In less than a week I’m going on my first ever 12K run. It’s called Bloomsday, and tens of thousands of people run it every year here in Spokane. I told my husband back in January that I was going to lose 17 pounds this year (that I accidentally gained last year just for turning 40; thank you very much). To keep myself accountable, I signed up for this race. You see, if you sign up for ridiculous things like this, you can’t stray too far from your goals for staying physically fit.
So in January I started doing exercise videos. I threw them all in the trash except for the Jillian Michaels one, the one that says “Eliminate Love Handles, Muffin Tops, and Wobbly Arms for Good!” Sure enough, after doing her absolutely impossible workout two or three times a week, I was actually gaining some nice definition in my stomach. I saw muscles I never had before, not even when I was skinny as a rail before I had kids.
By the end of January, I had discovered Zumba. Oh, Zumba was so much fun that I actually looked forward to Wednesdays as my favorite day of the week. We met at a church, 150 women of all shapes and sizes. Even though I’m a total klutz and I fumbled around like an idiot, I eventually learned the moves. Meanwhile my fumbling around caused other women to feel good about themselves, since they weren’t as stupid as the red-headed person who kept twirling the wrong way. A man from the church with a big movie camera wanted to record us doing Zumba to advertise to the church women to come join us. As much as I love being on camera, I did NOT want to do Zumba in front of a camera. Since the camera man was right in the middle of the gym (with two groups of women facing each other), I purposely stood to the side of the camera so that there was no way I would be in it. Whenever we moved our arms around, I pretended to hit the camera man with my fist, much to the delight of the women facing me, who burst out laughing on camera. (He never knew I did this; bless his soul…)
Since the winter was so long, I got sick three times with a cold or flu. My flu even included a fever. I totally ditched my Jillian exercises because it was just too darned hard after all. But I never missed Zumba, even when I was sick. Much to my amazement by the end of February, I asked my husband if the scale was broken, because I had already lost 12 pounds. (If you read my blog article about losing 10 pounds, you know why I thought the scale was broken.) You see, I hadn’t exercised but once a week. All I did was, I ate less. And I drank more water. That’s all. So losing weight has almost nothing to do with exercise. And yet there is something about exercise that helps you to think more clearly, have more energy, and be more toned for your husband. So those things matter. Supposedly you sleep better, too, but sleep has more to do with not having a million things on your mind, like what to say to church people when you see them.
A couple of weeks ago my husband popped down a big bag of Cheetos in front of me. I said, “Honey, I’m trying to lose weight.” I’m not sure what his goal was, but he scored big points with me. After eating a moderate amount of Cheetos, I made the sudden decision to do the Jillian Michaels video again…
