Working out is one of the best things to do to stay healthy and relieve stress, even though going to the gym when there are gymbros around is one of the most stressful things you can do. If you, unfortunately, go to a gym where there are men, follow these tips to have a good exercise sesh without being hit on, stared at, or talked to for an hour with unsolicited workout tips.
Try swimming.
While avoiding the weight room is an obvious must if want to minimize your male interactions at the gym, go one step further and try a form of exercise that physically stops you from being able to interact with anyone. If a guy even starts turning in your direction while you’re in-between laps, you can just dive back underwater and splash away. You don’t even have to fake a polite “sorry”. They won’t be able to hear it!
Block out the men.
If using a large body of water to visually and audibly block out men from the gym isn’t possible, do everything you can to mimic these effects on dry land. Use noise-canceling headphones that scream “DO NOT APPROACH ME” and will still block out any comments from the men who inevitably do (bonus points if they’re so big, they also obstruct your peripheral vision). Try wearing super dark sunglasses so no accidental eye contact will be taken as an invitation to come over and talk. Sure, it may be unsafe to wear sunglasses while using heavy machinery, but what’s even more unsafe is getting caught in a conversation with Trent who just needs to show you proper running form.
Don’t.
In an ideal world, it would be possible to go to the gym without any male interaction. But since we don’t live in a utopian society, the only completely effective way of avoiding men at the gym is to not go at all. Yes, that means not being able to work out, but also then you don’t have to work out! Take care of your mental health in other ways like lounging around and doing nothing. And if you just have to exercise, you can always do, like, a yoga video at home. It may suck to confine yourself to your room to be able to exercise without any unwanted conversation, but two minutes back at the gym will remind you why you stopped going in the first place.
Doctors who talk about the health benefits of going to the gym clearly have never been hit on mid-squat when all you want to do is listen to your workout playlist in peace. Fortunately, there are ways to mitigate the inevitable presence of men at the gym, even though it’ll never be 100% effective. But you can always just wait for a Curves to open near you!
