My Most Embarrassing Fitness Moment: Erin vs. A Massive Cliff in the Sidewalk
Sidewalks seem innocent but can be treacherous! Credit: madmolecule
For this edition of Question of the Week, each FBG is recounting her most embarrassing moment when it comes to working out. Buckle up…these should be fun!
I’m so unbelievably clumsy that it’s a little crazy that I don’t have a list of crazy fitness mishaps and embarrassing fitness moments that’s at least a mile long. Seriously. I run into a door jamb with my shoulder at least once a day. I fall down—or up—stairs on a fairly regular basis, and I’ve been known to spill coffee on brand-new furniture. It’s just how I roll. “I about bit it” is one of my catch phrases.
The clumsy kind of trouble just finds me. In high school when I was a cheerleader, I clocked a basketball referee in the head with a poster I was trying to throw to fans in the bleachers. I got pegged in the wrist with a foul ball at a softball game of my husband’s. It just picked my wrist out of all of those in the bleachers.
One of my most embarrassing moments in fitness has actually been documented here already. I went to an intermediate/advanced level group exercise class and knew immediately I was in over my head. The class description was way off base, as I found out the moment class got underway. I can only compare it to taking a calculus test when the only math you’ve had was in elementary school—the choreography was that advanced. My face was red the whole time both from intensity and the embarrassment. But I stuck it out, and switched to the beginner class that week. That class remains my all-time favorite, even topping Zumba.
My most recent fitness mishap though occurred toward the end of my first pregnancy. My neighborhood is super walkable, yes, but some of the sidewalks are most unfriendly. You see where this is going. (And it should come as no surprise that Jenn and I share similar moments.) Well, pregnant me hits what can only be described as a cliff in the sidewalk, and I went flying. It was one of those falls where you step out as far and with the largest steps you can manage in order to save yourself, while your arms are flailing.
I made it several awkward lunge-steps down the sidewalk and thought for a second that I was going to recover. Unfortunately, I was unable to save myself, and in protecting myself from falling on my stomach or knees, landed full force on my hands. Oh, the scrape-age. Mortified, I looked around for witnesses, because that’s what you do when you fall. Luckily there were none; I am still thankful that no one was driving by. Because one thing that draws more embarrassing unwanted attention to a fall is a pregnant belly. In the state I was in physically, my ego couldn’t have taken more bruising. But it was a good reminder to watch my step at all times around my “walkable” neighborhood.
Can you join Jenn and me in the fun fall club? —Erin