Weight Loss Journey
Here I am before losing 60 pounds.
Have you ever felt like life is passing you by? Yes, I have a wonderful family, fulfilling career, and no major crisis (at the moment!), but my mind always said to me, “I’ll try/do that when I lose weight.” Well, there I was about a year ago, well into my 50’s, (a girl can’t reveal her age), and realized that if I didn’t lose this weight NOW, there were some things I would never be able to do. Did someone say zip line? Travel? Just walking around the local fair or car show made my feet and hips hurt, (yes, we have those things in small town Ohio). How was I going to travel the world? I decided that I better begin this journey or I would end up on my death bed wishing I’d been able to do all those activities, “If only I’d lost that weight.”
I have tried numerous diets over the years, some organized, some on my own, but they never last long or, even worse, I gained the weight back rather quickly. So what has made a difference this time? It is my own diet. Or, rather, what I call my eating plan. It consists of foods I like! No trying to choke down foods that someone else says I should eat but taste, um, bad. Real foods that are healthy, cooked in a lean but delicious manner that really can be filling! Yes, I do keep track of calories – myfitnesspal.com is a great app and website. I mostly cut out pasta, bread, and sweets. The sweets were the hard part – I love chocolate anything – but I discovered something miraculous! After about a week or two, I no longer craved sugary snacks! Now, I do keep some individually wrapped Dove Caramel & Milk Chocolate candies in the pantry for craving emergencies – they’re forty calories each, and very satisfying, especially when I eat them SLOWLY, not just in one bite! It has been a long process, but that’s okay, because I can do this, well, forever. Here is an “after” picture my son recently took 
of me. It’s the first time I’ve been in a dress in probably twenty years – shocking, I know! I went shopping – and I’ve gone from a size 18 to a size 10. I will continue my eating plan to help lose another ten pounds and tone my muscles. The many benefits of having lost sixty pounds is incredible, but one of the most surprising was my migraines have almost completely disappeared!
