South Sea Island Home: Zumba - a family love affair

It is the year of war. War against the fast-approaching middle age arms, chin and post-baby tummy. Up until now, I think my youth, height and pregnancies have disguised a lot, but in the last year I really noticed how things were starting to get worse. I have not been blessed genetically with the skinny gene. Even if I was a size 4 in my early 20's, it only took one baby to do away with that, and then my famous lack of self-discipline just took over.

But now that the 40's are within sight, and I hear from older girlfriends that it gets harder after 40 to lose weight, I've decided that this is the year where I will reclaim my - if not my 20's body, at least the slimmer side of me that is hiding in there somewhere!

We bought Zumba late last year and it has revolutionised exercise for me. I have tried gyms, fast, regular walking, painful diets and self-denial (which lasted about 4 hours). But Zumba really is fun, and my kids LOVE it, too. It's not like exercise. And being someone who naturally hates exercise, but loves dancing it really has appeal. I did once try to get my husband to join with me and a girlfriend and her husband in a dance class, but I just got the look, if you know what I mean! But with Zumba I get the best of both worlds, and there's nothing quite like your skinny, fit, active 8 year old daughter begging to put Zumba on to get you all motivated.

The Zumba instructors are skinny, beautiful girls, but they are encouraging, in a tv kind of way.

But as I said to a girlfriend recently who borrowed my dvd's, do it by yourself to start with. Even if you are reasonably well-coordinated, Zumba is hard mentally, and hillarious physically, especially if you're a spectator watching someone try it out for the first time.
It's fast - which makes it more effective than the gym for me. I like it. I hope I can keep it up.

But this is the closest you'll ever get to seeing me do Zumba!