If you have been on my Facebook page today (and if not, friend me now and go check it out) you would have seen my ’smokin’ body’ friend Mandy (and I do mean smokin’ body!) ask me to check out an article.  It was on Time Magazine’s blog and it was about exercise making you more fat.  She wanted my take on the article and you know that’s just asking for trouble!

I am sure everyone thinks that that article is ridiculous–and you know, you would not be too far off!  BUT, on the same hand maybe not.  I am warning you…this is going to be long.  Also, I am going to come from two completly different angles on this article so be prepared to stretch your brains today. 

First point:  I want to always look good naked.  I don’t just want to be thin/skinny/small/whatever.  If you said to me right now, “Jodi, you have two choices 1) thin but with a saggy tummy and an ass that could be mistaken for a sackcloth at an Amish Revival OR 2) big like Queen Latifah but you could lift a small child with one butt cheek”, I would be in a day care right now moving some kids around!  Do you hear me?  I ALWAYS WANT TO LOOK GOOD NAKED.  PERIOD.

So whenever I read these articles I have to laugh.  We want what we want but just don’t want to work for it.  Starve me to be thin but dear God in Heaven–don’t make me work!  OY!  What do you mean I have to work hard?  Sweat?  Oh heck no!  So instead of accepting that the human body was meant to move, exert energy and be active, we conduct study after study after study to prove how inactivity is ok or not ok.  Or better yet, we fool ourselves into believing that walking up a flight of stairs to get to our chair–I mean work–is a good substitute for exercise.  The fact of the matter is if you want to “just” lose weight (and muscle tone), then go ahead and just diet…or cut off a limb–whichever is the path of least resistance to you.  But if you want to be beautiful, hot, sexy, healthy and whatever other adjective you can put in there, then get your butt up and grab a kettlebell and work that posterior chain until you can put a cup on it and call it a tabletop!

Looking good naked is hard!  And it is rewarding.  And it separates you from all the other folks out there.  Looking good in clothes is not super easy but it is not as hard as looking good naked.  I do realize that if you are reading this blog, you want to look good naked. 

So no matter how many of these articles people print up, those that are concerned about how they look as a finished product are not going to pay them much mind.  They know.  And those that are looking for an excuse are going to laminate the article and use it as a place mat for their meals.  Know what I’m saying?  To me this is like politics or religion:  your views are not going to be swayed by one article or news piece.  It’s either you get it, or you don’t.  It’s as simple as that.

Now to bend your mind a bit…

Second point:  He’s right.  Yes, you heard me.  He’s right.  I am a perfect example of what he is talking about.  The problem is, he has the mechanism all wrong.  If he keeps up his research he will eventually get it right.

Most of you know me so you know where I am going to go with this.  I am a big girl.  I have no problem telling you that.  In fact, it’s the pink elephant in the room when you meet me.  I am not ashamed of it nor am I intimidated by it.  But I am frustrated as all get up about it at this point in my life.

I was always thin.  I was the girl that couldn’t get pregnant because I didn’t weigh enough.  I actually had to gain 10 pounds to get pregnant with my first child.  I have had to lose weight 2 times in my life:  when I graduated college (what do you mean I will gain weight if I sit in a library from 4pm til midnight 7 days a week eating Snicker’s bars?  Who knew?) and after my second child.  In between those two very brief times in my life I weighed no more than 110 to 115 pounds.  Then I competed. 

Competing brought my body to another level.  I had muscles on my muscles and if I got any leaner you would be able to see the outline of my intestines through my skin.  But just like this article, I was too extreme.  I dieted to the macro, worked out to the very last minute that I could each day and never backed off.   One month after I got off stage for the last time, I let myself gain about 15 pounds to put me at about 10 pounds above my normal skinny weight.  I hung out there for a year but get thisàI never stopped show dieting and didn’t stop working out like a clown.   Instead, I fried myself into a state of fatness gaining 40 pounds in 4+ months with no change in diet and no change in exercise.  And for the first time in my life, I was “fat”.

My fault? Yep!  Cause? Jackass behavior and metabolic disruption.  Plain and simple: I fried my adrenals and depleted my metabolic cup.  Could I have fixed it?  Sure—if I knew then what I know now, yes.  But it took me 4 years to learn that diet and exercise can make you fat if you are not responsible about it.

So this brings me to his shortcomings in the article, and honestly, the short comings of America.  Why do we have to be so SO?  Why must we be just SO far to the right or SO far to the left?  The point that he is bringing up in this article is valid but he did not QUALIFY it.  Instead he SENSATIONALIZED it and made it trivial and silly.  He made it so ridiculous that you cannot see what is really going on here.

Exercise doesn’t make you fat.  EXTREME exercise makes you fat.  Extreme exercise while over-dieting really makes you fat.  Endless deprivation.  No good fat in your diet.  Lack of sleep.  No recovery.  I could go on for days.  But working out and then “rewarding” yourself with a muffin is not even worthy of an article never mind a deep discussion.  No, let’s talk about the REAL deal.  Most women are bingeing and (not always) purging themselves into the land of heaviness.  JUST EXTREME ON ANY END WILL DO IT.

This is now what I am all about:  BALANCE.  Hormonal balance, emotional balance and physical balance that will elicit that beautiful, lookin’-good-naked body to perform on a level it never did before.  Bring on the balance!

Now I am not a “soap box” kind of girl.  I don’t typically champion causes or want everyone to “get fit” because I am.  That’s great for you if you are that way.  I am much more of a sharp wit and would rather sarcasm you into the right way to do things than rah-rah-shish-kum-bah you.  But this is now my new mantra because seriously ladies, I cannot stand to see the look in your eyes when this happens to you.  It’s devastating. 

So just know, this guy is a putz.  His article is too simple and lacks merit.  But the underlying message is real and you need to take heed.  In the mean time, I am going to go try and pick up my 3 ½ year old with my butt cheek because although I am now a big girl, I am tight.  See you at the gym!  WOOP WOOP!