FitBit wanker

I've joined the cult of FitBit TW: fitness, weight management

Here’s a photo of me with a pony, because why not?

I’ve never had to put a trigger warning on a piece of writing before, but with a heavy January warning, this week’s piece is about fitness and weight management. Don’t worry, this isn’t a How To guide or a calorie counter by any means, it’s just a piece about staying active when you are in a wheelchair.

The fresh slate that people usually follow in January is one that wipe clean in September. A Virgo, and mentally shackled to the Back to School campaign forever, September is my time to plan ahead. Most of my reflecting happens then, as well as my most drastic haircuts. I have always found January and February the hardest months of the year, with everybody hunkering down and staying on their best behaviour, when I’m already four or five months into a new outlook, a clean page, a fresh outlook, and roaring to go.

This year, I am truly embodying the spirit of January. Last week I went for a walk in Glendalough with pals, followed by a roast in mine - the sheer gall of it all. I even set up a walking WhatsApp group, I a lady who hates WhatsApp groups, planning this weekend’s excursion and congratulatory brunch. Taking to the lakes of Wicklow isn’t my worst crime; I got a FitBit, and I’m treating its instructions as gospel.

Fitness apps, I thought, were not for me. Not out of fitness snobbery, or an earthy belief that if you’re sweating, it’s working, but because of my wheelchair. Whenever the step counter is active on my phone, I get so frustrated that it doesn’t recognise the motions of pushing a wheelchair. 5KM runs are marked as 11 steps, walks in and out of town, totalling nearing 7KM, swept aside as 35 steps. None of it makes sense; I am active, but up until now, I could never tell how much good it was doing.

Fitness for most disabled people is a self-taught thing. I was left out of PE classes in school by my teacher, so my base-level knowledge of exercise and health was non-existent until recently. On crutches, I burned a lot of energy. Every day was a marathon of sorts, but when I became a wheelchair user, I covered more ground than before, but I had this ill-conceived notion that I was more restricted, sitting still.