Being a person who is good at getting things done is part of my identity.
And yet lately, I’ve been struggling. Not with everything. In the world of fitness, I’m struggling with one very specific, very small thing: doing my daily mobility routine. The routine includes exercises to improve my hiatal hernia, hip mobility movements, and some stretching to maintain the range of motion I worked so hard to get after knee replacement surgery.
I’ve got three different 10-minute routines–one done lying on my yoga mat or in bed, one to be done with a chair, either seated or standing holding the chair for support, and a flow version for when I’m feeling extra good.
My plan is always to do them in the morning. In theory, I’ve got time between when I take mediation and when I can eat breakfast. There’s supposed to be a full hour there! And yet…sometimes between Wordle, and drafting my #ThreeGoodThings and “Hey, Google please play the CBC news” and similarly “Hey, Googling” the weather in Guelph today and showering and putting on coffee and thinking about breakfast and lunch…well, you get the idea.
I’ve written about my 5 to 9 routine here before and admitted that really for me, given my work schedule, it’s more like 5-7 am and I listed some options for what I might do in that time. The options were write, walk Cheddar, ride my bike, or my physio/mobility routine. And yet I’ve mostly managed to do none of those things in the 5 to 7 am time slot! It’s all Wordle, scrolling and going back to sleep. To be fair, that’s also when I share our blog posts to social media, which WordPress won’t do automatically anymore.
I said “mostly” because the week gets a great kick off with all my Monday morning energy going into the Herd’s Morning Morning Coffee Crew ride. And Tuesdays and Thursdays we’re at the gym at 7. The mobility routine has to happen first, before these things. And it’s just 10 minutes.
I could do it while the coffee drips! Actually, that’s not a bad idea. I might try it.
Do you have a small thing you struggle to do? What techniques have worked for you to just get it done? I’m listening….
I’ve been in physical therapy for a recurrence of sciatica since late July. I’d had pain and weakness in my right hip since May, causing me problems climbing stairs and pain that would wake me up at night. Blech!
Once I finally acknowledged that yes, I needed some help, and got started with a supervised twice-a-week plan, plus at-home exercises, I felt relieved. Relieved that I had a structured plan for dealing with the pain and getting stronger, and also relieved that I could leave this plan up to the professionals (thanks, Julian and Louis!), who would guide me through a process of healing and rebuilding my muscles and getting needed functionality back. Ahhh…
Starting with stretching exercises and some easy strength-building (e.g. bridge, clamshells), I moved on to a full array of hip machine exercises, leg presses, balance activities, farmer’s carry, and stair climbing with dumbells on one side. It’s been gratifying to see and feel my strength increase and pain decrease. Yay!
My classes are all on the second floor of one of the campus buildings, with extra stairs to get into the building. I’ve really not enjoyed waiting for the super-slow elevator to take me to my floor, but it was necessary. Until the past couple of weeks. I’m now taking all the stairs, and my strength has increased so I don’t need to rely on the stair railing to offset weakness in my hip. Yesss!
I knew it was coming, so I wasn’t surprised when I got a call from the PT practice to say I didn’t need twice-a-week sessions anymore. I’ll go once a week for the next few weeks to transition to discharge. This means they think I’m recovered enough to maintain my newly-regained strength and flexibility on my own. Uh, yay?
I mean, here’s the thing: I know I should be feeling like this:
This lamb is feeling it. Thanks, Jonathan Mabey from Unsplash.
And I am. It means I’m pretty recovered and functional. I’ll have 4 more hours back for my week. I won’t be paying $40 in co-pays each week. I’ll be climbing stairs to beat the band!
But I also I feel a little like this:
This woman is also not completely sure about the plan. Thanks Simon Abel for Unsplash.
What am I worried about? I’m worried about the challenge of keeping up my fitness maintenance without the help of the PT bros, who I’ve come to like and respect and depend on. Now I have to depend on, well, me. Hence the worried face.
