{L-Picture from highest weight, R-Down 85 lbs}

My personal weight loss journey losing 90 pounds.

I've been thinking about sharing my story for a while. But, being vulnerable is hard. I decided to share it while I have the courage to do so. June 24th, 2024. My husband's birthday. I decided I was done. I was done yo-yo dieting just to lose weight and gain it back.I was done hurting. I was done not being able to breathe. My neck was so large that I had to wear tank tops to be able to breathe. I couldn't bend down or get up. My joints hurt. I was a shell of myself and I was miserable. I was good at faking it, and blaming everything else besides taking responsibility of my own actions leading me to letting myself continue to gain weight. While this has been on my mind for a few weeks to share, I always chickened out. It wasn't an easy thing to actually put time into to sharing. But I hope, if one person who needs to see this feels encouraged. Then it was worth it. This might have to be a multiple part story, and that is okay too. Let's start at the beginning. When I was a kid, I'd say around 9-10 I remember never being full. I could eat as much as my dad and still not be full. Always feeling hungry. I liked the creativity of cooking. Flavors were exciting and I liked to eat what we created. When you don't feel full, this becomes a problem before you even realize it. I remember being in 5th grade and weighing 100 pounds. I was the biggest in my class. I think a part of my weight gain was the adjustment from moving back to the United States from growing up overseas. I came to the US with a British accent and no background on the cultural norms of being raised in the US. Around this age, a mix of starting to lose energy from gaining weight, hormones, and diet this is where I started to gain. I was always dense, and active for my size but continued to gain. {Trigger warning}. Stop here if the discussion of an eating disorder will be hard to read. There wasn't a ton of change for a few years. But Freshman year of high school, I was sick of being the "fat'" kid. I realized that I had hit a growth spurt and I could make it work to my advantage and finally get thin. I became bulimic and anorexic. I would eat, purge, and then work out. At this time, I was swimming, running at the Y and then coming home to do abs, eat a bite of two of chicken and then back to the treadmill. I remember at one point, while at the YMCA looking at my stomach surprised I had a 6 pack. Still feeling fat. Still not thin enough. I would work harder, I would train harder, I would finally get thin. This was not sustainable. I confided in a youth group leader that I was struggling and she told my parents. Back then, there wasn't as much help with eating disorders or mental health. I feel like "getting caught" and burning out myself, I eventually wasn't as focused on working out. I turned my attention to friends, fun and trying to survive high school. Towards the end of high school, the eating disorder came back when I joined Weight Watchers and was surviving off of turkey and mustard because they were "free points". What I was really doing was tanking my hormones, so that when I would eat regularly, I would gain anything that I lost back. I was starving myself to try and get the "perfect" body. Lord willing, my children will not feel these same struggles. While for some, this will be excruciatingly painful to read, I hope it brings hope as you read on. At this point, I wasn't kind, was obstinate and trying to find happiness without much luck. Shortly after this time, I met my husband. I was 19 broken and spicy. I stopped worrying so much about my weight and was focused on the newness of a new relationship. I remember losing weight before we had our son and yo-yo dieting through us having children. I would gain weight, lose weight, get pregnant, and then repeat the cycle. My 5'4 frame always squishy in the mid section. It was easy to blame it on pregnancy, easy to blame it on having picky kiddos, being busy, etc. But truthfully, none of that was all of the truth. Fast forward years of hormone imbalance, poor treatment of my body and poor eating habits. I finally got on the scale in June of 2024 and realized that if I didn't change something, I wouldn't be around to see my grandchildren. About a year before this, my dad came to me and said he would do anything to help me. But, I wasn't ready. Truthfully, I'm not sure what the finally step was that got me to start. But, what better time to start, than my husband's birthday. Before I start to talk about things that I have done in the last 7 months. I want to encourage mothers, take pictures. Get in pictures. Take whole body pictures. If you ever think you will be on a weight loss journey, don't stay out of pictures because of your dislike for yourself. I wish now that I had them. One to show how stinking hard I worked, but to that girl, she deserved to be documented too. Despite not wanting to be seen. I remember telling my kids not to take my picture because I didn't want to see it. I wouldn't look in the mirror. It was bad. But here is the story of redemption and change. Here is the part that I hope encourages anyone who has gotten this far. I decided to go all in. I wanted to change from the inside out. Fix my hormones, blood sugar, metabolism. Everything. I joined weight watchers, and started to track everything that went into my mouth. I knew that when I ate dairy I didn't feel well, but needed a little, felt better with low carbs, and felt good with high protein. So that was the base. I drank a lot of water, ate my body weight in eggs, cottage cheese/greek yogurt, turkey, broccoli, protein shakes, and slowly modified what I was eating. Definitely have food obsessions where I eat them every day for weeks on end, and then can't touch them now. I am still low carb, I don't eat rice, pasta, or bread. For myself, I'm an ALLLLL or nothing type of gal. So I stay away from deserts. When I am craving them, that is when I will make sure I have a protein shake that day. I don't get loaded up coffee's any more. And really only go to Starbucks for their egg bites or snacks for the kids. Oh, and I gave up alcohol about 2 years ago. I'm going to start writing down recipes that have gotten me through this. Gotten me away from being a binge eater and able to sustain. I started walking with our daughter between 3-5 times a week, and guess what. My mood is completely different. My husband says my spark is back. I'm genuinely happy, and realize how much I was faking it before. I didn't think I was unhappy if you would have asked me, but now. I see the difference. If you are struggling with losing weight, need a friend, or want to hear more tips on how I did it? Reach out! I'm an open book. My kiddos and I are going to put together a cook book. And I'm excited to share some healthy and some healthy-ish recipes. I can't wait to see what the future holds. From here, my goals are to lose the 30 lbs I need to lose to get to goal weight, tone up, continue to increase my strength training and continue to listen to what my body needs. Sometimes, I look in the mirror and can't believe I'm here. Gosh I wish I would have taken daily pictures. But, from the girl who avoided the camera to now wishing I had them. What a huge change. I hope if you read this. It encourages you. I hope that it shows you that if you have struggled with an eating disorder, binge eating, or anything else food related it is possible to get a healthy relationship with food.