Hi Friends!
Hope you're enjoying your day so far! I've had a lot of you ask what motivated me to lose weight and how I did it. My Aunt Barb emailed me this week with this question. She inspired the post. So here it goes...
The thing is I didn't wake up one day and say to myself "I need to lose weight & my goal is 80 pounds." As a matter of fact, I never started my journey with a diet or thought about losing weight. It was never a planned goal to lose weight. My weight loss journey began as a fitness goal. I was traveling to California weekly as a consultant and began walking on the beach every night.
Truth is I was bored with life. I wasn't living or experiencing life. I had low self-confidence for as long as I can remember and that transformed into a fear of failing which I carried around with me from childhood into adulthood. Instead of trying things, I held myself back to be safe.
Walking on the beach every night became a turning point in my life which drastically changed who I was and my confidence. It was my time to reflect. Who am I? What's important to me? What do I want to experience in life? Why am I scared of living? I realized I wasn't confident in myself. I had been a size 12 or 14 since high school. I tried to diet and lose weight so many times, but was never successful. Then I injured my leg in 2000 which became an excuse for me to avoid exercising. It was also a major player in my low self-esteem.
So what was different about my experience 5 years ago? I stopped thinking about dieting and started thinking about living. I was thinking about how I wanted to be healthy, experience life, be confident and most important...STOP allowing my injury to define me. As I walked every night, the weight began to shed from my body as did the fear.
Within a few weeks, I dropped 10 pounds. When that happened I felt empowered. I could take on anything in the world. It was an incredible feeling. From that moment, I was determined to lose more weight. I began changing my eating habits, tracking my calories and watching my portions. Everything fell into place.
A couple before & after pics.
Before Weight-Loss
During Weight-Loss (after 10 pounds lost)
After Weight Loss
Today...Still Getting Stronger
Looking back, I wish I had documented my weight-loss better with pictures. But like I said, it wasn't planned it just happened. In the end, I lost 80 pounds in 18 months. My relationship with health and fitness blossomed into the love I have for it today.
What's my advice to those of you wanting to lose weight? Stop thinking about diets. Diets are trends, short-term. Look inside yourself and find out what's motivating you to lose weight. Identify things you can change in your eating and activity to lead a more healthy lifestyle. Small changes add up big over time. If you stick with and are patient, it will happen.
What's your weight-loss motivation story?
Lots of Health, Food & Love,
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You look amazing!
Thank you!
Just found your blog and your story is so impressive! Calorie counting has always turned a little too obsessive when I've done it (I'm pretty neurotic to begin with), so it's neat to see that you were able to have great success with it. Looking forward to reading more. 🙂
I'm not sure why but this website is loading incredibly slow for me.
Is anyone else having this issue or is it a problem on my end?
I'll check back later and see if the problem still exists.
Working fine and I verified multiple platforms.
Congrats on the weight loss and how much you've learned since then! I lost loads of weight 25 years ago, and then after dealing with thyroid issues lost 100 pounds 2 years ago. I'm glad I did a good job of tracking my progress when I lost weight this time ... it is great looking at pictures along the way.
Hi there! I could have sworn I've been to this
blog before but after browsing through some of the post I realized it's new to
me. Anyways, I'm definitely delighted I found it and I'll be bookmarking and checking back often!
So proud of you!
XO,
Mom
Great story! My health is motivating me. In August I was 7 points away in my glucose fast test from being diabetic. I also had gestational diabetes while pregnant so my chances are much greater of being diabetic. I decided enough was enough and made the choice to start exercising. The food part is still a big challenge but in just a few short months my glucose went from nearly diabetic to just at the top end of normal. 🙂
Congrats, Wendy! That is great you were able to conquer diabetes. I can relate to your food challenge. Food and portions continue to be a battle for me. I will post on this topic. Thanks for the idea! 🙂