10,000 Steps to Relapsing

Currently at [company where I work], Corporate is sponsoring a competition called 10,000 Steps. M_____ Healthcare(s) from every state are participating in this competition to lose weight and get healthy. It’s a month long competition, and it consists of wearing a pedometer all day, every day, to track your steps walked (and thus miles walked throughout the day). The goal is to get 10,000 steps a day, which is roughly the equivalent of 5 miles walked daily.

I decided I didn’t want to participate in this competition. 1) I’m pregnant. That’s an excuse (and a damn good one!) right there. 2) Having a former/recovering anorexic wear a pedometer and get obsessed with miles walked and calories burned isn’t exactly conducive to recovery. 3) I know my treatment team wouldn’t really approve of my getting in 10,000 steps a day. Pretty sure they’re unhappy if I get in more than, like, 10ish. (There are about 13 from the sofa to the fridge, which, really, is pushing it.)

We’re split into teams according to our department. I’m on the Finance Team, even though my job requires nothing finance-related at all. (Which is good because even long division is pretty tough for me.) There is a community spreadsheet that everybody logs their steps onto, and I got an email from a chick in my department yesterday asking me to log my steps. I emailed back, telling her that I wasn’t participating in the competition, and she responded by telling me she was glad I had let her know.

So I leave work for the day.

I get in this morning, and have an email from her. She said that HR had said that if I wasn’t going to participate, then I needed a frigging DOCTOR’S NOTE stating whether or not I could or could not participate - and why. What? Since when is it mandatory to participate in stuff like this? I can imagine my doctor’s note going something like this:

To Whom It May Concern:

I, Dr. C_____, hereby give my permission for Brie to become absorbed in needless calorie burning. Brie used to have an OCD problem with numbers and exercising and losing weight, nearly died from it, but REALLY I think it’s fantastic she is being pressured at work to wear a pedometer that will broadcast to herself and the rest of her co-workers how many calories she’s burning and miles she is walking - and getting competitive over it. We look forward to your insurance paying for her inpatient hospital bill.

Regards,

Dr C_____

Bah!

And then, I got an email from someone in HR a couple hours later, telling me that they’d talked it over, and instead of a doctor’s note telling me I couldn’t (or could) participate, that, well, I just needed to. Pariticpate. So would I kindly stop by his office and pick up a free (UGLY) t-shirt and pedometer? I don’t need to walk the 10,000 steps daily, but I do need to keep track of and log the steps I do take.

How many steps will it take you to walk over to my desk and kiss my big, fat, pregnancy-induced growing butt? Oh, just 17? BRING IT.