I grabbed the remote and restarted the sucker.

Do you know the expression “when time stood still?” I can tell you about that now. I kept picking up the DVD jacket to check — yep, 60 minutes running time. I swear that 3 hours later I stumbled across the finish line.

I sat there in my living room and thought … that was tough. Was I up for the challenge of Dove’s Bodies? Maybe it would end up in the heap with Jackie Warner and Jillian — not due to boredom but due to my inability. Perhaps I would simply remain The-Body-Dove-Never-Got-To-Work-With.

Then from the depths of my fat covered soul I rose like a phoenix and … decided to go to bed early.

I woke up so sore. I’m not sure if it was good sore or bad sore, I was just sore. I went to the breakfast table. And sat. And stared.

Maybe I would rest today. Take it easy.

I started about my day and an hour later, I just stormed into the living room, grabbed the remote, turned the DVD player on, and did the whole DVD.

I remembered that pregnant woman in LA in Dove’s class not even resting so I WAS GOING TO DO IT! I may be old but I’m not pregnant and pregnant always trumps old.

I had decided. I decided I was in. And just like that I started. The first two to three weeks or so I felt this trembling on the inside after every workout and it didn’t involve an orgasm. I could feel the toxic sludge of my body moving. It was as though I could feel my blood pushing fat out of its way. Maybe it was an inter-arterial orgasm from fat being dislodged. Whatever. I’ll take it.

The relationship was on. I was going to make a last ditch effort to fight gravity and middle age spread! I was not going to end up in a size 12+! I was going to rid my body of cellulite! I was going to push!

I could do about 8 pushups when I put the first DVD in and … whoa, she wanted me to do how many? A lot. Was she nuts? Earlier didn’t we do enough to kill off a small army of fat? But I see that she’s saying I could do them on my knees, but wait, I didn’t like doing work on my knees but I didn’t have time to question this as she just flows from one thing to the next and I find myself getting into a rhythm that I can’t break out of.

And …