An introduction (long)

[Guest guest]

Now that I've kind of barged in on your group I suppose it's time to

introduce ourselves. My wife of thirteen years and I started the BFL

program about two weeks ago in response to an enthusiastic review by one of

Rhonda's co-workers. After reading the book and seeing the video we

thought, " what the hey, we've got nothing to lose but fat " . We have since

become enthusiastic supporters ourselves.

A few years ago Rhonda did aerobics on a regular basis at a gym, and I

recently belonged to a court club for 4 months but I only set foot inside to

pay my dues. I lost weight in my wallet... Neither of us have been

physically active in the last several years. I used to weight train, play

beach volleyball, surf, snow and water ski, and road bicycle, but that was

in my 20s, and I turn 43 in May. Rhonda turns 36 on the 29th of this month.

Neither of us is overweight, R is 5'4 " and weighs about 115 lbs., and I'm 6'

and weight 175, but we are both overfat, soft, and out of shape. We have a

picture of me on the beach in Hawaii from our honeymoon, and one on a beach

in Thailand from last year and it looks like the Challenge pictures in

reverse! It's amazing how we " see " ourselves as we want to, until hit with

the reality of a photo.

We've also talked about learning to snow board, but the truth is that

neither of us has the stamina to put in a good day and we would probably

just end up broken or in the lodge with a hot cocoa and Schnapps... Last

summer I learned to wakeboard and it almost killed me from exertion. My

younger friends thought it was hilarious. We knew it was time to do

something positive, but just couldn't get off our butts to do so. What we

needed was a push and a program that delineated EVERYTHING. Body For Life

did both.

We bought equipment. We stopped drinking beer every night. Rhonda gave up

smoking (yeah!!!) And we stopped eating out every night (I do miss the

Thai, Greek, Mexican, and Outback meals) and started eating according to the

plan. We can't believe the change in how we feel in just the first 2 weeks!

Now we regret that we waited so long to do something like this for

ourselves.

Funny thing is, we look worse now than we did when we started. We know that

as the muscle develops under the fat that the fat becomes more obvious and

seems looser. But the soreness is going away and it's being replaced by a

heightened awareness of our muscles. It's like we are more inside of

ourselves than before. We like it.

Tomorrow we are taking pictures, finally. I'll scan 'em in and post to the

list so you will know who you are talking with.

Our primary goal is simply to better ourselves. We don't want to be held

back by self-imposed physical limitations, so taking control of our bodies

is essential.

Thanks for listening, and we'll see you on the list,

Lonn

Speaking of the list... what a mess!!! Fortunately, this is a very small

group so the lack of list discipline is not a major problem. But as this

list grows, especially with people unfamiliar with the rules of posting to

lists like this, it will become more and more difficult to follow a thread

if proper list protocol is not followed. Instead of 15 or 20 people on the

list, imagine 150 or 200 people. I'm wanting to help educate, but I know

that that can be construed as pushy or controlling, and the last thing I

want to do is push people away. We both need your support and experience to

be successful. So if I occasionally make suggestions, understand that I'm

just trying to help the communication flow so we can all be successful. And

I will start heading them as " non-BFL " or " off-topic " so you can skip them

if you want to.

[Guest guest]

Hey Lonn,

thanks for the update on you and Rhonda. Sounds like you two are well on

your way.

~Laury