Trapped in a Crossfit Bathroom: Tight Nikes To Blame

I know, I haven’t updated this blog in a month or more. It’s been busy, to be fair, but that’s no excuse. I will try and do better. Here’s what’s up in the Crossfit department, should you care.

I am currently sitting on my couch with pneumonia perseverating on how many days I have missed at the gym. Not because I’m sad to have ruined my streak, but because I am terrified to go back. Of course, I will. There is no doubt, because I want that good-brain feeling that place hands out like candy; but it’s still scary because missing a week of working out makes me wonder if I will be brought back to my early days at the gym when, after a workout, my body hurt, my hair hurt, my goddamn blood hurt. I can’t go back there. This is how they get you, you see. You can never stop, because those days are too terrifying. Anyway, enough of that, I’ll get better and go back and that’ll be that. 

I'm really here to tell you a gym story; a gym story that is almost too terrifying to be real. And be warned, it could happen to you, too!

It was early summer, and I had been going to the gym for enough months that I felt a small bit of confidence when walking in the door. Confidence insofar as I didn’t need to run to the whiteboard and check for burpee box jump overs before I even put my sneakers on, nothing too crazy.

It was a particularly warm Saturday in June, when Alex and I showed up for the weekly partner WOD (workout of the Day). He regularly partners with me, even though we are at far different fitness levels. In fact, fitness levels matter very little to anyone at our gym, as anyone would happily partner with anyone else. It’s kind of remarkable in that way. But that’s neither here nor there, because on this day, I was feeling strong and ready to show Alex that I could keep up to him, or at least relatively, and I was even wearing brand new NIKE workout tights, and they were a full size down from the month earlier. A good friend of mine mentioned that if I got my tights a bit small, I wouldn’t feel so jiggly during those times when we have to run as part of our workout. Now, this little tidbit of advice is key to this story, and the reason I won’t name that sweet, good-intentioned friend.

Now, let’s cut to the workout. It’s your typical burpees, followed by squats, followed by wall balls, followed by running outside of the gym, and on and on. When it comes to running, I struggle, mostly because of the pain in my knees from carrying so much extra weight. So, Alex and I have a system. He runs the prescribed 200 or 400 or 800 meters and I run until I see him turn to come back and then I turn to come back and we typically end up back at the gym together. It’s how I scale running and it works for me. Now, after the third or fourth run, another friend, who shall not be named, happened in the parking lot where we were running and yelled out to me “Go Shanell, You’re doing great!” because she is so sweet, as I ran/walked/hobbled back towards the gym struggling for my life. This struck me as funny, so I laughed and therefore peed a little. Since I pee a little almost every workout, (truth hurts), I beelined for the bathroom to finish what I had started. 

I struggled to get those damn Nike tights down to pee because I had been sweating from that proper workout but I finally liberated myself. But then...I couldn’t get those fucking tights back up. I was stuck in the crossfit bathroom (which opens up to the entire gym, by the way) and I couldn’t get my stupid tights back up. Meanwhile, Alex, or so I was told later, thought I had fallen during my run and was busy looking for me. He was worried I had hurt myself, which even as I type this makes me giggle, because I was stuck in the fucking bathroom with my pants down, fully panicking, while he was walking around the gym asking if anyone had seen me. 

I am not gonna lie. I did tear up a little because, as funny as I find this incident now, it was too real in the moment. I imagined peeking my head outside the bathroom door, trying to get Alex’s attention amid the entire gym, and it motivated me to muster all of my strength and deadlift those stupid tights up over my ass. When I was finally successful, I staggered out of the bathroom to find a worried Alex, but we had a workout to finish, so the story would have to wait. 

As you may have guessed, those tights live at the back of my closet now, waiting for the day when they run a bit loose. 

T’il Next Time

P.s. If you like the illustration accompanying this post consider checking out my Etsy shop. Thanks

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