How did I get here?

Like many women approaching age 40, I've taken a moment or two (or a hundred) to wonder how in the world I got "so old". When I was 20, a sophomore in college, my mother and father were 40...which, to the sophomoric mind, was OLD. It's hard to shake that long-standing paradigm. The strangest part of "getting old", and I've talked to many others who seem to agree, is that no one seems to know "how we got here". Like, um, where did the last 20 years go? And, how can I be nearing this significant age without feeling terribly old?

But "feeling old or not" aside, I am not happy with my personal fitness level. I need to take action...NOW. I have five months before the big four-oh hits, and I've decided to create a fitness goal for myself: I want to feel good about myself, to be able to put on a bathing suit without the accompanying self-loathing, to get dressed in the morning without tribluation and misery, and to be healthy.

I have a storied past with working out and fitness: I have been in incredible shape and dedicated many, many hours to the pursuit of the perfect body. I never achieved it. At least, I never thought I did until I got pregnant, had a baby, and two years later still hadn't lost the "baby fat." When I look back at those pictures, I see how much I took for granted. I looked GREAT! Not perfect. So what? I looked GREAT, and I wasted it feeling so shitty about myself and killing myself for something I could never achieve.

So, I've decided to take action - palpable, immediate action - and embark on a challenge. I'm not great with challenging myself; I tend to do too much negative self-talk, casting doubt upon my abilities. But when I saw the informercial for Shaun T's INSANITY workout, I immediately thought that this might be the workout for me. It's obviously hard, difficult, impossible, insane...but it just might be the thing that helps me conquer my demons about body image and self esteem.

I am blogging about this journey because I need to get negativity and self-doubt of my head and onto the page. I need to share my successes and failures. I need to be accountable. I thought maybe a public forum might help me reach these goals, perhaps inspiring others along the way.