Who is this Fit Dolly?
My fitness journey could be compared to Gulliver’s many travels. I remember being a five year old and winning all the sports. Then one sports day, I was running a race in front of the school and everybody’s parents, I was taking the lead, I was going to win and then… I fell on my face. Some how at that young age I knew what humiliation was and this was it. Making me never want to run a race again. Well not for the next 20 years anyhoo.
I had B cups aged 11 and have never forgotten the horror of being told by my PE teacher that I should get a ‘proper’ sports bra to stop being a distraction for the boys in my class. This wasn’t a compliment, it was mortification. So I spent the next five years crying wolf with ‘cramps’ to get out of any sporting activity. Although there was a year that I became sports captain (yes call me Oliver Wood with an extra quaffle) but this was only because I was nice, not because I had any great athletic abilities.
I did play with family in the back garden and I even picked up a toad instead of the ball once from a pruned bush, but I never enjoyed being active. So by the age of 23 I was a rather cuddly lass that needed to lose a hundred pounds to prevent heart disease.
I started dabbling with fitness around this age. I had a crush on my pilates teacher who looked like a WWE wrestler. I even ran a 5k with the girls. Us being us, not the competitive sorts, decided to attempt completion whilst carrying a dyed pink hard boiled egg on a spoon. After the race, we felt like we earned a trip to the nearest pub so off we went to eat and drink as much as Henry VIII.
Then at acting school, I had a classmate comment on how in his opinion I was the best at every class except movement. This comment was what made me and my then g-cups attempt to run around the Harlem Meer in Central Park. God it was miserable. Did you know runners rage is an actual thing and I think I invented it? I was so depressed and angry during this activity. I couldn’t breathe! But I was bloody determined.
I spent the next year trying to find some kind of fitness that I enjoyed doing. Dressed in pink, my blonde self walked into a spin class in Harlem. I of course struggled to keep up and had an extremely sore derriere and hoo-ha, but I finally understood why people love to exercise.
Two years of Spinning, Bikramming and a Jillian Michaels dvd later I became a fitness instructor in New York City.
Oh and there were judgements made when people walked into my classes- usually from men- about whether or not I was going to be able to give them a good workout. Me of Dolly Parton-esque stature with a bubbly personality. Well let me tell you, those men crawled out of my class looking like Gollum, so precious…
In the past seven years, I have taught Spin, Bootcamp, Aerobics, Barre and even trained many clients privately. I have also grown to love other fitness activities such as Crossfit and Running. In a space of three years, in spite of being run over, I walked/ran six half marathons, a full marathon and a hundred mile relay! There was also this one time I entered a Crossfit competition and came last… But I think me and my partner were the smallest and we had only been going to Crossfit for a month- we definitely would have won a first for ambition lol.
As someone who was once lazy and someone who had to spend a long time in recovery, I have learned a lot about maintaining a fit and active lifestyle. So I hope you make sure to subscribe to THE BIL to get some inbox love, as well as some helpful tips to keep fit with.
As always,
Live With Love
The Bimbo in Limbo xxxx
Header Photo Credit: pexels- Karolina Grabowska