Sobriety and Fitness…do they go hand in hand?

So you kind of touched on it already this week but, um, I wanted to talk about fitness and sobriety, and not in the sense of like, "Hey, we all got sober.

Hey, we all decided to get fit." Like, obviously I know some people struggle with it, and I don't want this to be like some kind of evangelical preachy thing about like getting up and going for a run and doing ice baths and, and all that kind of bullshit.

But I did get a WHOOP, and it, it kind of raised a question for me actually, and it wasn't why do I love fitness or why have I got into fitness? It was almost can fitness replace your addiction? And not necessarily in a negative way because I know that getting fit and being better is, is a positive.

But with my WHOOP in particular, and it's been good and it's kept me tracking stuff, et cetera, and it's great.

However, I found myself a little bit doomy if my recovery is not good or a little bit doomy if I kind of, it says I need to miss a day.

And then I got thinking about like fitness and sobriety and like i- in the same way that I used to kind of have the shame cycle of like come downs, I now get the shame cycle of like not going to the gym.

And Elle's always taking the piss out of me 'cause she calls me gym 'cause she's like, "All you talk about is bloody gym, gym, gym." And I try not to-

[laughs]

... because I'm not trying to make it my personality.

But it's something I genuinely enjoy, and I've really got into the weights and I'm, and I'm enjoying it and I'm, and I'm conscious of it.

But I do find myself potentially forming quite negative habits around like eating and, uh...

I mean, pe- may- maybe it's not negative.

Maybe someone who's a PT would listen and be like, "No, that's the right way to do it." But, you know, I do feel shame if I eat bad food, and I do feel like I've got to train harder.

And I just wanted to kind of have a really open discussion about like all the amazing stuff that like wanting to get fit and sobriety can bring, but also really, really being really open about like how it can become a little bit dangerous in a way and maybe potentially, you know, uh, replace some of our addictions with addictions and maybe take it to the extreme.

And I know you and I, you know, neither of us, and I don't want to speak for you, but neither of us are like naturally born athletes, right? You and I both have to work really hard to, to, to stay in good shape and fight for it, and that's something I do enjoy.

But I know that both of us, it's, it's a real focus for us, but it does take up a lot of my brain space, and I want to see how you felt about it in sobriety as well.

Yeah, I mean, I think I've gone through a whole journey with fitness since being sober.

And I think the, I guess the addict in me, which, you know, I've always had that addictive personality with whatever it is I do, right? So, you know, from being a kid through like chess in my like [laughs] really when I was really young to like tennis and like playing and coaching tennis and, you know, football and then going on to like golf and jujitsu and all the other stuff.

It's like that addiction is...

I guess it's like the dopamine release of like trying to learn something new, do well.

You obviously got the endorphins that kind of come off the back of training and all of these things as well, which is, which is great.

[lips smack] Um, but yeah, I think like that served me well in some cases, you know, having that addictive personality because it, it keeps you coming back and it keeps you focused and makes you wanna do stuff more and more and more.

Um, obviously it's a very negative thing to have when it comes to [laughs] like drink and drugs because, you know, you've en- we've ended up doing this podcast because we couldn't fucking deal with it.

But I would say that it served me well in that aspect.

And yeah, my last like sort of four and a half years journey with fitness has been a really interesting one.