My first yoga class....

For those of you who haven't seen me in a while....I'm shorter than I used to be, considerably shorter...A few weeks ago I had a physical and discovered that I stand a giant 5'5" tall. Although I think that this is still slightly above the average height of most American women, my drivers license declares me to be 5'7". I'll admit, I don't honestly know if I was ever 5'7"...but what is indisputable is that when I had a physical just after Sam was born, I stood a proud 5'6 1/2".
My shrinking is concerning for a couple of reasons....there's the obvious osteoporosis, degenerative bone disease concerns...and then there is the fact that I have been telling myself that as a 5'7" women, I am only a few pounds overweight...(at some point I read that 5 pounds for every inch over five feet is acceptable and normal...a little piece of trivia that I have clung to for years!) However, now that I am in fact only 5'5"...well, let's just say that I have a little more than a "few" pounds to lose!

One of the things that the doctor suggested (along with a bone density scan and a lot of calcium supplements...) is to take a yoga class. Apparently, you can regain 1.5"! So yesterday morning, I headed off to my first, Bikram "Hot Core" Yoga class....

I was the first person to arrive...so I got to hang out with the instructor, Peter (who greeted me in bright red yoga panties and from what I could see has no hair anywhere on his body). Peter is a muscular freak of nature...he could be used to teach anatomy classes...even if he had been fully clothed, he's got a body type that screams, "I can wrap my legs around my shoulders and then walk on my elbows and feed myself with chop-sticks!"...Peter was very happy to meet me, he welcomed me to my "sanctuary" and began to demonstrate proper yogi breathing....then Peter let me into the yoga studio....I knew that it was going to be hot, but I had no idea that it would be so hot that I would be soaked in perspiration ten seconds after entering the room (I'm not exaggerating...not even a little).

My friend Ann ( who I begged to join me) arrived a few minutes later. Peter was happy to meet her too, although Ann (pronounced "On" by Peter) quickly fell out of Peter's good graces when she asked if it would be OK to take a break to call and check on her four month old son...the look on his face was the same that you might get if you showed up to test a Lamborghini riding on the back of a garbage truck...."This is your sanctuary, you want to take a phone break?"....

There were only four of us in the class...one very fit yoga body looking women, one middle aged, not in better shape than me looking women and then "On" and I ...My intimidation quickly melted (no pun intended) away as I discovered that I am more flexible than I thought, and I could in fact do most of what was being demanded....at one point, "On" and I got yelled at for talking...when we weren't, we just smiled at each other....I wanted to interrupt the reprimand and explain that we hadn't said a word, but decided that wasn't very Yogi...I also have problems following instructions like "proud chest, swing your arms, left over right, elbows behind your ears, perineum drawn upward" (Not really sure how to do that last thing...), Peter had to tell me more than once to bend "my other left leg"...but overall, I loved it. In fact, last night I felt so good that I contemplated going back this morning for another 90 minutes....but then I woke up this morning feeling like I had been beaten with a bag of rocks....I think I'm taller though.