{"id":2317,"date":"2011-09-05T10:23:03","date_gmt":"2011-09-05T17:23:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=2317"},"modified":"2025-11-02T18:02:33","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T01:02:33","slug":"gym-boys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=2317","title":{"rendered":"Gym Boys"},"content":{"rendered":"

I bought a gym membership (at my gym 24 Hr Fitness) for my oldest two boys.\u00a0 The middle one needs it because his habit of being sedentary has put lots of extra pounds on him.\u00a0 And my oldest needs it because he’s a string bean who wants muscles (and he doesn’t know it but his torso is low-muscle-tone and to achieve that goal he’ll need to work hard on that). <\/span><\/p>\n

When we finish, my heavy boy is sooooo happy.\u00a0 He thinks its cuz he’s DONE!\u00a0 I know that may be part of it, but its also the endorphin rush of the work out! Ha!\u00a0 On the opposite scale, when we START my oldest is thrilled, cuz he loves the gym and the goals he thinks he’ll be achieving.\u00a0 His enthusiasm gets compliments from fellow members at the gym.<\/p>\n

The first week of this was a challenge.\u00a0 I had to reign in my over-enthusiastic oldest son so he wouldn’t try a machine without me guiding him.\u00a0 Last thing I need is for him to give his body a permanent injury out of ignorance!\u00a0 Took two weeks before I could trust I wouldn’t turn around and find him on a machine even I had no idea how to use!<\/p>\n

And I had to push my other boy to make sure he did it correctly without slacking off.\u00a0 Fast little reps that we’re doing him ANY good. \u00a0 Being a mini-training is irritating because I wasn’t getting very much of my OWN workout.<\/p>\n

But after that first month we got it down.\u00a0 Plus my oldest now has practice showering in a gym by himself.\u00a0 Just in time for High School. (YIKES!)\u00a0 And my middle son has learned to change his clothing from work out outfit to clothes in a public area.\u00a0 He’s too terrified & shy to shower at the gym, so he does it later.\u00a0 I’d hoped he’d shower & save me money, but I gave in to his shyness. \u00a0 I did insist he change clothes at the gym.\u00a0 He’ll be doing it soon enough at Middle School… with his mean peers.<\/p>\n

The second month is a breeze.\u00a0 I can tell them we’re doing legs or arms today and they do 3 sets of 4 reps at a hard weight and 30 reps at an easy weight.\u00a0 I instruct them to chose 4 of the 6 leg machines I’ve shown them and run between them getting in my own workout and checking on theirs.\u00a0 I praise them A LOT.\u00a0\u00a0 And push my heavy boy delicately.\u00a0 I have to find the balance between his effort and his shyness.<\/p>\n

Luke doesn’t need excessive cardio so I have him running the treadmill.\u00a0 He likes to run and might be good at track if he can develop his lungs to stick with it and conquer his body’s desire to stop.\u00a0 Last week, I taught him to run without thunking the shit out of the machine!\u00a0 And he did it beautifully.\u00a0 If I can get him into a sport in high school, that he can DO, he’ll make friends.\u00a0 He needs that.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Working it like a slot machine you can ride!<\/p><\/div>\n

Evan finally found his groove next to me on an elliptical machine.\u00a0 Plugging my headphones into the system he cracks up to Regis & Kelly!\u00a0 Before he knows it, he’s worked that machine for 20 minutes and burned 170 calories. \u00a0 I glanced over one time and saw him riding the machine on one side like a roller coaster!<\/p>\n

What he’s not aware of yet is how well this is working.\u00a0 I’m already seeing him able to do heavier weights and do better working his abs.\u00a0 And while he may not actually be losing pounds, he is getting thinner.\u00a0 His clothes fit better AND you can see the change in his face.<\/p>\n

And I’m losing my extra pounds also.\u00a0 \ud83d\ude42 \u00a0 Although that may be due to the fact I’m not eating ICE CREAM every night!\u00a0 Ha!
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I bought a gym membership (at my gym 24 Hr Fitness) for my oldest two boys.\u00a0 The middle one needs it because his habit of being sedentary has put lots of extra pounds on him.\u00a0 And my oldest needs it … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-joy-of-family"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2317"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2317\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2500,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2317\/revisions\/2500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}