Kate Driscoll, a recovering alcoholic and public relations consultant, lives in a Boston suburb with her engineer husband, Bob, and their six year-old daughter, Meghan. When Bob's business goes broke, Kate finds that even her regular A.A. meetings don't help with the money worries, so she turns to a local gym for stress relief. "The gym was cheaper than psychotherapy and seemed to work just as well," she says. Though she describes herself as a "relentless heterosexual," Kate is soon horrified to find herself falling in love with Lou, a female instructor at the gym. Kate's affair with Lou carries her through increasing financial difficulties and her husband's growing depression until she is forced to make a decision that will shape the rest of her life. "Shit happens," Kate's A.A. friends say, but magic happens too as Kate learns that, no matter what happens on the outside, the answers to her problems lie within.