Hi Everyone!
So I have been TOTALLY addicted to Facebook and have been neglecting my sweet little blog!  I wanted to blog briefly about my weight-loss experience!

If you have been following my blog and see the photos of me, you’ll know I’ve been overweight for a while now.  I guess I’ll just start at the beginning.

I met my husband in Kindergarten, we actually started dating October of 2002, I was 127 pounds.  When he came home from Iraq in March 2004 I was 139 pounds, when we got married in October of 2004 I was 155 pounds, when we got pregnant 6 months later, I was 180 pounds, I was 217 pounds a week after I delivered our son, 3 months later I fluctuated anywhere from 191-198 pounds.  I just stayed there.  I would try diets and nothing seemed to work.  Well it didn’t work because I didn’t really try.  I wanted a magic pill.

All the while, my weight gain was ruining my marriage.  My husband was rightly frustrated that I was not even near the woman that he married.  I was fat, sluggish, uninterested in anything active, hated summer, hated swimsuits, sat with pillows over my lap so people wouldn’t see the giant fat rolls I had, wore larger clothes to “camouflage” my weight.  My husband and I talked about my weight every few months, this always resulted in a big fight and me crying.  My husband is the kind of guy who LOVES to work out, if he needed to lose weight he’d just do it.  It wasn’t that easy for me.  I didn’t want to put forth the effort, I just wanted to wake up skinny or just be fat.  But I didn’t want to work for it.  John was very honest with me about how my weight was effecting him…to be honest I cared that it bothered him, but didn’t care enough to change it.

I didn’t feel THAT fat.

Well in January of this year, John and I went to Maui.  We have these amazing friends who live there, Nate and Jenna.  Jenna is an amazing professional photographer, on one of our last days there she did some beautiful photos of John and I.  Then b/c she is just this sweet, after we got home she sent us this bound album with the photos she took.  As I sat and looked through this album all I could think is, “Who is that fat girl with my husband?”  “Is that really what I look like?”  “What have I done?”

It was a very real realization that I had not only let myself go, but that I had been unbelievably selfish in my over-indulgences.  How unfair to my precious family.  How very unfair.

I promptly called Chemae, who I knew was a health coach with Take Shape for Life.  She got me signed up on the program.  But it took me some time to convince my husband.  You see, I have cut calories and exercised (well I told John I cut calories, I really wasn’t), I’d done Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, LA Weightloss, Alli, taken Phentramein, taken Hydroxycut, joined gym after gym.  Nothing worked.  Not becuase they aren’t good programs but because i didn’t want to put forth the effort.  For whatever reason, this was different.  Chemae told me that all I had to do was eat the food and I would lose weight…well that made sense to me.

So my husband agreed to let me try this program, I knew if I failed he would be royally mad.  I just decided that this wasn’t optional.  I had to lose the 75 + pounds.  So a week later my food arrived and I started eating every 2-3 hours and after a week I had lost 10 pounds, the next week I lost another 6 pounds, the next week 4 pounds and now I consistently lose 2 pounds per week.  I am 41 pounds down and have 25 more pounds to go, but plan on being done in September.

Thanks to Jenna, Chemae, Take Shape for Life and a willing husband, I am changing my life 2 pounds at a time. I wholeheartedly belive that if I hadn’t done this program, I would be ruining my husband and son’s lives, I would still be miserable.  but instead, I am wearing a size 7/8 jeans, medium shirts, I enjoy the gym, I look forward to my food I get to eat and I am ACTIVE.  My husband is in love with this new me and our marriage is healing from the pain I caused.

If you have struggled with your weight, please talk to me.  I am doing Health Coaching b/c I believe that this program works.  I believe that it can change your life if you let it.  I believe that it is about time we give ourself the hope that we deserve.  It’s time to get healthy friends!