The good news is that my gym has all the machines I need and is a mile from my house. I also know what to do, and in fact like the experience of the weight work and strength training. And, I can bring a friend to my gym for free on the weekends, so I can enlist help in getting there.
And yet.
I’m almost at that transition point– not yet finished with PT, not yet into a regular gym routine. So that’s my next challenge: get to the the one-mile-away-from-my-house gym to do those exercises without the guidance of physical therapists, but instead with the company of other exercisers, including friends.
Maintaining strength, flexibility and functional fitness is really important to me. And it doesn’t always come easy. It’ll take some adjustment, just like twice-a-week PT and at-home exercises did. I’ll report back in a month to let you know how things are going.
Dear readers, what have your experiences of transition from PT/physio to maintenance exercise been like? I’d love to hear what’s worked for you.
I have written About this before. So has Sam, multiple times, all the way back to 2018. Our focus was on bikes more generally and how they can help with disabilities, but three years ago I predicted an e-bike would be in my future. It was and I love it.
However, it was out of service for nearly a year with some sort of electrical issue. I hadn’t worried about it over the winter. But then I had to take it to Toronto for repair, only getting it back when my son brought it with him for Thanksgiving,
Meanwhile, my knees have been sufficiently sore that I didn’t feel like biking much this year. Plus I’m still nervous about biking too hard or too long with my heart murmur. And I have needed my car much more because I combine work with errands involving hauling stuff, or visiting my mom who lives almost 30 km away.
Getting the e-bike back felt like a gift, especially when two swimming friends invited me for a little ride. One cycles everywhere and the other does triathlons. Did I mention I have barely ridden in a year?
I didn’t have to worry about keeping up or overdoing it; the little boost from my battery was just enough.
Me with my e-bike, along with Florence and Sumiko, enjoying a glorious late afternoon near the Ottawa River.
We rode for a little over 20 kilometres, with frequent stops to admire the views on both sides of the Ottawa and Gatineau rivers. And of course there was ice cream.
Me in a bright blue shirt, enjoying an ice cream cone It was a locally-made green apple flavour.
Way back when, BTB (“Before The Blog”), I hurt my back pretty badly. First, there was a fall when skiing. Then, there was the Australian beach crash. I talk about the beach incident here. For years after those accidents I put my back out doing simple things like taking off my cycling shoes or sitting too long at my desk.
All of that prompted me to get a standing desk and I’ve used one at work for more than a dozen years.
So for the past bunch of years, since moving to Guelph, I haven’t had very many back issues. I figured I’d solved that problem.
Until last week.
After three days of bike riding, followed by hot yoga, and then weight training, I spent way too much time sitting at my desk. I was tired and somehow never moved my desk to the standing position.
I followed the very long sitting at my desk day with a night at the movie theatre. When I got up from the movie theatre seat, there was that horrible low back pain that I know so well from the past.
The next day I was okay sitting, and okay standing, but moving between those positions was very painful.
I thought, in that doomy and pessimistic way that gets us all sometime especially in this political climate, that that was it. My back would just hurt forever.
Sarah nagged me into stretching. And I ordered a new set of yoga balls to use on my back when I’m sitting.
Things are getting a bit easier in my brain and in my muscles and while it’s tempting to jump back into my regular routine, I am determined not to fall into that trap.
Instead, I am working bit by bit on creating more ease for myself in my day to day actions.
And, like the title says, creating ease isn’t easy.
This ease was actually fairly easy to create. Image description: a drawing of the word ‘ease.’ Each letter is capitalized and is a different colour (blue, yellow, purple, dark pink) and the background is all kind of overlapping sets of concentric circles.
Creating ease means doing gentle yoga and stretches, breathing deeply, relaxing when and how I can and, it means spending a lot of time and energy paying close attention to how I am moving, how I am sitting, how I work, and how I do a variety of tasks.
