How to stop the bounce…
3 minute read
February 4, 2013, 10:54 PM
Remember back in September when I walked over to get that haircut and then ran back? I realized one thing after that exercise: I could run now. And I could cover some pretty good distance, too! I am, as they say, in pretty decent shape now. A far cry from the little butterball that I was two years ago. I’m also more than 100 pounds smaller than I was two years ago.
When I ran home, I was giving running a spin to see how I liked it. And I did like it. However, one thing has kept me from doing it again since then: the bouncing of a certain part of the body (not that part – nor that one). The problem is my stomach. My stomach has hung over a little bit for a very long time. I don’t remember when it started, but it has. It never hung that low, even though it hangs less than before. But it still hangs over. However, despite having lost around 30% of my original body weight in the last two years, the “spare tire” hasn’t gone away. And when I run, it really starts bouncing around. And I hate that. I don’t like that it’s there, and I hate it even more than it bounces around like it does, since it makes a smacking sound as it moves. I realize that this is probably going into “oversharing” territory here, but you know, I don’t think I’m that special here. I’m sure that other people have had a similar problem. Thus I discuss this in the hopes that someone else will leave a comment below (hint hint) and explain what they did in this same situation. All I can find is information about pregnant women’s stomachs bouncing, and there are two problems with that: I’m not pregnant, and I think I can safely say that I never will be. There is no baby inside of me. Just excess body fat. Then if I use the term “spare tire” to describe it, I get car articles. Big help. Not.
My idea for handling this is in arresting the motion of this bit of flab by strapping it down. Surprisingly, my old radical cheerleading tights don’t work for this purpose. I was hoping that they would. But I tested them out by jogging in place on the balcony, and my stomach still bounced. Drat. I was hoping that spandex alone would do it, but no. I think that part of it is that I wear my pants at navel level. Thus most of the spare tire is below where I wear the waist of my clothing. Maybe that has something to do with it.
Has anyone else successfully arrested the motion of their spare tire before? What did you do? What kind of clothing did you wear or what sort of devices did you use to stop it from bouncing? Is the idea just to wind something around my middle very tightly, or am I going at this all wrong? And what about once I start running? Will it come back out and thus need to be readjusted? Are compression tights or something what I’m after? Will they hold that gut in place? “Gorgeous girdles for everyone”?
I want to have running be an alternative to swimming. Something to do on the weekends and/or on days when I’m not at the pool (I have no intention of changing my four-days-a-week swimming routine). After all, the Matthew Henson Trail is literally steps away from my house, and I’ve never been on it, but want a good reason to go. But I don’t like that bouncing. I find the bouncing feeling annoying, and I find the sound a bit embarrassing. And I think I could run quite a bit. Build some different muscles. Burn some additional calories. You know. And maybe not take three days to recover from it like I did last time I went running.
So your thoughts welcome. Please leave a suggestion below about how to hold the stomach in place.
Categories: Clothing, Recreation/Exercise