Hot yoga

I don’t sweat. I think I have a few weird body-related things like I can’t lie down with my palms facing upwards without pain. So the idea of hot yoga sort of appealed to challenge whether I would actually sweat. Husband was really keen – not to see me sweat, I hasten to add- but to give it a go. So when @PureHotYogaUK was running a special deal – 10 days for £25 – he suggested we tried it. I said great – thinking I would go a couple of times over the 10 days just to try it out. But no, in husband’s mind, 10 days free membership meant going every day for 10 days. After a few minutes negotiation, we agreed on 7 sessions with two of them just relaxation/non hot.

So this morning we arrived in good time for the first hot session. I have a limited gym wardrobe (no surprise there) so wore a short sleeved t shirt and yoga pants. I turned down husband’s offer of a singlet – showed far too much upper arm for public consumption. We both went to the changing rooms (not much bigger than a cupboard under the stairs) and I was ready first, as always, so entered the studio which was like stepping off the plane in a very hot country. Not really knowing where to sit and feeling like the class had already started, I sat down in the first mat I could find. Husband followed in shortly looking very confused – no glasses = no vision – but I directed him towards an adjacent mat. He had started sweating before we had left home. Then the room filled up and the teacher started the practice. Within the first minute I realised that I had seriously misjudged where to sit – as hot yoga virgins, we were sitting right next to the heater which was blasting out hot air constantly. Within about 5 minutes, husband looked like he had been standing under a shower all morning. I remained stubbornly dry. 15 minutes in and my face began to glow. At the halfway stage, there was a puddle where my husband had been, I could see the rest of the class glistening with sweat, two men had stripped their tops off and still I hadn’t broken out into anything that resembled a sweat. My face, however, was now the colour of a very ripe tomato and I was finding it hard to keep up. Embarrassingly I was doing downward dog while everyone else was in cobra….

Afterwards, when recovering in Cafe Mila, I heard the words I thought I would never hear in my lifetime from my husband “I reached the point of giving up. I just wanted it to stop.” He didn’t speak for about an hour.

I’ve been out and bought so more appropriate clothing. We plan to get there early tomorrow and bag some mats near the windows – as far away from the heaters as possible. Am not sure we’ll stay the distance….