A start up is getting women of all ages up on the dancefloor for a spin, but not in a nightclub.
Jane Spencer-Rolfe, who is in her late 50s, and Ronni-louise Hetherington, 39, met last summer at a Slimming World session and, with some help from Ms Spencer-Rolfe’s 24 year-old son Laurence Spencer, they formed Let’s Bop with the aim of getting women dancing and socialising together.
They now have sessions running at the John Peel Centre in Stowmarket and the LP bar in Bury St Edmunds, as well as a new one at Stonham Barns in Mid Suffolk.
The dance start up is a far cry from Ms Hetherington’s day job as a client developer for a civil engineering company. Ms Spencer-Rolfe
spent 23 years working in Probation offices, and was founder of one of the first on line dating services, nomorefrogs.com, based on a psychometric matching process. “I’ve always had an entrepreneurial spirit,” said Ms Spencer-Rolfe, of Needham Market. “With Let’s Bop, we are a three generational outfit doing something which is very much a tomorrow’s idea, as an ageing and often stressed-out population need to find simple ways of feeling good, and doing things that are good fohr them! Everyone needs to keep moving - and all the better doing something enjoyable such as dance.
Ms Spencer-Rolfe points out jokingly that there’s no panel of judges at Lets Bop. “We aren’t all Strictly, much as some of us love it!”
As a sufferer from depression and anxiety, Ms Hetherington says she knows how important it is too look after mental health as much as physical. “There are times when I have felt as a woman I don’t want to be at various venues due to my age, but I still want to enjoy music and the atmosphere of a club but feeling comfortable with who I am now,” explained Mrs Hetherington, who is from Stowmarket. “Its a way that I can support other women, bring a way of release and escapism from the day to day, and have a damn well earned good time.”
For more information see https://letsbop.co.uk/.
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