Day Five – Keep Going, Even If It Looks Like It’s Not Working Pt.2

Jack will be 16 in November. My eldest son; my 5 foot 10, tall, handsome boy.
He’s ALWAYS been slim, right from day one, but then he started to grow upwards; fast! He went from slim to long and lanky in a matter of months, and that’s where he’s been ever since.
He can eat like a horse and not add a millimeter, let alone an inch, to anywhere on his body – I have no idea where it all goes; pounds are definitely NOT sneaking onto Jack’s body by stealth!
So not only has Ellie been working on switching her nutritional lifestyle, she’s also had to develop a will power made of iron to stick with eating the new way, whilst Jack continued to the eat the old way.
Yesterday, Ellie breezed in from school and announced, “Jack’s decided to walk home instead of getting the bus!”
What?! School is 6 miles away along some very narrow country roads; they are really not ideal for walking along, dangerous in fact, which is why no one does it!
I wondered what had triggered that off and mused on whether, or not, to drive the route to school, find him and pick him up. I thought better of it, he obviously had a reason for walking and me driving ‘to the rescue’ probably wouldn’t help. I’d just have to wait a couple of hours, until he got home, to find out.
Ten minutes later he was home – now I was confused!  Ellie had omitted to say that Jack HAD actually got on the bus, but decided to get off a village early; it’s the small details that can be the most useful you know *sigh*
The upshot was he’d got off the bus early to get some space and calm down; he’d had a bit of a run-in with some bigger boys in his year, not taller but broader – you can see where this is going right? – and it was the age old story: three on one pushing and shoving, with a lot of intimidation, rounded off with the threat, “This ISN’T over!”
I must confess to having to imagine I was glued to the chair in an attempt to counter every instinct telling me to hunt these boys down, teach them some lessons in manners, decency, respect and what it feels like to have their backsides kicked in to touch. HOW DARE THEY! Ooooh I can feel myself getting cross all over again!
However, deciding that beating up teenage boys  probably wouldn’t set the best example (and the thought of being charged with actual bodily harm not appealing much), we spoke about the various options Jack had available instead.
We crossed off the non-viable ones, like bunking off school and getting your mum to go and rough ’em up a bit and, in the end, we’d narrowed them down to two:

1. Involve the school and have these bullies dealt with (statements are being taken on Monday)
2. Train and eat properly with the goal of putting muscle on

Declaring, “I don’t want to be skinny anymore, I want to be strong and big and confident…I don’t want to feel helpless again,” the decision was made; these were the two things to put into action.
Within hours an eating and training programme were in place and measurements had been taken:

• 16 years old
• 5ft 10in tall
• 60kgs
• 5% body fat – yup, just 5% (great for six packs!)

I know kids can say they’re really keen when, in reality, they’re not but the two big signs that Jack really means business were

1. when he mustered every ounce of courage that flows through his body and was prepared to stand in his boxers so I could take before photos – when he and Ellie were in Italy in August he lived in jeans and a t-shirt, it was 38C on some days but exposing anything more than your head and forearms was just NOT an option. NO!
2. when he decided he would train in the mornings before school

“What time are we going to train?”
“6am.”
“OK, what time shall I set my alarm for?”
“5.45am,” I said, expecting there to be some look of horror or the suggestion that we might start a bit later, but what I got instead was,
“Cool.”
I was awake VERY early this morning and couldn’t get back to sleep, so I mooched around here for a bit and added some bits and pieces in the background, which will be popping up soon, when I heard the beeping of Jack’s alarm at 5.45; he was downstairs, ready, at 6am.
He did really well considering he’s never done anything like this before, AND especially as his trainer is his mum – poor boy’s got it tough – but he gave everything his best shot and by 7am was at the kitchen table, eating straight after training, and experiencing, for the first time, the amazing feeling of satisfaction knowing you got up early and you got the job done.

I’m very proud of him.
His goal is to have packed on a fair bit of muscle before my mum lands back from Italy for a month in the middle of December. He wants to meet her at the airport and for her not to recognise him for a few moments and then be gobsmacked.
I had to laugh to myself earlier, he came into the office and asked, “What time are we getting up for training tomorrow?” You should have seen his face when I said we weren’t training again until Monday – he looked so disappointed.
Until five weeks ago for Ellie, and yesterday for Jack, it’s looked like my healthy lifestyle was having NO impact at all. Being a positive role model just WASN’T having the effect I was hoping for!
What else could I do? Nothing, other than carry on even though it looked like it wasn’t working.
I realise, now, there was nothing else to BE done other than wait for them to find their OWN reasons why which were strong enough to cause them to come and ask for help.
I don’t need to wait any more.

As for my own training today, I can sum it up in two words:
MORE ABUSE!
There’s no more to be done this week (Sam…did you hear me? *grin*) and I’m looking forward to seeing the results of my first week of six pack torture training on Sunday; and now…I must sleep!
See you tomorrow 🙂