An "Old Life"

Warning --- this is my first entry on this blog. I'm going to take you on my journey from the beginning to the present. This blog will ultimately be about my own journey of weight loss, finding myself and adventures in exercise, etc. It will include my own personal thoughts and experiences, plenty of motivation, inspiration, and I'm sure a few surprises. This first entry, and probably the next several entries as well will be quite long and extensive. So brace yourself for a long read if you can manage to keep your eyes open, your mind interested, and your butt in the seat long enough to read through its entirety. I like to talk, (or in this case, type), so I'm not going to go easy on you, lol. :-) You ready for all this? I'm not sure I am. Been up since 7ish, and I'm already dragging the top of my body over the length of the counter top. Maybe some wake-up juice first (coffee, strong caffeine!)

**Alrighty, let's see if that helped.**. :-)

Let's start at the very beginning. A very good place to start --- Once upon a time there was this shy, fat girl. (She still can't to this day believe she ever allowed that to happen, but alas she did) She wasn't always fat, but for almost 17 years of her now 40 years of life, she was indeed: FAT. Yes, that's an ugly word. Sounds mean, vicious, judgmental, etc. but, it is, what it is. And I was that. Fat. What is "fat"?

**From the Merriam-Webster Medical Dictionary, 'Fat' is "notable for having an unusual amount of fat! Especially fleshy with superfluous flabby tissue that is not muscle."

**From Wikipedia, "Adipose, or fatty tissue Is the body's means of storing metabolic energy over extended periods of time. Depending on current physiological conditions, adipocytes store fat derived from the diet and liver metabolism or degrade stored fat to supply fatty acids and also glycerol to the circulation. These metabolic activities are regulated by several hormones (i.e., insulin, glucagon and epinephrine). The location of the tissue determines its metabolic profile: "visceral fat" is located within the abdominal wall (i.e., beneath the wall of abdominal muscle) whereas "subcutaneous fat" is located beneath the skin (and includes fat that is located in the abdominal area beneath the skin but above the abdominal muscle wall). Visceral fat was recently discovered to be a significant producer of signaling chemicals (i.e., hormones), among which are several which are involved in inflammatory tissue responses. One of these is resistin which has been linked to obesity, insulin resistance, and Type 2 diabetes. This latter result is currently controversial, and there have been reputable studies supporting all sides on the issue."

Okay, so there's your health/science lesson for the day. Basically, you need fat. Your brain needs it as well as your skin, and organs. But people today tend to eat all kinds of junk, even if it's as simple as chemically processed foods filled w/additives and preservatives. But, that's a whole different blog entry that I'll save for later. :-)

Let me get back to the beginning of my story -
My childhood. My childood was actually, just fine. I was very active. I was a tomboy. I didn't care for the "girly" toys, I wanted toys that would either make me use my creativity (Lite Brite, Spirograph, coloring books/crayons, this slimy gel-type science kit that made bugs and butterflies, but I can't remember the name of it, some kind of bug factory thing. But it was awesome!), or that got me active and outdoors. My favorites were my jump rope, pogo stick, roller skates and my 10 speed bike! I wanted to MOVE!! I wanted to be outside at all times! I couldn't stand playing w/dolls, the only Barbie Dolls I ever got were from friends who didn't know me well enough and gave them to me as birthday gifts. I think I took their body parts off to see how they worked, then gave them to my little sister. I did have a Barbie Bust, where I could style her hair and do her make-up. I did have that side of me - where I loved fashion, make-up, jewelry and hair. But, I had to be active and outdoors. In the winters, I was always out building snow forts and tunnels, sledding down the hill across from Algonquin Elementary School, dressing up in my snowsuit to go outside. In the summer, I had to be outside so much that my sister, our friends and I would camp out in the tent in our back yard all summer long. I had my sleeping bag, pillows, books, tv, Nintendo (the original, and by then I was already a sophomore in high school, lol), boom box and food! The only time we slept indoors was if it rained. I even so much as would prop the hose up over a tree branch and wash my hair outside. (Yeah, I know, I was so weird, but that never changed, lol -I still am) I rode my bike e-v-e-r-y-w-h-e-r-e!!! I also walked everywhere. I spent every afternoon riding around through the forest preserves by our house, up and down the big hill, and all 4+ miles around the lake. I went exploring everywhere as well. If it was nature related, I was all over that!

My mom didn't want my sister and I to get big, so she was very strict w/our diets. Never allowing sweets in the house. If we were at a function w/food, 2 small desserts was our limit. We were never allowed soda or Kool-Aid to drink. Milk and water. That's it. I thought we were living this awful life because we were missing out on all that good stuff that we were never allowed to have. Now, I do appreciate what my mom was trying to do. However, I think I may have been better off having some of those treats more often as a child.

