My Struggles

mood: pumped up, sorta
pandora/ipod: "hella good" by no doubt

I used to be an athlete. Not that you'd know that by looking at me now, but there was a time when I was one of the better soccer players in my area. I thought I'd go to college and play there. Until I ripped my ACL to shreds and had to have it replaced junior year.

That surgery had many consequences.

1. I was no longer being scouted to play soccer in college.
2. I started to take my singing more seriously.
3. My physical activity level dropped like an two-ton anchor.

While I could never have predicted the results of #1 and #2, I should have been able to predict the fallout of #3. I went to college a year and a half later. And started to get fat.

Slightly down from my heaviest, as Lucille Ball, Halloween 2009

Thus began my 13 year battle with my weight.

I wasn't a chubby kid. I was a dancer and a soccer player from the age of 5. Always active. But then college came and if I couldn't play soccer well, screw it, I wasn't doing anything athletic. By junior year I had ballooned up and I wasn't able to take it off until I was in grad school.

Up, then down. Up, then down. I've done most of the popular diets over the years (I dropped like 30 lbs on the South Beach Diet for my wedding) but the problem, as anyone who struggles with their weight knows, is that once you stop the diet, the weight comes back. Miraculous, right?

When my marriage faltered, I started gaining again. Then I began writing and while writing saved my sanity through my divorce, it's not exactly an "active" hobby. Before I knew it, my clothes weren't fitting again. Ugh. That's the worst feeling in the world, isn't it? You're going through a stressful personal crisis that shakes your self-esteem and on top of it you're getting fat?

Yeah. Awesome.

*headdesk*

I look back at some of the photos of me from three or four years ago and you can almost see how unhappy I am, even when I'm smiling. It wasn't because I had gained weight either, the pounds were a product of the unhappiness and low sense of self-worth.

February, 2010 - starting to climb out of the abyss

This ringing true with anyone else out there?

But for every down there is an up. 2010 was a good year for me in many ways: writing, singing, personal life. And gradually - so gradually I didn't even realize it was happening - I was happy again.

July, 2010 - feeling better...

And with happiness came another awesome side effect. I started losing weight. I wasn't dieting. I wasn't getting on the scale everyday. People kept telling me I looked like I'd lost weight but I figured they were reacting to my renewed sense of vigor. Then just this past Thursday I had to go to the doctor and, oh, the Dreaded Scale of Doom!!!

Which told me I've lost 20 lbs. in the last few months.

20-freaking-lbs.

November, 2010 - down more than 20 lbs. from Lucille Ball - and feeling FIERCE!

I wish I could say there was a magic elixir, but there isn't. I hate gyms and pretty much refuse to go unless forced or coerced, but I own a dog and decided a year ago to take him on "serious" walks everyday. Like 45 minutes to an hour. I bought some toning shoes, mapped out some routes through my neighborhood that maximize the hills, and I shlep my ass outside every night after work with that little 6lb. dog.

So, I don't know how it happened, but it did. I'm not as "skinny" (relative - I've never been a skinny girl) as I was on my wedding day, but I'm at a place where I feel sexy. To be honest, I'm not sure I could have dropped any weight while I was still so unhappy with my life. The two things go together for me, either bolstering each other or entangled in a downward death spiral.

Now let's just pray POSSESS sells well so I don't have to bury my sorrows in fried food. :D