Why Do Men Act Like Jerks in the Gym?

My husband badgered me to go to Bally's with him today. I usually work out in my home gym or take a run or climb outside (I'm stuck in an office all day), but he talked me into it. Sunday is a good day to go to Bally's actually, because the place is nearly empty and you can get your pick of equipment. I thought, "Great. Some extra hubby time. Get my workout in early. Take a nice swim. All done."

Things did not go as well as planned.

For some reason I cannot fathom, my husband insists on dressing like a Sweathog. He has perfectly good t-shirts and workout pants, but he digs through his closet for 20 minutes to find the scruffiest, ugliest pair of sweatpants he has. These sweatpants have holes in the legs, paint splatters and are circa 1982. If I knew he still had them, I would have tossed them in the trash years ago!

Then he takes the top from a NEW sweatshirt and cuts the arms off with a pair of scissors (jaggedly, I might add). He will not wear his regular running shoes, but must wear an old pair of Converse. He looks like a reject from Welcome Back Kotter. This is how he goes out in public.

First on the agenda is weight training. I already have a set routine that I do with free weights at home so I do a modified version using dumbells and some of the machines. My husband has no plan and goes from machine to machine in no particular order. His hopping about inconviences a couple of other patrons and one of them tells him so. They have a few words. The patron finds an employee who explains to my husband that he needs to follow one of the posted usage routines, please. My husband has been going to this gym for three years and knows the rules but he is still pissed. So, he decides the best way to "show them!" is to lift way too much weight. He strains his shoulder.

I had since moved on to the treadmill. I have 60 minutes of treading, in a combination of fast walking and light running,  to do. After he finishes his weights, my husband gets on the treadmill next to me.  I'm already over 15 minutes through my required time. He decides he will catch up to me by doing 45 minutes of RUNNING at an incline of 15%. Really? He hasn't even jogged around the block for five years.

I remind him that heart disease runs in his family and he hasn't exercised that hard in a long time. "Maybe you should do the beginning trainer program instead of that one, hon?" I suggest. He gawauffs and cranks the speed up. "I used... tobe....a.... gym.... nist.... this.... is.... nu.... thing!" he puffs.

His clothing choice begins to make a difference immediately. He's drenched in sweat in a matter of minutes. I have to give him my water bottle because he refuses to stop for a drink and he didn't bring his own. I start calculating how long it will take the ambulance to get back to the heart hospital when he collapses. 

Finally, he decides the stair-stepper is a more manly aerobic pursuit and leaves me in peace to torture his knees on that device.  Finally! I can concentrate on the last and most difficult part of my tread.

I'm just winding into my last 10 minutes or so of the tread program, when a man gets on the treader to my left. We chat a little bit about the gym, different sports, basic gym politesse. Well, hubby sees that someone is talking to me and comes over to hover. He shoots the other tread-walker the dagger eyes and starts making stupid jokes like its high school. When my program ends, he hangs all over me while I go to the drinking fountain to fill up my bottle. Because he's so sweaty (so am I), I push him off me.

"Stop it!"

"What's your problem?" he shoots back.

"You're sweaty!"

I thought that would be reason enough. He doesn't think so. He tries to argue. I ignore him and walk down stairs to the showers. He decides he's going to take sauna. He knows I won't go in the dry sauna because it makes my asthma flare. I ask him to go in the steam room and I will go with him. "No way. Dry sauna is better." I remind him that I can't breathe in there. He'll have to go by himself. I know he's just doing that to be a poop.

I go rinse off and sit in the whirlpool for a few minutes. I have no way of knowing how long he'll stay in the dry sauna just to spite me.

I get sick of waiting. I shower and change. I go out to the lobby and watch t.v. He comes out a half-hour later and claims he was waiting all that time for me to join him in the dry sauna. "I can't go in there!" I say. "Well, I didn't know that!" He says. We just had a freakin' conversation about this 45 minutes ago. Crimeny!

He's sullen on the drive home. Apparently, I have ruined his workout.

What makes my husband act like a juvenile caveman once he steps through the gym doors? Is it competition? I wish I could be a fly on the wall when he goes by himself. I'll bet he's just as nice as pie.