I've been privately blogging about my struggle with weight-loss for A LONG TIME!!! It is only now after some inspiration from following my friend's blogs that I've decided to "out" myself and make this official. I've read alot of blogs and I know that while we are all different there are so many common threads. Especially amoung us women. And moms of small kids. The mom guilt we struggle with--the lack of time--lack of sleep, feelings of imbalance and defeat.
"Tis better to have loved and lost than never loved at all" is a quote that we've all heard. I've often wondered to myself whether that was true or not when putting it in the context of being in great shape and then getting fat and completely OUT of any shape at all. That's what I let happen to me. And once that pandora's box was open there was no going back.
Eleven years ago I was at my fitness peak. It was July of 1999 and I had just became certified as a Personal Trainer thru the NSCA. I was teaching kickboxing, pilates, yoga and doing alot of personal training. I worked at the YMCA as an accountant, so during my lunch hours I was teaching class or working out on my own. I LOVED the reciprocity of personal training--and seeing people reach their personal best. In 2001 I got married and in 2002 became pregnant with my first child. I worked my butt off all thru the pregnancy--kept teaching class and only quit teaching kickboxing a month before I had my daughter. When I was 4 months pregnant or so, my husband and I separated. He didn't know who he was anymore. Something about the married life with a kid on the way was a little bit too much reality for him. I was really hurt--mostly angry--and too proud to let my family know what was going on in my life. I gained 40 pounds during the pregnancy--had some complications from all the stress--and in the end received the biggest blessing in my life. A week after I had my daughter I was back down to 10 pounds of my pre-baby weight. But that didn't last. As a single-mom, my days of 3 hour workouts were a distant memory. I got a better paying job and switched to survival mode. My daughter is seven now and a divorce and remarriage later, instead of 10 pounds to lose--it yo-yoed up to 63. I quit Personal Training, because I really feel that in order to "talk the talk" you have to "walk the walk" and I didn't look the part. I could motivate, inspire, empathize and give people the tools they needed to change, but I couldn't do that for myself. It just doesn't sound as convincing coming from someone who couldn't be in control of their own self.
[insert blather about years of being defeated about weight-gain, inability to lose weight and keep it off--etc]
I guess it was in late April of 2009 that I made a pivotal decision. It was a line in the sand for me that said "this has gone far enough". I made a radical choice to have weight-loss surgery--IF my insurance would cover it. The insurance approved surgery within just a few days after it was submitted. That was really something to think about! For insurance to cover this it meant one thing: it is cheaper to pay the $16,000 for the surgery than it is to pay for the illnesses and maladies that would accompany obesity. That was an "aha" moment for me.
So, I had surgery in June of 2009.
I've lost 25 pounds since then. Without being consistent in ANYTHING and without really trying. For six and a half years I had been obsessed with calories, nutrition, weightloss, exercise...all of those things. One of my goals of having this surgery was to release that obsession. To be able to climb the rock wall with my daughter, to be able to wear beautiful dresses again...but especially to not obsess about weight.
A weird thing happened when I got banded. Suddenly I stopped caring about protein, calories..etc. While that may sound like exactly what I was aiming for--I've still got a ways to go! I'm coming to a plateau so I guess I'm going to have to get off my butt and start trying harder!
So--I'm starting this blog to document this last 38 pounds. Here I go!!
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