I fat-accepted myself so hard, I became a jock – part 3: cycling.

In spring of 2022, I tried out a kick scooter my husband randomly brought home, and loved it, which got me thinking about riding a bike. I needed something to do in the spring and summer, when ice skating is much less available. Back in 2020, I’d bought myself a little three-speed steel retro bike, with fenders and a Dynamo hub and a front rack, but I was too busy and stressed to re-learn how to ride a bike at that point.

So once I finally had the bandwidth, I took my bike out into the quiet parking lot of a closed doctor’s clinic on a Sunday, practiced mounting and dismounting (using a curb), and slowly got myself riding on quiet streets and getting my balance back. Riding a bike as a fat adult felt quite different than it had as an average-sized kid, and it took a while to get my muscle memory back. But with patience and letting myself go slow, it did come back. With a vengeance.

I started riding that granny bike everywhere, as fast as possible, on gravel trails and in the forest, and eventually for 50 km one summer’s day. Then I thought, “I’m gonna need a faster bike.”

All of this, from buying skates and taking lessons, to buying a bike and then needing a better bike, was all wildly intimidating as a somewhat shy person, but also as a fat person. Going into sports-focused stores does not feel comfortable as a fat person. I feel lucky that no one gave me a hard time, but they easily could have, and it would have been very discouraging.

I forced myself to go to a couple of bike shops and test ride some bikes…and then I fell in love, predictably, with the ugliest and most expensive bike possible: a Salsa Warbird with a carbon frame in millennial gray. I was immediately repulsed by the colour when they pulled it off the rack, but when I rode it, I found myself whispering sweet nothings to it, telling it how smooth it was, how fast it was, and how much I loved it, even though it was far too expensive for me. I went home and sulked for a week, and my husband told me to go back and buy the Warbird, so I did.

It was still ugly, and I still loved it more than I have ever loved an object before. It was and continues to be the most expensive thing I have ever owned. I rode it a bunch in the late summer and fall of 2023, culminating in an 85 km trip.

The following spring, I got hit by a car (thankfully it was a very slow, ridiculous crash and I was only a bit bruised), and had to replace a bunch of parts on my bike (which thankfully the driver’s insurance paid for), as well as the frame, which is now a beautiful, glossy black instead of gray. So now I’m even more in love with it, and that’s what I was riding this morning, yet another roller coaster in my life.

I did not think all this would happen when I decided to accept myself as a fat person and stop dieting in November 2000. I just wanted to experience peace in my body, stop caring so much about how I looked, stop experiencing the intense shame that I’d been taught to feel about my weight, and the guilt and confusion around food that came with it. I had no idea I was an athlete; I had no desire to become one. But somehow, learning to treat myself and my body with compassion allowed me to learn things about myself that had been hidden for years, decades.

As it turns out, I’m a small-time thrill-seeker, a diver, a skater, a cyclist. I’m still fat. Hills are hard, but I descend like a beast.

I may or may not have ridden my bike 50 km to eat a Fat Bastard burrito in front of an out-of-business Jenny Craig.

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2 responses to “I fat-accepted myself so hard, I became a jock – part 3: cycling.”

  1. theAntiChick Avatar
    theAntiChick

    Way to go! I don’t know if I could ride a bike again after decades of not doing it. And I am SO HERE for riding any distance for that photo!!

    1. Michelle Avatar

      It felt really weird to ride a bike again after not having done so for 20+ years! I was actually pretty amazed when the muscle memory returned.

      And thank you for liking the photo, haha. Nothing more awkward, but still strangely fun, than standing on a major thoroughfare in downtown Toronto to take a photo in front of a closed Jenny Craig.

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