Megan Banks: After 20 years of easy living it's time to hit Jim

Many weird things have happened this year.

I've started putting coconut oil into my coffee, I've stumbled through 10km in a marathon, I've laid on a mat of tiny plastic pointy things in a bid to sleep better, I've given up the thing I love most in the world, wine for 31 days, and of yesterday I've become a gym member.

I haven't been a member of such an exclusive club for probably 15 years, in fact make that 20. All those years of living a blissful, inactive life, hoping my spare tyres would somehow become flat.

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But all good things come to an end and about three months ago we had the awesome team from Sport Hawke's Bay come into the studio and give Adam and me a health "Warrant of Fitness".

Adam, who has been going to the gym regularly this year and running 2km every day, flew through (if we don't mention his cholesterol that is), whereas, on the other hand, I had a few, ahem, issues.

The main issue I took offence to was my metabolic age.

Their magic set of scales deduced that, given my BMR (body mass index), my metabolic age was that of a 60-year-old.

In other words, my metabolism was 15 years older than me!

Nothing against 60-year-olds, some of my favourite people are in their 60s, and to be honest, they are in much better shape than I am. But given my parents both died young of heart attacks, I had due course to be more than slightly concerned.

Which got me through the doors of my local gym and putting down the equivalent of a house deposit (or so it seemed) on a year's membership.

I've paid upfront and I don't know if that's a good thing, but I do know that I have to actually start and use it.

So far I haven't stepped foot on an actual treadmill, and the only weights I have lifted have been the 18kg and 20kg respectively of my two boys.

But baby steps, people. And just so you know, I've decided to rename my bathroom Jim, so at least I can say I do go to the Jim every morning. And five times at night.