This topic about the gym has resurfaced my mind a lot more recently. About 2 years ago I was at my all time highest weight and when I saw that, I knew I had to change. So the first thing I did was sign up for a gym membership. However, the creeping thoughts about the gym overcame me and I lost all motivation to go. So, my sister offered to go with me and I felt at ease for a little bit.
Upon entering the gym I noticed the types of people that were working out… skinny. I thought that I didn’t belong there and dreaded going to the gym everyday. However, my sister helped gain some confidence when she told me that “no one is staring at you or anyone else because they are only there for themselves, they only care about their body and that’s it”. This definitely helped me alot and not to worry that someone is watching my every move or my body.
However, even after having this type of semi confidence of the gym, there is still one thing that I haven’t gone near alone, the smith machine. The smith machine is just wayyy out of my comfort zone and makes me feel vulnerable. One of the main issues with this situation is that the gym I go to only has about 3-4 working smith machines so everyone is usually fighting for them. This also makes me think that they are staring at me to finish up if I was to ever go on it. Even if I do get the confidence to go on the machine alone I don’t know how to use it at all and as someone who is big it seems very intimidating to ask someone. Recently though, my best friend from high school who regularly uses the machine let me try it out without any judgment. I appreciate her a lot as she recognized my concerns and without a second thought took me and taught me how to use it. She also said “no one cares about you, they are only there for themselves”. This once again reassured me but I still have that thought of people judging my body cross my mind all the time.
In today’s society I believe there is a set standard for how women are supposed to look which is skinny and fit. So when someone who is big tries to engage in any type of physical activity it seems like there is an awkward air around them. This reminds me of Young, “Throwing Like a Girl “ article where it says “ Women often approach a physical engagement with things with timidity, uncertainty, and hesitancy”. I related to this so much because sometimes I think and wonder to myself if my body is actually able to go to the gym. Slowly but surely I believe that I will be able to build the confidence to go to the gym alone and use any machine there without thinking that I am being stared at or if my body is made for the gym.
Unruly Bodies 
I used to hate going to public gyms. I would always compare myself to the other people there. They were skinnier or stronger, and I just felt out of place. But the more I went there the more I realized that no one really cares who else is there. Even now I’ll find myself feeling insecure, but I just have to remind myself that we are all there for the same purpose and no ones actually looking at me. I hope you gain the confidence to use any machine you want!
I completely understand your feelings of being uncomfortable and timid at the gym. I feel like as women we have to fit a standard of what our bodies should look like, and the gym is a common place that we go to fit this standard. For women we are constantly criticized and for me personally when I am at the gym, I feel vulnerable, so being vulnerable and criticized it and uncomfortable feeling. For me when it comes to approaching situations, especially physical, the fear of doing something with people watching and doing it wrong and getting embarrassed or uncomfortable does steer me away from certain activities, where this can be different for men because they are not as harshly criticized.
Hi, I really appreciate your post and it something I used to think about a lot when doing any type of physical activity including the gym. When I used to go running in the mornings I initially had a lot of anxiety about running where other people and drive or walk past me. Then I just did it and loved it and honestly I loved how I looked but once I began to gain wait it wasn’t something I wanted to do publicly. Similarly, I love working out in the gym. Especially when I can go very early in the morning when there are very few people if any. I used to wake up early so I could get in the gym between 3-4 AM and that was the time when I was most consistent. I told myself and others that that was mostly because that meant I would have the whole space to myself but I know that it’s really because I don’t want people looking at me. Since it hasn’t been feasible for me to go very early in the morning for like the past year I haven’t gone even though I technically could go later.
I hope for both of us that we create a different relationship with exercising/moving our bodies that is based on how we hope to feel inside rather than what we want to look like. I believe this will help us really understand that we have bodies for the gym because our bodies made it to the gym. Period.
It definitely takes a lot of courage to go to the gym, so good job! Although I can never relate to your situation entirely since we all have different lived experiences, I can relate to being intimidated by the gym. I remember the first time I stepped foot in the RAC, I didn’t think I would go back. I was also paranoid that everyone was staring at me so I always talked myself out of going. But, just like your friend and sister said, the people there are usually focused on themselves and their own journeys. This reminded me of the concept “inhibited intentionality” because certain genders (such as women) are capable of using the machinery and doing the exercises at the gym but are limited by the norms and stigmas set forth by society. This leads me to think: are there very inclusive gyms out there?
Hi, there, I think this is a really important topic. I have always been very skinny, and my identity was very much shaped around that. Because of this and a lot of other micro, mezzo, and macro factors (especially ballet) that caused me to have an eating disorder for about 4 or 5 years. It got to the point where I was able to see myself more clearly and the pendulum swung the other way; I was disgusted with how skinny I was.
Around a year ago, I started going to the gym. At first I was really nervous, first because I was worried it might be unhealthy for my recovering eating disorder. Then, I was nervous because I thought people would judge me and look at me. And this is with me being skinny, which is what a lot of people unfortunately desire to be. I couldn’t imagine the anxiety I would feel if I went to the gym for the first time as a bigger person surrounded by skinny people. I go to the gym to bulk, and that includes lifting weights. With lifting weights, this brings the aspect of gender into play. This gave me even more anxiety because I was very skinny, lifting weights, and taking up in a space dominated by men. Needless to say, lifting weights and going to the gym has helped me to work through the anxiety I have, build confidence in myself and my body, and taking up space especially around men.
Anyway, a couple months ago I was doing step ups on the smith machine (with my headphones in) and a man came up to me and corrected me telling me to keep my eyes up…. I’ve always seen things on tiktok about men coming up to women while they are working out and trying to correct them (the audacity). I was thinking about saying something and I got really nervous, especially because he was an older, visibly strong man. But I decided I should say something, because it really pissed me off. I told him that I appreciated his advice but in the future he should ask if someone wants to be corrected before saying something. I mentioned how I had been in the gym for long enough to have confidence, but if it were my first day at the gym I would be so embarrassed and probably just leave. And thinking about my body versus a bigger body, if it makes me feel bad, I’m sure it would make other women feel bad especially if they are self conscious because they are bigger.
Thanks for your story I really connected to the part about feeling like everyone is watching you.
I go to my college’s gym, and it is crowded. Every machine has someone waiting to use it. It wasn’t crowded over the summer, so I went a lot more, but now? NEVER. I refuse to use that gym even tho it’s free for students. I felt so self conscious. It feels like everyone is fit and those who don’t look physically fit seem to have infinite stamina. I feel like a pig in the lion’s den, so I stopped going.
But now I’m not working out at all and I feel so much weaker. I love feeling strong and powerful and in order to keep that up it feels like you can’t miss a single day. I’m trying to find a workout buddy right now. Hopefully I can either go back, or more likely find a new gym that is less crowded.
I really resonated with this post because I myself, as a thicker black woman avoided the gym like a plague. I think a lot of people don’t realize the gym has a privileged connotation to it. Most the people introduced to me through television and media were skinny white women who’s implicitly had a decade membership to their home gym. Not only economically unreachable, but like you said the gym bro persona did not fit my image in any way shape or form, so I empathize.
Very relatable. Modern media takes great pains to make good health and a small body synonymous in order to maintain a culture of consumerism, but even knowing that, spaces with a focus on the “ideal” body can be very disheartening. I myself have always been warded away from going to a proper gym because there’s always the strange feeling that even though it’s fundamentally a place where everyone is working on their body, everyone else always seems to already have reached a different strata of fitness, and I feel like I’m in the way, or intruding. I’m happy to see that you’ve worked towards comfortability in the space though, even if the one machine seems elusive.