Rah rah girl power

Yesterday I said the only movie I'd liked recently was The Departed, but I thought of another one: Casino Royale. What? Try finding anything to criticize about a movie screen-sized Daniel Craig. Yum. Anyway, I bring this up because I just found out about The New Republic's Oscar blog, which is super cool, even if you haven't seen the movies. Well, if you like reading about movies. Which I do.

So a couple years back when I was having my quarter-life crisis, I decided to quit my job and take the summer off before I started the new one. I decided I needed to learn how to rest. How self-indulgent of me! But really, I was coming off the second-worst anxiety meltdown in the history of me and was confronting the astonishing and miserable fact that I hopeless at identifying stress. Okay, I'll spare you the details lest this start sounding like a self-help book testimony or something, but I realized that if I were better at noticing what things were about to or already making me tense, I could, you know, possibly prevent future krazy person anxiety meltdowns. What a concept!

I quit my job, immediately eliminating an enormous section of daily suckitude. Faced with a blissfully empty summer, I tried to think of what would provide structure, but restful structure. Something to hang my day around. And I came up with (dum dum dum) YOGA. Specifically, yoga at 6 am, three days a week. HEE. This is HILARIOUS.

It's hilarious because, while I ran my fair share of suicides and layup drills and full court presses in high school, I am not much of an athlete. I do not like to exert myself in any way. I do not go hiking, I do not ride a bike, I do not play community sports, I do not even vacuum. (This is Phillip's job. Seriously, people. And God bless the Roomba.) The most I do is walk around the lake, preferably with an ice cream cone or a latte, depending on the season. And here I was signing up for yoga THREE DAYS A WEEK. 

But I went. I bought myself some cute yoga pants and told myself not to snicker at any new-agey vocabulary and actually went to yoga, three days a week, at six in the morning. The first week nearly killed me, but I kept going. The teacher wasn't as new-agey as I assumed yoga teachers to be and I was finding the breathing exercises really helpful. And every time I had to stick my legs up in the air and hold the pose, I knew all the shaking meant I was probably doing something good for me. No pain, no gain!

Then the class ended and I started a new job and I haven't had the time (or inclination, to be honest) to try yoga again. Until now. DUM DUM DUM! I found a naive pregnant friend to drag along to my old yoga studio's Thursday night prenatal classes. I haven't been getting enough exercise lately and I hear that labor is, ah, a lot of work. I sort of recalled enjoying my yoga classes, even if they kicked my butt, so I talked my friend into it, paid my money and last night found myself sitting in a circle with a dozen other pregnant women "centering" ourselves.

It was AWESOME.

We ranged from 13 to 38 weeks (and my God, the 38-weeker was the tiniest girl in the world; she looked like a seventh grader who'd swallowed a basketball.) As we went around the circle sharing our names and how far along we were, a lot of the girls there were saying how emotional they've been, how worried they are, how they need to calm down and breathe. And the teacher nodded her head sympathetically saying that we have enough hormones for 100 birth control pills swishing around inside our bodies right now. IS THAT EVEN TRUE?

We started our "practice" and pretty soon I was breathing hard and willing my legs to stop shaking, all the while noticing that the 38-weeker next to me was doing the freaking splits, I kid you not. But it wasn't the slightly competitive focused yoga I tried before, it was girly. It was very... sisterhoodish. Like we were all there because it got us away from office desks and dirty dishes and two-year-olds, all of us following the cheerful calming voice of our encouraging den mother. I didn't feel like anyone was checking me out to see if I'd done this before or how well I could balance, I wasn't even too mortified when the teacher had to come over and physically move my knees into the right place. There was even giggling- in the middle of yoga!- when one of the girls couldn't seem to maneuver around her belly.

I'm not much for the sisterhood. Bridal showers make me uncomfortable, I've never really liked all-women bible studies or even just hanging out with groups of more than two or three girls. (Unless I've planned it, of course. I am that big a control freak.) And the baby shower my friends are giving me is going to be co-ed, not least because all my friends are Phillips' friends, but it will save me the mortification of sitting around with a group of girls talking about breast pumps.

But there was something about this yoga class that was so refreshing and, dare I say it, empowering. Most of my friends have already had their first babies and it was just sort of exciting to sit with a group of (mostly) first-timers and experience the same things all at once. Or to say, "I'm crying for no reason!" or "My sciatica is starting to act up!" and have everyone know exactly what you're talking about. The teacher was incredibly supportive of whatever we wanted and needed ("Feel free to get up in the middle of your practice and use the restroom!" "Is it too hot in here? Should we open the doors?") and so excited about everybody's babies. While I'd rather eat glass than join a sorority, I don't think I'd mind an hour once a week.

It was like reading all your favorite blogs, or reading emails from the girls in your forum- IN PERSON. I am so going back next Thursday. My butt totally hurt when I left, but I was in the best mood I've had for a long time.

Comments

[karianne]

I'm so glad for you. You will need this even more (the sisterhood) after the baby is born. Your mind turns to mush, but you come up with all of these crazy questions.

I did yoga once a week while pregnant with Ivy during my second trimester and the peacefulness of it was the reason I went back. Those nights, I slept like a dream which is very unusual for me.

[Katie Ann]

Yay! Stress release is always a good thing, I'm glad you loved it!

[Angela]

My prayer is that when I become pregnant someday, I will be described as looking like a 7th grader who swallowed a basketball.