Some qualitative thoughts about all this exercise stuff
Looking in the mirror and seeing abdominal muscle makes me feel sort of dislocated and strange. It's almost that typical moment in a werewolf movie where the budding werewolf finds new hair in unlikely places
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Weirdly, while my goal was always to get stronger, I was thinking more about bone health and freedom of lower back pain than muscles. The only other times in my life I've exercised at all rigorously, I've also carried enough body fat that the muscles never really showed, though they were definitely present under the fat.
I'll adjust to the visible muscles, but it's *definitely* odd that my body image seems to handle being overweight better than it handles being fit! My "set point" when my metabolism is working well but I'm not exercising or moderating my diet falls into the overweight category of the BMI scale, around 145. I'm not super happy with how I look there (quite pear-shaped), but it doesn't "look funny" to me. I've had my thyroid go kerblooie and my weight pop up to 160. Even that looks "less funny" to me than I do right now, or how I did when I was at this same weight but less muscular. I was probably more fit when I was biking regularly, but most of my muscle development then was in my legs and lower back and less visible; I was also carrying more fat then, too. If I keep this up a few more months, I'll be more fit than I ever have been in my life. With chronic fatigue. O.o
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