his time in Korea once.

 

Me: Did you guys ever get prisoners?

Dad: All the time. We’d bring them back and hand them over to others who took them to the rear.

Me: Were they bad guys?

Dad: Some of them didn’t want to be there at all and were glad to be captured. Some weren’t.

Me: What happened?

Dad: We handed prisoners over to a man who supervised the transfer to the rear. We learned some of them didn’t make it, that they tried to escape and got shot.

Me: Oh no.

Dad: When we asked him about it he thought it was funny we cared. We brought in one kid who even spoke English. Friendly and cooperative. We liked him. We told the transfer man if he didn’t make it to the rear we’d come looking for him.

Me: What happened?

Dad: I don’t know. We checked on the kid later but never saw the transfer man again. Strange things happen in war.

Me: That sounds about right.

Dad: When we weren’t running ridges, we went through towns. The regular way was to walk along the block of buildings to the end and stick your weapon around the corner for a burst before taking a look. One time I took a look first. One time. It was a feeling. I saw a woman with two babies standing in the middle of the street.

Me: Their lucky day.

Dad: And mine.

 

Who doesn’t love a lucky day?

This Saturday’s People’s March feels like a lucky day.

I’m feeling lucky. How ’bout you?

 

If you believe that decisions about your body should remain yours, that books belong in libraries, not on bonfires, that healthcare is a right, not a privilege for the wealthy; if you believe in the power of free speech and protest to sustain democracy; or if you want an economy that works for the people who power it—then this march is for you.