My ADHD brain is ok with the first few things but it is not a fan of the latter part of that list – in fact, even the thought of paying that kind of attention to those details is tiring.
But I do want to feel better. And I know that unless I make some adjustments, it’s going to be a) harder for my neck/back/shoulders to heal and b) I’m going to keep having some of the same issues over and over.
Right now, I am working on two things that I hope will prevent me from exacerbating my current issues AND will help me avoid some other issues in the future.
Here are my current practices:
1) Getting up and rolling my shoulders/doing a few neck stretches every 20 minutes or so.
I already like to use the repeat timer app throughout my work day so I have a better sense of time passing AND so I don’t feel like any given task is going to take forever. (I have given myself permission to change tasks whenever the timer goes off)
Now, I don’t just note that time is passing, I use the chime as a reminder to move and stretch. It’s not perfect – I sometimes inadvertently ignore the timer – but I definitely have a higher success rate than I would without it.
2) Practicing holding my head differently when I am drawing, writing, and using my phone.
Since a lot of my leisure time is spent doing one of those activities making this change will really help.
Instead of spending so much time with my head down and my neck jutting forward, I am taking Katy Bowman‘s advice about how to hold my neck:
A video called ‘Hold Your Head Better When Using Screens’ from the Nutritious Movement YouTube channel. The still image shows a woman in a purple shirt standing in profile holding a phone in her right hand and holding her left hand up to the back of her neck.
Since I can’t necessarily put my drawing/reading/writing in the same place I would hold a phone, I am also using the same movement to take breaks during my drawing/reading/writing sessions – here’s a demo in this Facebook video of hers from a few years ago.
Between these two movement elements things, the yoga, the massage therapy, and all of the being-careful-but-not-coddling-myself, I am hoping to keep inching towards more ease in my body – especially the muscles of my neck and upper back.
Creating ease isn’t easy but it will be totally worth the effort, right?
Ok, for a change, this is not referring to me taking charge of the meeting or the performance, this is a much more literal situation.
Not completely literal, of course. I am not actually reclaiming floorboards that I once owned. Anyway, let’s carry on!
Have you ever heard the quote, attributed to various writers, about how the goal of writing is to figure out what we already know?
Today’s post is a prime example of that.
I started out writing a post about my Monday morning exercise and then discovered something I hadn’t realized I knew:
I haven’t been spending enough time sitting close to the floor in the past few months and it is having a negative effect on my whole body.
Before our Christmas tree went up in December, my living room floor featured a huge blue exercise mat with a big, green, circular cushion (over 3ft in diameter) on top of it and a bolster cushion on top of that. (Yes, in case you couldn’t guess, my house is much more functional than pretty.)
And, in general, when spending time on the main floor of our house, I would either sit at the kitchen table or I would sit on on the big cushion, the mat, or on the bolster. (Our main floor is pretty open and the living room/kitchen are kind of in an L shape so it’s equally possible to watch tv, hang out, or do whatever in either location.)
I really liked having both options and I found the mat/cushion combo much more interesting than sitting on a couch or chair. (Yes, my ADHD insists that even sitting must be interesting to my brain.)
And when I chose the mat/cushion combo I was always sitting in different positions, at different heights, and either completely relaxing (i.e. lying limbs akimbo like a pile of goo) or doing some stretches/moving around a bit.
Having different resting positions as part of my routine was really good for me.
Not only did it tend to make me aware of which parts of my body needed some extra attention but it also made using a variety of muscles a much more automatic part of my day. It was a low-key use of those muscles but I was still using them.
However, when we put up all the decorations this past Christmas, I put the big cushion and the mat down into the basement hallway to keep the living room from feeling too crowded.
And, unfortunately, I really liked the way the room looked without those things in the middle of the floor so…
Both the mat and the cushion stayed downstairs for ages and I didn’t really think about the things I *wasn’t* doing because they weren’t in their usual spot.
