God what awful terms we use to describe our bodies; muffin top, spare tyre, saddle bags, back cleavage, bingo wings, camel toes, jelly belly, builder’s crack; the list goes on. I’m not even sure what some of them mean, let alone what I have to do to get rid of them. It’s a sort of loss of innocence; when you hear a new one, you have to check to see if you have it, then you see that, yes, you do have it, then “it” becomes one more thing to feel bad about.

My suggestion? Just don’t look. Don’t stand in front of the mirror waving your arms like a maniac to check how much the flesh wobbles. It’s not going to wobble any less because you know about it. Don’t stand sideways in front of the mirror sucking your belly in as far as it will go and then blowing it out as far as you can. Just because you’ve seen it, it’s not going to disappear. Don’t keep trying to catch your VPL out in the mirror by twisting around to see your bum and pulling your knickers up to your chest. I’ll say it again: just because you’ve witnessed it, it’s not going to go away. Believe me, it’s all downhill from now on and there’s nothing you can do about it. No diet on earth, no fitness programme in the universe can win the fight against time or gravity. You might as well get it over with and get rid of the mirror now, while you still have a shred of self-esteem left.

If you’re really desperate, and you insist on having a mirror, you could try nicking one of those skinny-mirrors they have in Mango. (Oh well now you know why their clothes look better in the shop than when you get them home.)

You could try dieting, but that’s no fun at all.

Or, horror of horrors, you could try exercising. In December, I started going to fitness classes with Anita Mullen, an Irishwoman (a coincidence I swear) full of enthusiasm for health an fitness. Anita is amazingly fit (she sings along to the music while she’s doing press-ups), but not in a psychotic-neon-lycra-thong-leotard kind of way. She doesn’t wear a sweatband on her head or legwarmers.She’s nice and perfectly normal and she’s able to coax the best out of her class. She’s tough on us if she thinks we can take it, but she also goes easy on us on a freezing cold night, when everybody’s stiff.

Anita has created GX-1 (the GX stands for Group Exercise), the first club in Malta to launch the world-renowned Les Mills group fitness classes. Les Mills threatens to be the next fitness craze to hit this island; it promises to have you not just exercising, but falling in love with fitness, feeling great and coming back for more.

Anita has been a fitness instructor since 2003. She tells me she loves to encourage people to push themselves that little bit more and to raise their fitness levels. She loves the energy of a group workout and an adrenalin-pumping soundtrack, which is what Les Mills is all about. She’s put together a team of Maltese and international Les Mills training instructors to be the first to bring the Les Mills program to Malta.

GX-1 opens its doors on the 1^st of February at Le Meridien in St Julians, with a schedule of twenty hours a week to choose from. It offers five Les Mills programs; Bodyattack (high energy cardio), Bodybalance (a combination of Yoga, Tai Chi and Pilates), Bodycombat (martial arts), Bodyjam (dance cardio) and Bodypump (weight training with bar bells), as well as a spinning class twice a week. The classes are updated every three months so that you don’t get bored of the same routine every time.

You’re probably out of breath just reading all this. If you are, your body might be trying to tell you something. Something like “Get up off your backside and get some exercise”. Ring Anita. She’ll help you out.

www,gx-1.eu

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