Benefits of Being Bodybuilder's Wife

I am married to a professional bodybuilder.

Not one of the gross ones, the steroid guys that look like the Incredible Hulk with those disgustingly huge veins snaking around under their skin.

Nope.  I got one of the good ones.  A natural, drug-free one.  A really hot one.

Did you see the cover of Men’s Health last spring with Ryan Phillippe?  My first thought when I saw it was that my hubby’s body is even better.  Oh, yeah.

There are some obvious benefits to being married to a guy with a better body than a movie star, three in particular.

Benefit #1 to Being Bodybuilder’s Wife: His Abs

Bodybuilder Hubby has amazing abs.  Perfect, beautiful abs.  We’ve been married for over 13 years, and I’ve never seen him without six-pack abs.  Sometimes they’re softer and rounder, and around competition times they are rock-hard and chiseled.  But they are always there.

At his 20^th high school reunion last year, some of Bodybuilder Hubby’s old female friends wanted him to take his shirt off and be in a picture with him.  Didn’t bother me a bit.  Admire all you want, I say, those abs are going home with me.

Benefit #2 to Being Bodybuilder’s Wife:  He doesn’t expect me to be in the same kind of shape that he is.

I’m not a total slacker, mind you.  I weigh a little less now than I did before our two kids (now ages 2 and 3) were born.  I have, in my opinion, fantastic arms and shoulders, thanks in part to lots of push-ups (100 in sets of 10-20, twice a week), pull-ups (2, twice a week, because that’s all I can do so far), and the fact that whenever I go on a walk I push 85 pounds of stroller and toddlers along the way.

I flexed for Bodybuilder Hubby to show off my arms.  He sort of chuckled and suggested I work a little more on my delts.  I’ll probably try to do that as soon as I figure out what that means.

But really, he loves me now, and he loved me thirty pounds heavier post-babies.  And that’s a really great thing.

Benefit #3 to Being Bodybuilder’s Wife: Bodybuilding makes him happy.

There was a bodybuilding contest in town this past weekend.  Bodybuilder Hubby spent the entire day there, helping some of his friends and clients (he recently bought a personal training studio), and then getting in a workout himself mid-day.  Since the contest, his phone has been ringing and chirping like crazy with calls and text messages.

The funny thing is, a few years ago, I couldn’t convince him he needed a cell phone, and actually went out a bought one for him without telling him, just to get him started.  He was convinced he would never need to use it.  Now he uses many times more minutes and texts than I do each month.  Which means, of course, that I was right.

I love listening to those post-contest conversations.  He’ll spend an hour on the phone with someone talking about recommendations for their diet or posing or whatever he thinks will help that person do better in the next contest.  It’s absolutely his passion, the thing guaranteed to put a smile on his face.  And when people come to him asking for advice because he’s had success, that’s the icing on the cake.  Even if he doesn’t get to eat it.

All the more for me.