So yesterday I set out to find some fitness blogs by, for and about women. What I found was not what I expected when I typed in “top fitness blogs for women.”

While I did find a few blogs I liked, I found a lot of blogs that really had nothing to do with what I consider “fitness.” There were posts about loving your body; posts about eating well for healthy hair; post about body dysmorphia (which was actually one of my favorites!). BUT there weren’t really any posts about women lifting and working out to develop beautiful lean, toned muscle. There weren’t very many posts about what women did to workout and improve their health.

I found a website called the 100 Must Read Blogs…By Women! and found that of the fitness blogs with descriptions only one had anything about resistance training in the blurb about it (and that blog was almost specifically for athletes). That is sort of sad don’t you think?

What do women have against resistance training? I mean I’ve heard the “I don’t want to get bulky excuse”, which is total BS. I’ve also heard women complain that they feel uncomfortable when they are in the weight room because all of the men are looking at them and judging them. This is BS too. I’ve stood and watched people in the weight room. The people who get looked at are the ones either doing something that looks absolutely silly OR people who lift an incredible amount of weight (which means…MOST OF THE TIME MEN ARE ONLY WATCHING OTHER MEN LIFT!).

Most female trainers who blog should know that women won’t get big from lifting weights. Most female trainers also know correct form so they shouldn’t be intimidated or worried about lifting in front of men or encouraging their clients to do so. So why are so few writing about weight training!?! I mean you female trainers who don’t promote weight training are part of the problem. I mean we can recommend that women experiment with their diet to find out what works for them, but no one seems to recommend that women experiment with all forms of exercise!

We want women to love their bodies and not be discouraged by the women in the magazines. I whole-heartedly believe that if we can get women to see weight training as something beneficial and not something that will make them manly that we will start to chip away at women’s body dysmorphia!

So here is me recommending that women experiment with exercise. Try a resistance personal training session or class. Try a spin class. Try Zumba. Try the weight machines. TRY ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING! Just stop climbing on the stupid cardio machines for hours on end with no variety to your workout program. PLEASE!!!