It’s Not a Diet, it’s a Lifestyle!

It was the dawn of a new day because I finally gained a confidence in myself; I knew that I knew, in the deepest part of my knower that I would NEVER again gain an incredible amount of weight, EVER!! To maintain a healthy lifestyle the rest of my life, I had to make life changes, ones that I could maintain for the rest of my life. Heard it a thousand times, but for some reason, at 30 I knew it was what I had to do. I began to slowly change my thought pattern as well. Instead of kicking myself from here to next week over a 10, even 20 pound gain, I could stop the gain right there. Stop and get back into control right then...not in two months and 50 pounds later!

Again, to someone reading this who has never known the agony yo-yo dieter lives through, all of the above sounds like the most obvious and "duh" sort of statements, I'm sure! "Of course you should stop at a 10 pound gain, you goof ball!" or "have a little self control you glutton, just stop eating!" I’ve heard it all before from thin folk who have no idea the head trip a yo-yo dieter goes on. If it were just that easy, why in the world do you think everyone is not thin? Why is dieting a multi billion dollar industry in the US alone? If it was so simple, and all you had to do was stop your out of control eating, don't you think that one of the wealthiest, most prominent figures in our recent history would have just done that...years ago? Instead, Oprah Winfrey, the queen of the yo-yo dieters, has spent most her adult life going up one hill and down, and up...you get the idea. If anyone could lose weight once and for all and just be done with this, don't you think Oprah would have been the one to conquer it once and for all? I'm just saying, it ain't that easy. Until you have been that person, and walked a mile in our big pants and fat clothes, before you sit on your skinny throne and judge, you really know not what you think you do!

No More Climbing the Big Hills on The Coaster of Gain

I remember it as if it were yesterday, even though it has been more than 18 years. I had just celebrated my 30th birthday. I can recall to this day, waking up shortly after that mile marker of a birthday and coming to an incredibly simplistic but absolute truth; I had to stop dieting! I had to stop starving myself into a size...whatever, because at the end of the starving, sure as shooting, I'd be making my climb right back up to the same size I had just said good bye to a mere few months earlier!
Second realization: I had to stop beating myself up every time I over ate for a day or two; no more punishing myself for gaining a few pounds. It suddenly became crystal clear, my low self esteem and the shadows of all my fat periods were sabotaging my will power. I had become so sure that it was an unstoppable force, this weight gain, and that once that first 10 showed up, I could do nothing to stop the next sixty to one-hundred from quickly adding on. The only thing that I knew for certain was that in a few months, I'd be going on yet another diet to start the cycle once again. I was so, so weary of it all, and had I never felt what it was like to be thin, I would have indeed given up a long time ago, and decided I was destined to be fat. But, for one half of my life, ever since I was 10 years old, when I wasn't knowing the agony of being very overweight I did know the happiness, the lightness, the joy of being thin...and as you've heard many times, thin feels better than anything ever tasted!

I believe that these realizations became very clear to me at this age in particular for several reasons; my little girls were just turning five and I remember them looking at me, with wide eyed wonder at how much mommy could eat at one time! I remember during my heavy times, them trying to hug me around the top of my legs and not being able to wrap their little arms all the way around...my legs, not my waist! I remember as a little girl, my own mom and how much pain I would be in for her when we would take walks and I would hear others snicker or make a rude comment because she was over weight. I was just a kid but I really felt like I could have beaten them senseless; I was so protective of my mom. Both she and my dad were really the main reason that I decided I needed to stop the big climbs once and for ever. For my whole life, both of my parents were overweight. They were always trying to lose the weight, but especially for my dad, his weight never stopped him from living a pretty healthy lifestyle. He played for his company's volleyball team for years, did all sorts of activities with his three kids and basically he lived a very full and complete life.

That is until he was diagnosed with a very rare heart condition a few months before I was married. He had just been put on a very heavy duty heart med and his breathing had become very short and a bit labored. I will never forget the day of my wedding, when my mom's friend began signing the Hawaiian Wedding Song as Chuck and I stood on stage lost in each other's gaze. Suddenly I heard my Dad's beautiful voice singing the harmony to the song! Honestly he had one of the most lovely voices I had ever heard and that gift was, hands down, the best I could have ever imagined!

In the next few years, his heart dictated that he slow his whole way of life down, but he and my mom still were second parents as they watched their five grand daughters over night many, many times and took them on trips all over Colorado and even to other states. They helped raise my girls and my brother's kids as well and their selflessness, even though my dad was literally dying a little bit everyday, made me realize that I needed to be as healthy as I possibly could for my kids. I needed to be alive and healthy for not only my own kids, but I believe a desire to be around as a strong and healthy grandma began in me all those years ago! I wanted to be a role model of health and fitness to not only my kids but, God willing, to their kids as well.

So as I sat perched once again, looking at another sixty or so pounds to lose before I reached a reasonable weight, I knew this ride down was going to be different, because I was positive that it would be the last time I ever climbed the big hills, ever again!