A couple of weeks ago when I was having people over and I wanted an extra place to sit so I dragged the big cushion back to the living room. It didn’t seem to take up as much space without the mat under it so I left it there in the living room.
I quickly noticed that the living room felt more inviting to me and I was choosing to sit on that fairly low cushion instead of on the kitchen chair that I had been defaulting to over the last few months.
It was pretty good for a while, even without the mat, but then Khalee went from occasionally climbing on the cushion to deciding that this circular chummy was actually *hers* instead of mine. So, instead of lying on it for a few minutes here and there, it became her first choice of resting spots in the living room.
Poor KP looks worried in this photo but I think she got her taxes done after. (Ha!) image description: a photo of Khalee, a medium-sized, light-haired dog, curled into a semi-circle on a large green circular cushion with a rectangular bolster cushion (in a blue pillow case decorated with green frogs) behind her. She looks a little worried or sad but not actually in distress.
Now, as much as I love KP, I am allergic to her fur, even with an allergy pill. Thanks to the increased time she was spending on the cushion, my allergies would arise in a fury if I tried sitting on it.*
So, I went back to not using the cushion at all but the fact that it is in the living room keeps drawing my attention. (FYI, the fact that it was behind me when I was exercising this morning actually led to this post.)
And, now that I think of it, my body has been pretty cranky lately and some of that crankiness is definitely related to the fact that I am just not getting that same range of motion and variety of activities/sitting positions in my day-to-day over the past few months.
And that happened because I changed the seating ‘geography’ of my living room
When the cushions and the mat were there, it was an automatic thing for me to choose to sit low to the floor in a variety of ways for part of every day.
Sitting low meant that I was doing a lot of getting up and down from the floor, shifting into different positions, doing a bit of stretching, and just generally not staying in the same spot for a long time.
But, for a while now, I have been mostly staying on the kitchen chair and staying relatively still. (Why aren’t the living room chairs or couch interesting? No idea! It’s a mystery to me, too.)
Right now, in order to comfortably sit low to the floor, I would have to make a conscious choice and move things (and a dog) around and as someone with a busy brain who has trouble prioritizing, it’s pretty hard to choose to do that because there are extra steps involved.
It’s annoyingly easy to get out of the habit of doing things, isn’t it?
I had noticed that my body was cranky but I hadn’t noticed the change in my habits.
What if it had taken me longer to pay attention?
It seems like a really slippery slope to becoming the kind of person who doesn’t get down on the floor at all.
And that, in turn, could be a slippery slope to becoming a person who *can’t* get down on the floor.
I mean, I understand that our mobility changes as we age and that not all movements will continue to be available to me but I sure as hell don’t want to lose any everyday mobility options just because I left a mat in a different room.
So, I have to remove the obstacles between me and my plan to spend more time sitting close to the floor.
I have to move the mat back upstairs.
I have to put the bolster cushion back in the living room.
I have to wash the cover on the big cushion and once its clean, I need to put a blanket over it so most of the dog hair will be on that instead of the cushion cover.
I must retake the floor!
PS – I was singing Was (Not Was)’s Walk the Dinosaur in my head all while I was writing this post. I may open the door, I will get on the floor, but I will probably just walk the dog. I don’t have a harness for a dinosaur.
*And that doesn’t even address the fact that she now considers it her space and will stand there staring at me if I sit on it. Yes, I am a people and she is a dog so I can technically overrule her on the question of cushion ownership but it’s very hard to enjoy sitting cross-legged on the cushion with her staring woefully at me – or worse, poking her nose into my face – from the side. I’ll have to figure something out. 😉
Most online dictionaries describe wiggling as something like “movement from side to side or up and down in short, quick movements.”
My wiggling
I wiggle for reasons ranging from self-care to pain management to fun. I wiggle while in bed after I wake up, to wake up my muscles. Sometimes I like to wiggle right after a shower, waterdrops flying. I have some L4, L5 issues in my back, so I will wiggle to relieve tension and pain, especially after sitting. And of course, I definitely wiggle when I dance.
