A Tale of Two Yoga Classes

My health woes have been well documented on the blog, so when the secret shopping company that employs me asked me to become one of the regular shoppers to do 'member' visits to a health club chain, I was understandably reserved about accepting the assignments. The vascular surgeon has placed me on restrictions (only walking, swimming, biking or NO impact activities), while the neurologist tells me that I can't lift more than 10 pounds.

Do you see the potential issues with these restrictions and participating in a health club?

It's not that I don't want to be fit, because honestly, I hate how much I hurt most of the time and think that being in better shape might improve at least some of the aches and pains. So, with that in mind, I accepted the request after my boss and I discussed this concern.

Over the past few months, I've been able to do several shops, but the classes best geared for me meet while I'm at work. However, they offer yoga classes at night and on the weekends, in between the zumba and maximum impact aerobic activities. So, I've now attended two yoga classes.

The first one was good. I was able to keep up, and I did about 95% of everything the instructor asked in that class. The next day, though, I was really sore and the way to improve it was to move gently, as if I was transitioning yoga poses. It wasn't until after the class that I learned it's okay to modify the workout to your needs.

So, I went into this one knowing it. Different location, different instructor and it seems that a weekend class (as opposed to the weeknight one last time) is full of more hard-core yoga enthusiasts (is that an oxymoron?) and this meant it was much more intense in the exercises presented.

But I knew the idea is to get moving, not to duplicate what the instructor did. Because today, there is NO way I would have done what she done without a visit to the ER afterwards. So, I modified. I cannot do downward dog because it stresses the feet and shoulder, so I did a cow. And so on. I got through the hour without breaking a sweat, without adding to the pain I've had this week and feeling that I did work all the muscle groups intended.

I just wish this location wasn't the furthest one from my house that they ask me to visit, because this instructor? I want to continue with her and see how close to those moves I can actually get with regular attendance.

That's pretty impressive. So is the fact that 8 hours later, I am not even the tiniest bit sore from the class. We'll ignore the knot in my shoulder that was there well before I walked into the classroom...