I’ve been working out with Meghan and Joel with New York Sports Club’s 2fit deal, but we couldn’t find a time that worked for everyone this week, so I worked out alone with Joel today. Each and every muscle fiber in my body (except my tongue, which was doing overtime work complaining…oops) felt like jelly. Every single thing I tried to do, from burpees + jumping up on a step (yeah, you thought burpees were hard? Add a jump!) to a simple row felt even more difficult than my first workout with him last year. I’m training for a half-marathon! I did a hard spin class last night! I should be able to handle this, right?

Joel asked me to do tricep dips on the side of a weight bench, and I finally just blurted out “Why is everything so hard? I mean, I can handle hard, but my muscle are just jelly right now. Your workouts are usually manageably challenging, but this one feels impossible.” He asked what I’d done since I saw him last, and I told him the StairMaster, running 9.25 miles and a hard spin class.

“No wonder you’re having such a hard time — those are hard workouts!” he said. And it had been a while since I’d done strength training before starting to work out with him again last week. I told him that basically the reason I started working out with him again was because I still wasn’t sure how to do strength training on my own. He showed me the XpressLine, and we went through how much weight I should put on each machine. I’m going to do it twice a week and work out with him once a week. I’m hoping all of this will make me feel comfortable enough to attempt other strength workouts on my own in a few weeks.

Also: MUST. DO. YOGA.

Also: I’m sure the booze and fried food had nothing to do with this. Or the brownie I nabbed at Whole Foods last night.