By the time I grew up, got married and moved out on my own I felt I was in Heaven. I discovered something during the first few months in our little apartment in Florida, w/my new hubby (other than finding out by our 4th month into our marriage that I was 4 weeks pregnant) and that discovery was that I not only love to cook, but I'm actually pretty good at it, AND I no longer have mom and dad telling me what I can't eat! I realized that by being grown up and on my own, I can now purchase, eat and enjoy all the things I was never allowed to have growing up. By the time I was 6 months pregnant, I weighed 200 lbs. My hubby thought it was funny. I was devastated. I was 20 years old, and foolish enough to think I can "eat for two", and not worry too much about it while I'm pregnant. I was also foolish enough to believe that I would lose all that I gained during pregnancy (which by the day of my last prenatal office visit, the day before our son was born, I weighed in at 232 lbs) that after the baby was born, especially by nursing him. Ok, so I lost about 10 lbs after he was born, and I was only able to nurse him till he was 2 months old, after losing my milk. I didn't think about eating better or exercising. I just tried to not eat as much. Moving back home to Chicago, getting our own apartment there and trying to do a little more activity than I'd been doing, I think I may have lost another 5 lbs or so. Then by the time baby boy was around 9 months old I started watching late night infomercials such as Tony Little's workout tapes. I was sooooo wanting to get those, but it was a few years before I finally did.

**break - had to take c/o a disaster in the freezer that the kids found. All cleaned up now. Besides, you needed a break from reading the mundane run-on paragraph there. Now I'm ready to continue w/another mundane run-on paragraph.** :-)

So, baby boy's first birthday comes around and we discover we're now preggers w/baby boy #2. This time I was thoroughly determined NOT to put on 95-100 lbs (or whatever it was I'd gained w/baby #1). I ate smarter, a lot more fresh veggies, and I tried to not give in to bad cravings. In the end, I was gaining or losing at each doctor visit. So by the time he was born, I'd only gained a total of 9 lbs. I wasn't exactly proud of that, because I know baby needed momma to do better than that, but I was still glad I didn't put on the excess weight.

Moving on, I got sick w/a pretty darn big kidney stone when baby boy #2 was a year old, even went into septic shock before having a stint put in and lithotripsy to have it broken down so it would pass. During this time I managed to FINALLY drop below 200 lbs. but, it wasn't anything I was actually focused on. I was mainly just trying not to die at that point. Plus, we moved away from Chicagoland and out to southeastern Iowa w/hubby's new job. So, I got better. Got rid of that awful stone. And again started enjoying food and eating a lot of garbage again. I stoooopidly managed to put the weight back on that I'd lost while sick w/the stone. Then we decided to try for baby #3. Again, I was determined to not gain all that weight from #1, so I was careful how I ate....but also made sure I ate well enough for a healthy baby gain. By the time baby boy #3 was born, my total pregnancy gain was 25 lbs. A healthy good weight gain for baby boy. Then when we had baby boy #4, I only gained 13 lbs w/him. I tried to be careful w/him, and apparently was again, too careful.

So, a couple years later, we went through a tough trial and tribulation period of losing our only daughter (born too soon, after developing a placental abruption, having her born at 21 weeks and surviving 90 min before fading out), and we decided we needed a whole new start on our life. Moved the fambly (yes, I call them my fambly) out to west central Illinois, where 12 years later, we're still here, in the same house, loving life! We made some friends during our first year out here and discovered we all loved getting together for all kinds of reasons. Including eating out at restaurants - a WHOLE lot, and ordering all kinds of appetizers and desserts, doing birthday parties for all the kids in our families, sometimes birthday parties for the moms and dads as well. Then the holiday parties - Hallowe'en, New Year's, Easter egg hunt parties, Memorial Day, 4th of July - and food was always the main factor. Lots and lots and LOTS of foooooood. All that eating made me very lazy, and very, very fat! I never wanted to go outside. I never wanted to participate in any activity. I never wanted to do anything physical. But sitting around w/all our friends and all kinds of food, glorious food....yup! That I could do! Weekly visits to Applebees w/our friends was also a must! This was a far cry of my previous life in my childhood! I managed to get up to 264 lbs by the time I was 30.

