Why My New Years' Resolution Isn't to Join Crossfit

Have you ever done something for someone to support them just because you love them?   Stand out in the rain cheering your father the marathoner on.  Maybe you’ve cut your hair a certain way because you know your husband or wife likes it that way, even if you don’t.  Or perhaps you’ve sworn off wearing high heels in the house because it terrifies your dog.  Either way it’s a show of love and support.

I'm single now, but I had a man with whom I lived with for over a decade. I loved and supported my boyfriend all the time (as long as it didn't involve going to a comedy club.)

The no comedy club thing is just sensible. For humans, plopping yourself down into a comedy club chair is like a worm willingly jumping ass first onto the sharp end of a hook and pumping up and down until the barb pops out through the back of its head.

You are bait. If you move, make eye contact, or try to wriggle away towards a drink or the door in a comedy club you'll draw attention to yourself and be eaten alive.

So you sit, unmoving, unlaughing, frozen until you fall over sideways like a fainting goat because breathing was definitely going to draw the attention of the comics on stage. Therefore you chose not to do it.

So I didn't go to comedy clubs for these completely normal reasons.

Instead, to make up for it, I went with my boyfriend to the only place in the world more life threatening than a comedy club. I went to Crossfit.

It didn't kill me. But it almost did.

CrossFit is a community that likes to do things to the extreme.  It’s a method of working out that really just incorporates all the things you used to do in gym class.  Things like jumping rope, chin ups, sit ups and handstands among other things.

The difference between gym class and Crossfit is the vomitting.

CrossFit’s mascot is called Pukie.  This because if you aren’t close to or actually throwing up, you aren’t working out hard enough.  My boyfriend was a Crossfitter.

When he first joined this rope jumping band of lunatics I went with him.  He thought it’d be nice if we did something together.  So I took some classes.   I went to CrossFit exactly twice.

My Crossfit story

After my first Crossfit experience I was so sore my muscles routinely gave out every time I tried to sit on the toilet.  No joke.  I’d get halfway’s sitting down and my legs and stomach muscles would collapse in pain and I’d crash in a heap on the toilet seat.  Then I would wince and say Ow.  

And then I’d spend the next ½ hour trying to stand up again without using my legs.

This is a photo of me 3 days after my first Crossfit workout.  My boyfriend thought taking me for a brisk walk would loosen up my sore muscles.  I had to look for ramps to walk down because I couldn’t physically step off a curb.  I know this because when we first started our walk I tried to step off a 4" sidewalk curb.  And I fell down.

This was his immediately finished a workout Crossfit face. He had just completed a self induced Crossfit workout that involved weights, water, barfing and I remember correctly - a golf club.

The second CrossFit class I took (yes, I went back because I wanted to be loving and supportive) I got a “special instructor” for the “special pupils”.  

 My special instructor was a guy who taught CrossFit on the side.  You know … on his days off from Extreme Fighting.  

Needless to say, class 2 of CrossFit didn’t end any better than the first.  Unless shock is better.  If shock is better then I did much better the second time around because class 2 ended with me going into shock.

Just for a few hours.  I used those hours to contemplate the allure of comedy clubs and the sanity of my then boyfriend.

You see, he too went into shock during his first or second CrossFit class. But he loved shock.  He thought shock was fantastic. The owners of the CrossFit gym made him sit down and drink some juice until the nausea and chills passed.

 He was treated special because of his shock and he liked it.  When I told my “special instructor” I was feeling sick and asked whether people actually threw up while working out his response was Not as many as I’d like, keep goin’.  I didn’t get any juice.

It’s amazing the pain we’ll put ourselves through to support someone we care about. My boyfriend continued on with CrossFit.  He loved it.  And I continued to support him from the couch with a Costco sized bag of Cheezies.

Therefore, on this day, the last day of December 2023, I'd like to announce I will not be putting Crossfit, barfing, or anything that has to potential to put me into shock on my resolution list.

My resolution does however have a little something to do with Costco sized bags of Cheezies - and nothing to do with comedy clubs.