I’m trying to identify when I wiggle, it led me to think about my body movements that would not be considered wiggling, such as jiggling:
The difference between ‘wiggle’ and ‘jiggle’ is the control had in the movement. If something jiggles it is uncontrolled… how far it moves, which direction etc etc may be constrained, but are essentially random. If something wiggles then the movement is controlled.” (English Language Learners)
While I am fairly sure my wiggling is controlled and therefore not jiggling, I also cannot easily sit still (as my partner often reminds me). My body seems to need to be busy. So, I present many wiggle-adjacent behaviours as well.
My mind is as wiggly as my body. I enjoy wiggling around in topics that pique my curiosity. I pride myself on being able to wiggle out of problems I get myself into. I seem to thrive—physically and mentally—when there is plenty of wiggle room:
Wiggle Room: the freedom or opportunity to do something or to change your mind and do something differently if that is what is needed (Cambridge Dictionary).
Wiggling through this post
When I was first conceiving this post, but my negative inner voice dismissed the idea (too silly, too childish), I knew I needed to find a way to wiggle out of this thinking.
And what better way to do that than to use a generative AI chat bot to think for you? 😉 So here is Copilot on the matter of how wiggling relates to feminism:
Screenshot of Elan asking Copilot how wiggling is a feminist act, and its brief responses.
Copilot doesn’t think. It doesn’t understand it’s own generated text. This last algorithmically predicted suggestion is a word salad. But the first three ideas make sense to me: I see my wiggling as helping me feel free, be in control of my body, and express joy.
Your wiggling
Do you wiggle? Would you consider your wiggling an empowering act? Is it time to get wiggling a little right now?
A child of the 80s and childfree today, The Wiggles, an Australian children’s entertainment group from the 1990s, never made it onto my radar until recently. But I was happy to discover that another fellow blogger, @isekhmet (Christine) knows about The Wiggles!
So, whether you are well-acquainted with this song, or you are just hearing it for the first times (or few dozen times—it gets in your head), here is “Get Ready to Wiggle” by The Wiggles (song lyrics). This is the “OG Wiggles.”
Get Ready to Wiggle by The Wiggles
Get Ready To Wiggle” is the very first song performed by The Wiggles. The song inspired the band’s name because they thought that wiggling described the way children dance.
I have never seen myself as a “gym person.” Long before I developed the chronic disability trifecta of rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia and degenerative disc disease, this was not a place where I felt at home. I have long been uncomfortable with my body – size and type – and being in a gym seemed to be a form of public exposure.
This, it must be admitted, is hypocrisy of the highest order. For most of my career – over 30 years – I have ensured that the universities where I worked held sessions for those who might feel uncomfortable in a communal gym environment. I have run numerous workshops on respecting and honouring all body shapes, sizes and weights. All that time, and I have never admitted this in such a public forum, I have hated how I looked.
At the same time, I was doing numerous rounds of physical therapy, which often seemed indistinguishable from what people might be doing in the gym. I remember working on various pieces of equipment and making this comment. The physio said, “It is exactly what you would do if you were paying for Pilates classes.”
In my first decades, I walked everywhere, and at a rapid pace. My only previous gym membership was to use an indoor track for walking in the winter. In May 2021, I became a dog parent for the first time, to rescue husky Atlas. He gets me walking about 13,000 steps on a weekday (I work from home) and up to 20,000 on the weekends. This has been helpful for my health generally but has also led to several injuries requiring more physical therapy. After the last one – a partially torn rotator cuff caused by slipping on the ice on one of those Atlas walks – I began to wonder whether I should be doing something to strengthen my body.
However, searching for a trainer and gym seemed a scary proposition. Fortunately, before I got far in my search, I saw a Facebook notice from a colleague in another part of my life.