I made a decision. Right after my 30th birthday, I went to my doc and told her "I spent all of my 20's in a food frenzy, being fat, lazy and miserable! I want you to help me change that" She sent me to a nutritionist, and working w/both of them, I was eating a low carb diet. This was back when the Atkins Diet was probably at its highest popularity peak. So, I followed along w/the plan and a month into it, I'd lost 20 lbs. Doc said I was doing real good. But then I started slowing down on the carb free diet, therefore stopped losing. By April, I was back up to 252. I was asked to be matron of honor in a friends wedding. And the style of dress that was chosen for me was an empire waisted floor length dress w/a shawl. And it was all a royal purple. The dresses were beautiful, the wedding was beautiful, my hair was beautiful. The pictures were not. I nick-named my dress "the purple hot air balloon", because it was sooooooo huge. And the reason it was so huge, was because I was soooooo huge! Yet, I still didn't pay much attention to my low carb diet anymore. However, I did realize by the end of July, after being more physically active (thanks the boys playing team baseball), and w/o knowing I was - but eating less, I'd managed to lose 20 lbs. This was w/o even trying at this point. By early August, I was so excited about losing weight, I decided to go w/it! We live out in the country, in the middle of a corn/bean field, literally, and our driveway is a 1/4 of a mile from the house down to the road. So, I figured if I just walk the length of the driveway 4 times down and back, that'd equal a mile! I started doing that everyday through October of '02, till it was getting too cold to be outside. Then I realized I was craving more physical activity, and walking everyday wasn't enough. I'd increased my walking to an hour each day, about 3-3.5 miles, started using 8-15 lb dumbbells, and I pulled out an old exercise bike my parents gave me. I was also using a Total Gym system (you remember? You know, the Chuck Norris infomercial's??) but, that was borrowed from a friend till he needed it back. Doing all this stuff, and wanting more, I had finally lost 88 lbs - or somewhere around that. I did that between Aug '02 - Jan '03. 5 months. That's a lot of weight to lose in 5 months. So, it made sense that I'd hit a plateau. But, I wasn't eating right. A lot of the time, I wasn't eating at all. Very, very small salads, very little other food. I was starving myself more than eating smarter. By spring, my hubby got me a Bowflex system. I fell in love w/that machine!! I still love it, even though now it sits in the garage, stored away, collecting dust. But, I was using it, hubby and his friends were using it, our oldest son even started using it, and he was only 10 at the time. It got a lot of use until hubby decided he was taking a 2 week break towards the end of July that year. So, I took a break as well. Turned out that break was permanent. Neither of us ever got back into it. I was still sitting at that same plateau of a 3 lb +/- range of my lowest loss at the time. Then w/o even realizing I was doing it, I started eating heavy again. And eating desserts again. No more walking. No more exercising. No more ambition to lose. The only ambition I had was to enjoy food again. It took no-time-at-all to put all that weight I'd lost, right back on again.

By the next summer (2004), I started walking again, but that was it. I managed to lose maybe about 20 lbs, but when winter came, I went back into hibernation mode. Spring of '05 comes around, I get a family membership at the local Y and start really putting myself into it again. The 20 lbs I'd put back on over that winter, I managed to lose again. Fall of '05 comes around, and as usual, I put myself back into hibernation mode, no exercising, enjoying eating sweets and comfort foods, putting that 20 lbs right back on again. Only, it wasn't just 20 lbs this time. This time I'd gotten up to my biggest weight ever. I weighed in at 283 lbs, I was wearing a size 22 - correction....I was SQUEEZING into a size 22, because I refused to admit I was actually a size 24, and wouldn't buy bigger clothes to fit more comfortably. I was in 3X shirts, and I wouldn't be caught dead in a swimsuit w/o a huge t-shirt to hide all my rolls. And even that was a rare occasion (to be in a swimsuit, that is). I was F.A.T. ("flabby and tub-sized"). Winter of 2006 was my lowest point, my biggest size, my heaviest weight.

At that point, I was contemplating gastric bypass surgery. Did a lot of research online, and it pretty much scared the living daylights out of hubs and I. It seemed dangerous, so instead of having the surgery, I opted to just eat a diet as if I'd had gastric bypass. I found how gastric patients were supposed to eat through various websites, and came up w/my own plan. I got myself back into the gym, followed my eating plan and actually lost 50 lbs that summer. I was thrilled! Buuuuuuuuuuuuuut.........winter 2007 came around, AGAIN, showing its ugly face and reminding me how much I hate the cold, how much I hate any kind of physical activity when it's cold, and how much I love comfort foods and sweets. So, I put weight back on. AGAIN. By summer, I was back at the Y, but I only managed a 10 lb loss by fall.

February 2008 I weighed in at 274 lbs. I was just sick w/myself. We were contemplating doing some remodeling on the house. But decided I needed some remodeling first. I had some major dental work done to regain my smile, and by summer of 2008, I'd had enough. Permanently enough. I made a decision, and I was going to do it this time.

This time, I decided I'm going to work on losing weight again, only I will make sure I get permanent results, and not ever, ever going back.

Stay tuned...............