gym

Anonymous

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Guy at the gym, if you ask to share the machine with me, then notice I’m lifting more than you and feel embarrassed about it, don’t then proceed to give me a lecture about how I need to reduce the weight. I’m probably only lifting more than you because I’ve been doing it longer and I’m pushing to my maximum. This works for me and has seen me quadruple what I can lift in a year. It’s still not that much and you will get to lift more than me soon, because you are male and that gives you a natural physical advantage, but until then try not to be a twat. Despite Einstein’s laws of relativity, making random women you descend upon in the weights room lift lighter won’t make you lift any heavier. I don’t go to the gym to perform emotional labour and to sabotage my own progress for the sake of random dudes who can’t bear to think of women being able to do more than them, so kindly let me get on with my workout in peace. Instead, concentrate on your weightlifting and you will progress, as I have – although I would suggest that if you’re doing it to make yourself feel more important than people without muscles, you’re probably doing it for the wrong reasons and a course of therapy might serve you better instead. Thanks.

anonymous

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I was taking my A levels at sixth form college, on this day I was lifting weights at the gym on campus. I went outside to get some water when this PE teacher who taught at the college said that “little girls shouldn’t lift weights”, I considered replying with “neither should old men” but I decided to ignore him and continue my weight training.

Abby

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I was at the gym, nearing the end if my workout so heading to the mats to stretch. I have my headphones on still, but a man comes over from the other side of the gym and justiculates at the mat and I catch ‘scuse me love’and not the rest. He stands infront of me on the mat. I remove headphones. Question what hes doing. Him:’I need to finishes my reps here. ‘ Me:(confuses face) excuse me? HIM: I said I need to finish my reps here. Me: (still confused) Him: (gesticulates to the mats again) I’m doing my reps here. Me:(noticing there are two large mats free) Isnt there room for everyone?) Him: I’m just being polite and saying can I finish my reps here? Me:(still confused but,)aright get on with it then. Him: you need to move your stuff (my jumper and water) I pick it up and stand watching as he proceeds to lie the wrong way across the mats taking up two sections and continues his work out , like it was more important than mine. I watch over him unimpressed and scowling) until he finishes.

Kitty

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I have always felt uncomfortable at the gym. It is embarrassing and I have overcome this fear to change my body.Just as I was becoming okay with the uncomfortable feeling of being that vulnerable in front of others, a male came up to me as I finished my workout.He told me how he “enjoyed watching me stretch.” And I was mortified. I ran off into the locker room and cried.I felt so vulnerable and gross. All the progress of telling myself that “guys were not looking,” was lost. But I decided that he didn’t deserve to make me feel that way. I got myself together and walked out of that locker room and confronted him. I let him know why that was not okay and if he is watching someone he should never tell them. I never felt so constructive. He even listened. Well he tried to, I felt constructive till he tried complimenting me after this confrontation. Oh well, it was the beginning.

athlete

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My friend and I were playing basketball one day during gym class. We are both on the team although she had been on the team for longer and was much better than me. This cocky guy comes up and started trash talking us. Saying things like he’d crush us, could take both of us 2 on 1, and that we probably played like girls. We played like girls. My friend dropped 50+ points on him and I dropped 20. We beat him 70-10 and barely broke a sweat.

Victoria

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One of the movements in the gym is called a ‘man maker.’ I made a point of this and the coaches now call it a ‘person maker.’

S.B.

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In gym class they have separate basketballs for each gender. I don’t know why, the heavier ones are easier to get in since they don’t bounce out.

Anna

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I used to go to the gym with two guys and we always did the same exercises. We were doing shoulders which is why we sat on those gym benches in front of the mirror, all next to each other, with dumbbells in our hands, doing our sets. We were just between sets, chatting for a moment when an elderly man approaches me, only to tell me that he wants that bench and that I am only chatting and not working out. I told him I was not done and only taking a break. He then turned around and muttered “women, uh” under his breath. It felt so strange because he would have never asked the guys that I was with to give up their bench.

Alex

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I’m a 19 year old female uni student, and I went for a run for the first time in a while today at 10.30am. I was next to a busy park where I had passed families and other runners, when a van honked the horn at me and the man in the passenger seat stuck his head out the window and pulled a suggestive facial expression and shouted something. I immediately felt uncomfortable and objectified. This is not a new thing – I remember being 14 years old and walking up the hill to an evening hockey club at school with my other female friends. We were honked by car horns on multiple occasions & it’s been happening ever since.

Nas

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I was at the gym and have been going to the gym a few years. I was looking at the weights and a guy came up to me and said ‘Hey babe, looks like you need some help, which exercises are you planning to do? I can tell you which weights you need’.