This seemed perfect timing – someone who met all my exacting criteria had space. Without giving myself time to doubt, I made contact. When I asked my rheumatologist if I could try strength and conditioning classes instead of the physical therapy he was recommending for yet another joint issue, he looked somewhat surprised but said as long as I was sure to do stretching beforehand and be careful to stop if there was pain.
So, in September I made my first entrance into a gym as a client, entering into this new setting with some trepidation in spite of my trust in trainer Laura. It was not dissimilar to walking into any new culture – ignorant of the purpose of the many machines and sure I wasn’t going to be able to make use of them.
However, very quickly, I was immersed in my new environment, learning the language thrown around casually – Romanian Deadlifts, Dead Bugs, Superman, Plank, Bird Dog, Leg Press, Leg Extension. Bands, Around the World, Kettlebell Farmer’s Carry and so on. It must be said that many of these challenge my mind-body coordination but I have managed to complete all – increasing numbers and weights each class.
I find most classes hard work and it would be easy to give up, but I try to make it a point to never stop unless it is clear that I am moving into the area of disease pain rather than exercise pain. This is the type of distinction for which there must be absolute trust with the trainer. Laura will listen to what is happening with my body and suggest variations on the exercise, or a different one. I appreciate that she doesn’t let me off completely but takes the risk to my health seriously.
There are obvious similarities with physical therapy – including working toward achieving the same goal of strengthening body parts and enhancing quality of life. However, I find upper body, core and leg training far more holistic than physical therapy on individual body parts. I get through both in a similar manner -much as I cope with painful medical procedures – muttering in my head, “It will soon be over and things will be better.”
And I do feel better. For the first time, I care less about how my body looks and more about gaining strength and capacity that will be of assistance as diseases progress.
So, what make a gym comfortable for me, a 60-year-old British South Asian Canadian woman living with disabilities?
This gym is small, located in a local strip mall. In large gyms I have visited, or been on the periphery of, the feeling of entering an alien culture has always been reinforced. The spaces are often cavernous, with sound echoing (Tinnitus is a side-effect of my diseases so this is always disconcerting), people moving from machine to machine, none of which I know the purpose of or how they are used. In addition, the majority of those present seem in great shape already. I rarely see the very fit but larger physique individuals I know exist. There is also often a notable lack of clothing which enhances the feelings of inadequacy for someone already concerned about their body. As I mentioned, it is a small gym. In my timeslot, there are never more than three individuals working with different trainers – we are all at very different fitness levels. Still, there is no air of competition, something I perceive in other gyms I have been in.
The trainer’s description of herself is not hyperbole and speaks to what makes me so comfortable to enter the space, as well as sometimes fail in the space:
Laura has been a beginner in the gym. She’s been the only woman in a gym. She’s had aggressive coaches and trainers who made assumptions (over-estimating and under-estimating) about what she could or could not do. She’s felt unwelcome and uncomfortable, and she’s been made to feel unwelcome and uncomfortable.
And she doesn’t want any of that for you.
Training with Laura means training with a trauma-informed coach in a supportive environment where she meets you where you are in your health and fitness journey. It means being encouraged to try new things and do more while being listened to about what you/your body can do that day. It means learning that you’re stronger than you know while being motivated by a compassionate and knowledgeable coach/trainer.
So, this January I don’t need any resolution (not that I make them) to keep me going to the gym. At least to this gym to work with this trainer!
Leela MadhavaRau is the owner of LMR Human Rights and Equity Consulting. She has spent her working life in the field of equity and inclusion, working at universities in both Canada and the United States. Her academic background is in Social Anthropology, with a specific focus on the transmission of culture across time and space. Her degrees are from McGill and the University of Cambridge. She has lived a life between cultures and countries, one of the few multiracial children born in 1960’s London (UK). Leela immigrated with her family to Canada in the 1970’s when “Where are you from” was one of the most common questions. Her career has been one of working to create dialogue; wanting all of us to be able to maintain curiosity and be independent thinkers. This responsibility has been inculcated in her four children, now ages 24 through 31. She adopted her Siberian Husky, Atlas, in May 2021 and her life hasn’t been the same since!
