Best case scenario.

I met my personal trainer this evening. There was some confusion at the outset - the woman who'd scheduled my appointment had written it on the wrong page, so I called to confirm the time and was told I didn't have an appointment - and for some reason that really rattled me. I guess I was feeling nervous enough that I panicked at the first sign that it wasn't going the way it was supposed to. But I managed to calm myself on the drive over by thinking about how I feel about clients who are nervous and flustered about being in therapy. ("I don't hate them. I don't feel contempt for them. I try to put them at ease and explain things to them. It's reasonable to expect my trainer to have as positive an approach to clients as I have." And I was right. Yay, rational optimism!)

I am embarrassed to say that I started to feel better the instant I met her, when I saw that she was kind of plump and not hard-muscled. That shouldn't make a difference to me, because it's sizeist, but I found it reassuring. It made it easier for me to talk to her about not being fit and not being sure I belonged in a gym. And it made me believe her when she talked about having a health-focused approach.

Her name is Kelly. She just graduated from college with a degree in exercise science, and she's studying for certification from the American College of Sports Medicine. She's got an earnest, geeky demeanor - she's not very polished, but she also doesn't have the kind of plastic-y cheerful attitude that makes me feel alienated and sulky. As I told her about my disabilities, she said, "Oh, this is going to be really interesting, because I'll be learning from working with you. Let's make your first appointment a week from now, and I'll do some research." She loved the print-out I brought her of my abilities and goals. She didn't (as I had feared she would) think it was overkill.

We talked about my goals - both in terms of what areas I wanted to work on, and what concrete things I might like to be able to do someday. She was enthusiastic about exercise being a way to bring me to the healthiest state possible for me - no matter where that is compared to other people. She reeled off examples of other clients who are health-focused rather than beauty-focused: she's working with someone who has a loss of bone density in her back, someone else who's a Type I diabetic; this gym has a great mix of people with different goals, and I should fit in fine if I'm working on making the most of what I have.

We didn't work out together today - this wasn't an official session, just an evaluation. We'll have our first workout next Tuesday. I'll see her three times in September, and then we'll re-assess. In the meantime she took a bunch of measurements and gave me some questionnaires to take home that cover things like attitudes and expectations about exercise. She made sure I understood that exercise is not a short-term fix ("you need to think in terms of making lasting changes to your lifestyle"), and also that I'll be sore to begin with ("but watch out for these signs, because they'll mean you're not just sore, you're injured"). Then I paid for my three upcoming sessions and went off to do some exercise on my own. I was very pleased.

It really did turn out to be the best case scenario. Which I knew it would, the moment she said, "Actually, I had a hard time deciding between Exercise Science and Culinary Arts." Is that the perfect sign of a trainer meant for me, or what?