Jane’s Phone: I Was Body Odor-Targeted At SoulCycle, Twice — NEW & UPDATED!
And I got a free outfit for it each time. (Pro scammer tip in there for ya.)
Oh, menopausal hormones! While laughing as my fellow oldster on staff, the phenomenal Vanessa, shared her weird menopause symptoms with me, I remembered this one of my own.
The person next to me (bike 17 to my bike 16, Tribeca studio) complained to the front desk after class about my extreme body odor.
I told my friends about it at dinner that night, and one of them said that his wife was going through menopause and had the same unusual and strong body odor come out while she was at the gym, so that must have been it. My cleansing habits had not changed. In any case, bike 17 got their class comp'ed and I got a new set of clothes on Soulcycle, so win-win. Thank you!
And then it all happened again — and then that was the end of it.
EDITED TO ADD: Lovely commenter Nomi perceptively, insightfully, and doggedly asked for more details about how I got the comped clothes. This is obviously critically urgent info for everyone to have, so I’m pulling the answer up here:
“Oh goody! I love when someone actually wants to hear more about one of my silly stories. So what happened was that after the class, a really sweet person from the front desk (with all the other Soul Crewmembers busying themselves behind the front desk or averting their eyes from the retail racks so as not to further my humiliation) told me that the rider next to me had complained about my extreme body odor and that they wanted to give me this new top and bike shorts for me to wear instead of the old stuff I was wearing to help in case it was a laundry issue. I felt so bad for how embarrassed that crewmember was to tell me and did my best to talk loudly about it then and on subsequent visits so that no one would feel like they had insulted or embarrassed me. The clothes were too small and I didn’t feel like I could return them. Should I?”
I could talk about this (and anything) forever, so continue discussing here with me below if you like. New angles unturned? Unaddressed aspects related to societal norms? Favorite deodorant scents? It is all so valid.
I think it’s weird that women are expected to smell like flowers and cedar at an indoor cycling class. Go ride your bike in nature if you don’t want to smell indoor nyc bodies!
A guy in my gym smelled so bad you could smell it throughout the very large space. I decided to take a casual approach and said to him "Hey buddy you kinda reek." then he answered in very poor English, not understanding what I said. I got more and more embarrassed, the longer I stood there and tried to explain it to him. Ultimately, he denied it, and I regretted my decision to approach him. However, I think telling the attendant instead would've made me feel slimy, which is probably worse.