Image description: Black and white photo of Tracy, short-hair, wearing wide jeans, sneakers, a black jacket and sunglasses, with a camera and a bag slung across her body, walking along a walled pier with a cargo ship in the background. Photo credit: Roben Bellamo
Back in January I wrote a post about how approaching 60 feels different from approaching 50. I breezed into 50 feeling strong, energetic, and at peace. On my 50th birthday, I wrote about beautiful September days where everything felt perfect and effortless. I had pushed myself into my 50s, with what, in retrospect, seems like a punishing training schedule to prepare me for two Olympic distance triathlons that season. But at the time it didn’t feel punishing. It felt invigorating and exhilarating. At that time of life, training hard clearly agreed with me.
Things have changed since then. Today it’s more about sustainable routines that can take me through the next decade(s) without injuries. I’m back to yoga, resistance training, walking, and some very light (read: slow) running. These are all things I still enjoy and that make me feel energized and strong. I almost never sign up for events anymore, though I do succumb to peer pressure once in awhile, especially if I like the t-shirt. Hence an 8K trail race next weekend (The Howling Ghost Trail Run) with my running group.
I’m not really in the mood to have a big decade birthday this year. It’s not that I object to turning 60. I just don’t feel like having a great big party to mark the occasion. And it’s not that I’m doing nothing at all — I have a couple of upcoming celebratory meals at my favourite restaurant. Today it’s lunch with Samantha and our friend Rob, for our annual get-together in honour of our birthdays, all in 1964 within the same 25-day span. Then on my actual birthday early next week I’m going back there to have dinner with a few friends. That day will include cake. Sometime this fall there will probably be a spa getaway to St. Anne’s with another longtime friend whose birthday falls within two weeks of mine.
We don’t get to plan when we’ll be in a mood for a big party and when we won’t. And if I’ve landed anywhere at almost-60, it’s at a place where I do what I want, not necessarily what’s expected. I’m feeling more confident about my choices these days, and deciding not to have a party despite this being a “special” birthday reflects that confidence.
When we first started blogging back in 2012, Sam started a thing where she would post “Six things” about whatever. I revived that on her recent 60th, and I’m going to end my own “60 is coming” post with six things I feel good about as I get really close to 60:
No longer experiencing the need to explain myself or my choices to people.
Physically, I can still push myself but I don’t push terribly hard anymore. I’m happy with my chosen activities and I take lots of rest that I don’t feel guilty about taking.
Instead of acquiring more stuff, I’ve turned my attention to getting rid of stuff.
Great relationships with family, partner, and friends. I’ve got excellent, supportive, loving people in my life and I feel incredibly fortunate about that.
My cats, daily meditation, photography, and my vegan blog.
The future looks bright as I look ahead to retiring in the not-too distant future and building a life in a new city with my partner. We are poised for the next adventure!
All this to say that though I’m not in a party mood, I’m quite chill about the upcoming BIG birthday.
I grew up with the romantic trope of the adventurous, rangey 20-something backpacker who freely wanders the world for months at a time. I stayed home for grad school in my twenties: the only backpack I carried was with my library books or my groceries. Then, last year at 44, I bought my first travel backpack (a Tortuga 35L), and so far I’ve done two short overseas trips with it (and smaller local trips).
What I lack in experience with worldly backpacking I make up for by watching others. These small midlife backpacking ideas gained learned from my more well-travelled midlife friends have made this style of travel kind and supportive for me. I acknowledge I use them as a privileged, white English-speaking woman travelling to urban and semi-urban places as a foreigner and a guest.
My friend Marnie and her 40L pack, while we were about to leave our guest house in Istanbul.
Lightening the load
My first lessons of midlife backpacking were: pack light (if you wish to avoid luggage checks on planes) and be ready to carry what you pack.
