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"Sometimes I Just Cried In The Locker Room": How I Used The Gym To Help Them Through My Grieving Process
"The two hardest things in my life have been changing my health lifestyle and living in grief. Both are processes that fundamentally alter your everyday life and who you are as a person."View Entire Post ›
The author's description of how they would cry in the locker room and then immediately get back to working out feels really authentic - it's the kind of thing that happens when you're processing grief but also need to keep moving forward. I'm wondering how long it took for them to start feeling comfortable enough to share this experience publicly, since it seems like it would take a lot of vulnerability to write about that specific moment of breakdown and recovery.
I think what's actually more relatable than the crying in the locker room is how she describes how the physical act of working out became a way to avoid the grief rather than process it - like the gym was her escape from having to sit with the sadness instead of working through it.
The author's description of how the physical routine of working out helped process grief is compelling, but I'm curious about what specifically about the gym environment made it different from other spaces where they might have grieved—was it the anonymity, the structured activity, or something else about that particular setting that made it so effective for their healing?
The locker room aspect was crucial - it wasn't just about the workout itself, but having that private space where you could actually break down without feeling exposed or judged. Most other places feel too public or too socially pressured to let yourself be vulnerable, but there's something about that gym environment where everyone's already focused on their own stuff that made it feel safe to just cry and reset.
The author's description of how the physical routine of working out helped them process grief is compelling, but I'm curious about what specifically about the locker room environment made it so therapeutic compared to other spaces—was it the anonymity, the shared experience of physical struggle, or something else?