Bodybuilding helped lift my spirits
From the Globe and Mail:
When a couple of guys at the gym suggested last year that I train for a bodybuilding competition, I laughed. I was 48 years old. It was ridiculous. Of course, I had to do it. I couldn’t walk away from such a challenge. To give up without trying would have been self-defeating. I hired a trainer, Vicki, a tough young woman. We talked about a schedule and a diet. “Nutrition is 90 per cent of bodybuilding” is a bodybuilder’s mantra. I kind of liked the diet, so that wasn’t a huge problem.
What really concerned me was my missing left breast, lost to cancer when I was 40. I wear a small, soft prosthesis on the street, but at the gym I am just me. One of the things I love about the gym is that I feel completely at ease there, such as I am. And completely accepted. But to stand on a stage in a minuscule bikini for the bodybuilding competition was a daunting prospect.