Many travel backpacks today come with a few different clips—across the chest and across the stomach—to distribute the weight of the pack. On my recent trip I left my waist clips at home to reduce overall pack weight; however, I regretted it, as without them the full weight of the pack meant my shoulders got tired faster.
In my pre-travel preparation I saw for sale many funky and clever but bulky and expensive smaller bags and bottles for stuff within the pack. My more experienced travel buds showed me that ziploc bags and plastic water bottles were much lighter, had many different uses, and could be re-used multiple times.
Medicines and their containers
Last time I travelled abroad I got a cold, and it was miserable without the medicines I use. So I was not going to leave them at home again
On my recent trip I kept with me at all times a small key ring capsule with emergency over-the-counter meds, and in my pack I had a larger fold up storage pill container with enough for the whole trip. Some of my friends even travel with (doctor-prescribed) antibiotics and medicines for UTIs, just in case of an emergency.
It may be extra planning and cost, but it is worthwhile to me to bring a range of medicines that can make me feel better if I feel unwell, even if it is unlikely I will get sick.
A large and small pill holder
Foot care and hydration
This year I followed my friend Marnie’s lead and took extra care of my feet: I brought moisture-wicking hiking socks, KT blister prevention tape, moleskin, wound cleaning wipes, waterproof bandages, and foot cream for quick at-night foot massages. When I scraped my foot raw on the submerged rocks while swimming at the beach in Greece, I was able to care for my feet the days following.
As well, I brought a water bladder and water purification tablets. I used them first as a water station in the places we stayed; later I took them along on hikes in 37 degree Celsius weather. I also brought electrolyte tablets, using half of one at a time. As a result, I was never dehydrated and I felt really good at the end of the day. I didn’t need expensive water bottle purchases in remote locations, and it kept my hands free.
Elan at the Saklikent Gorge, Turkey, wearing a bucket hat, sunglasses, shorts, and a backpack with a bladder and hose for hydration.
Apps and digital tools
My friends showed me how to up my mobile game when traveling internationally.
Our trip planner, Kim, checks not only directions but also the Google satellite and street views of the places she is going. That way, she can marry written or oral instructions with visible paths and landmarks to confirm wayfinding.
Upon Kimi’s recommendation, I used the free version of the DeepL app for real time written and audio language translations. We used the app to chat with some local women on the train as we played cards, and it was a great way to pass the time and make new friends.
After I accidentally gave the wrong amount and currency to a store vendor, a Sheila suggested her free version of Units Plus, a currency exchange app that converts two currencies quickly. This app was helpful in places with multiple currencies to avoid overpaying.
I used to travel with print books, and I appreciate the serendipity of leaving or finding good books where backpackers stay. However, this time I used Apple Books for a novel, a library travel audio book, and podcasts to pass the time while traveling.
Every app saved pack weight and made the trip a little safer, easier, and morefun.
Give myself and others grace
My midlife-friendly learning on my recent backpacking trip: do what I need to be a little easier on myself and others. Stop and take the pack off. Invest in quick-dry underwear (that really does dry super quick on the line). Take a break for another coffee before I get tired and grumpy later in the day.
Always try to be patient and kind with others, especially those in the travel service industry. Take the time to ask a hotel owner about their family or a server about what they would recommend ordering on the menu.
I learned to embrace the fact I don’t have anything to prove on my backpack travels. Instead, I could exercise the self-understanding that I have acquired by midlife (compared to my much less self-aware self in my 20s). Being a midlife backpacker has helped me to be not only kinder to myself as a traveller but also to the locals who shoulder many burdens put upon them by travellers (most of which I do not ever see).
Elan’s legs and feet over a concrete walkway on our way to Fethiye, Turkey. We stopped for a break, so I used my pack to elevate my legs and give my feet a much-needed rest!
What small ideas or tips (for backpacking or otherwise) have you learned that make your travel journeys a little easier for you in midlife?
