What Would Jillian Do?*

I am on my knees in my bedroom, dripping with sweat.

Five seconds is all Jillian will give me to recover, so I take it and count as slowly as possible before I get up.

For the last 15 days, I've become something of a hostage to her "30 Day Shred" (Lose up to 20 Pounds in 30 days!) DVD. It is a series of 3 - 20 minute grueling fitness routines, which include such things as "plank jacks" "mountain climbers" and something called "burpys" - a three step process that involves nearly every muscle in one's body and a move I'm still loathe to understand.

Twenty minutes is all she asks of me, and I give it to her with a kind of devotion and dedication I haven't brought to anything in years. I'd seen the video advertised somewhere on line a few weeks ago, and thought (naively and vainly) "Twenty minutes? How hard could that be?" Nearly impossible, it turns out, even when one starts at Level One and is pretty decent shape. If one says so one's self.

Let me be clear: I have never purchased a fitness video in my life and I hate every minute of this one.


It is circuit training, with is a Machiavellian combination of free weights + cardio, which = torture. Jillian is the now famous and slightly scary Jillian Michaels, Uber Trainer, of The Biggest Loser fame. Here she is, being inspirational. Well, inspirational and a tad threatening.



Now, I've never even watched the show all the way through, however I'm familiar with the concept, and with Jillian, because let's be honest, you can't miss those abs of hers. And then there's her approach, sweet, threatening and tough, breaking people down to build them back up. You can say what you want about her methods, but damn do those peeps shape up over time. Why have I never watched the show all the way through, you ask? Well, because that show is for them. You, know, them. Those people whose lives are out of control, who don't know what to eat, never exercise and need outside motivation to get off the couch.

Here are some of them:



At any rate, I'd always fancied myself no Biggest Loser. I lived in Los Angeles for most of my 20s, for god's sake, with a fitness routine that included five spin classes a week, next to a parade of small screen actresses, and often taught by the other Uber Trainer Bob, also of The Biggest Loser, pre-fame or running the same starts in Santa Monica that Madonna and Fergie were rumored to run and hiking the trails of the Hollywood Hills, those hills that those same small screen actresses were always babbling on about in Shape and Self and Cosmo. In short, I exercise, I eat (mostly) right, and after years of punishing myself, I've made peace with my body (mostly). Until I got on the scale approximately 16 days ago and I was 10(ish) pounds heavier than I've ever been in my life.

And here's the thing: I hadn't really noticed.

Sure, maybe I'd glimpsed some loose meat hanging from the back of my arms or my slightly fuller cheeks or whatever it is that's happening between my belly button and my hipbones (I'm still not entirely ready to talk about it). I mean, I have some reasons for why it's happened - first and foremost, I am no longer in my 20s, I'm staring down 40 in a few short years - and then there are the events of the last six years: I left LA for the kinder, softer city of Portland, Oregon, my sister and mother were diagnosed with breast and brain cancer respectively less than five years apart, my mother went on hospice eight months ago and I moved in with my parents to help out. Last, and certainly not least, I finally (and incredibly) met the love of my life.

So let's recap: I hadn't really noticed and I had excuses. It turns out I am in fact a Biggest Loser, I'm just not breaking down on national television while being forced to wear spandex in front of the entire world.

Please understand I know that these 10(ish) pounds are in no way important.

There are earthquakes and political upheaval and a soaring jobless rate and oil spills and loved ones who are sick. But these stupid 10(ish) pounds are all I can control today, so enter Jillian and her ubiquitous presence on the inter-web and via her new show Losing it With Jillian, where she moves in with families who (amazingly) don't really understand what's coming, and she's all up in their Kool-Aid within minutes, tossing out Cheetos and screaming in their faces re: HOW MUCH DO THEY REALLY WANT IT??? Which really means how many more squats can they do before they pass out. And because she is ubiquitous, one day while I was minding my own business, reading about LiLo on The Superficial or something, her 30 Day Shred popped up, and then there was the business with the scale and the rest is history.

She is surprisingly gentle on the DVD - although still merciless - laughing with her two perfect body buddies who do the routine with her.

Every time I think about skipping The Shred, there is Jillian, her buff arm gently twisting my weaker one behind my back, leading me back to the TV, holding me there with her stacked abs, softly whispering, "C'mon buddy, just push play." And so I do, trying to take it to heart while I shake in plank pose when she tells me that this workout is hard for them too, she and the perfect body buddies. I see a mist of sweat on one girl, nothing on the other. Not that I really care about them. It is all about Jillian. She calmly reminds me of jean shopping and bathing suit season as we lunge back and forth, how in no time I will be at Level Two and then Level Three! and then, well, I will be totally shredded. And despite the vague nausea and the occassional urge to reach through the screen and strangle her, I'm buying it, hook, line and sinker. I simply cannot get enough.

Hey, are you still with me? the tag line beneath my weight chart yells out. I joined Jillian's online program for 30 days free, a bonus to purchasing The Shred. Jillian stands there on the left hand side of the page when you sign in, a clever smile on her face, her hands on her hips. You haven't entered your weight! No, Jillian, I haven't. Why? Because I haven't lost an ounce this week, or last week, for that matter. Despite my devotion and 15 days of torture, 20 minutes at a time, not to mention those horrific scissor jumps and plyometric lungey thingys and dead lifts, nothing is happening.

Forgive me Jillian, for I have sinned. Barring no discernible weight loss, I had the Soothing Lettuce Wraps at PF Changs this week. Twice.

So delicious, and only 100,000 calories.

Look closely and you can see the grease glistening in tandem with their soothing presence.

Ok, so there was also a glass of wine or three and then I skipped The Shred at least twice.

I am ashamed, and I will atone, thanks to you and your incredibly savvy marketing team. You are everywhere I go now, from the TV and radio promos touting The Biggest Loser to Losing it With Jillian, to the inter-webs, where, when I'm minding my own business trying to illegally download HBO shows or order some cute summer sandals, there you are, flashing a faux instant message at me that reads, "How much do you want to lose? Sign up now! C'mon, you know you wanna." I do wanna, Jillian, and there you are - here, there and everywhere, solving my internal fitness dilemma before the phrase, "What would Jillian do?" can cross my lips. I know, I know. You would order the ahi instead of the wraps, you would substitute water for wine. The one thing you would never do? Quit.

So, I haven't.

Quit, that is. I keep doing The Shred, and more cardio have been drinking a tad less wine, and haven't revisited my friend the lettuce wrap. The scale still isn't moving dramatically as the days of this routine piles up, but I'm stronger, faster, less inclined to wheeze and collapse during those f-ing mountain climbers. My clothes are the tiniest bit looser, my arms a bit firmer. It's a little bit of tangible progress, a smidgen of control in an out of control world. These are small victories, but ones I will take, in the midst of the unpredictability of this life. The good news is, I can be free of all of it in a few short days, although I'm not convinced that will be the case. She's solid, that Jillian, and my god, those abs. And arms. She's got a hold on me, and I'm hanging on with everything I've got.

*This was originally written a few months ago, as a pitch to This American Life about being held hostage by something in a humorous way. They passed, but I've continued on with Jillian and more DVDs - her No More Trouble Zones - i.e., Muffin Tops, Love Handles and Flabby Arms! as well as Burn Fat, Boost Your Metabalism...and she's still kicking my ass.