My Fitness Journey

I've been on Spark for a few years now, and I realized I need to blog. So I found it suitable to start with my fitness journey so far.

I've always been active. I was the athlete in school. I'm still an athlete at heart. Thankfully, sports kept me thinner. In my head I always felt like I was battling weight, but that's only really because I was comparing myself to other girls. When sports ended I tried to keep my weight under control by exercising, mostly running and going through ridiculous diets such as Adkins, cabbage soup diet, South Beach, Herbal Life, dieting pills, the skip breakfast and lunch diet, Slimfast and I'm sure there were more. Sorry if my list offended anyone. The older I got the more I packed on.

At age 30 I weighed 195 pounds. That's a lot for a 5' frame. I had stopped running, because frankly I couldn't do it anymore. That was quite depressing. I never liked it to be begin with, but now I can't even do it for a quarter of a mile sheesh. My legs and feet ached, and I was in denial about my diet. I said I was eating well, but my portions were out of control and I would pretty much over eat or over drink any chance I got. I guess my only saving grace is that I never stopped working out. By this time I was doing some programs half-assed like Turbo Jam and Turbo Fire. I did manage to lose some weight with them, and I really did like them, but I didn't have the drive or energy to do them everyday, and why do them if I wasn't getting anywhere with them. I didn't know it at the time, but I was quite depressed, stressed, my confidence was low and I was so disappointed in myself. Then I saw this picture of from a family reunion in Aug of 2011, and this was my turning point.



That was not me. I don't even know who that person is in that photograph. That was the point when I didn't want to be the short fat girl in the room anymore. I wanted to be the person that would brighten a room when I walked into it. I wanted people to notice me and feel my confidence, positivity and comfort. Hell, maybe even turn some heads. I knew that was never going to happen if I stayed in the rut that I was in.

So in Sept of 2011 I stopped dangling my feet in the water trying to test the temperature. I took a deep breath and jumped completely in. I got serious about my workouts and really started following the Turbo Fire program. I got serious about my NUTRITION. Not my diet, but my NUTRITION, and started drinking Shakeology. I got serious about my accountability. There is no better way to reach your goal than to surround with others who are working for the same goal and push you to get there. I even worked on my personality development. The book I recommend for learning about fitness and life long goals is Chalene Johnson's Push. I took baby steps in order to reach small goals one at time. It took time for me to get this low. It's going to take time for me to climb out. I started to see progress. Those baby steps snow balled into more momentum and more momentum. I developed healthy habits that I could live with and not feel deprived. I became addicted to working out, eating so that my body feels good and functions better and gaining success.




The best thing I did was come to terms that I am who I am. My body doesn't function like anyone else. I stopped comparing myself to others and do what I have to do in order to reach my goals. If that means I can't skip a weeks worth of workouts, I have to stick to a certain calorie count or miss out on Wed. drinks with co-workers then so be it. Truly being proud and confident in yourself is worth so much more than a plate of food or a weeknight beer.

So today I am 30lb lighter. I still have more to go, but it's no longer about how far I have to go. It's about how far I've come, and what I'm going to do to get better.