The Real Me

This year has been an experience. A huge part of that experience has been my weight loss. I am within 5 pounds of having lost 100 pounds! I started Weight Watchers the second week in January of this year, and I hope that I will have lost 100 pounds by the second week of January 2011. A hundred pounds lost in a year...I can't even imagine.

Me after losing almost 100 pounds

The other day some of my family members dug out pictures of me from last Christmas. They are heartbreaking to look at. I joked that I couldn't believe they let me out in public looking like that, but in reality I only see how miserable I was. There's not many pictures of me around because I wouldn't let people take pictures. I refused to even really look at myself in the mirror, choosing instead to use only a small hand mirror to put on my make-up in the morning. I hated everything about the way I looked and felt.

As I looked at those pictures and reflected back on my life for the last 8-10 years of being over-weight, I began to realize that losing all that weight has allowed me to be who I really am.  Thinking back, I realize now that I felt as if I was wearing a fat suit and that I should be able to just take it off whenever I wanted. It never seemed real that I weighed so much, that I looked so big. In my mind and in my dreams, I was still average sized. It was a shock every time I saw myself in a photo or a mirror.

People who know me have commented on how my attitude has changed with the weight loss. I am happier and it shows. It has helped me out in my relationships and at work.

I'm often heard to say, "Nothing tastes as good as being thin feels." This is so true because feeling thin is so much different that I ever thought it would be (or remembered it being) when I was fat. Knowing that I look better is only half of why being thin feels good. Attitude is the other half. I am just an all around happier person, and I think it is because I can now be the person I really was on the inside. I don't have to feel like the real me is being hidden under layers of fat and giant clothes that are meant to try to hide how fat I really was.

I'm not done; I still have over 30 pounds to lose, but the big change has already happened. I can be me now; I feel as if others can now see the real me.

If you are overweight and are unhappy with how you look and feel, then I encourage you to finally make the decision to make a permanent life-style change for the better because NOTHING tastes as good as being thin feels!

75 Pounds Lost!

So excited to have finally reached my 75 pound mark! It has been 8 months, so I'm losing at a pretty good rate. I am hoping to reach 100 by the end of the year (by Christmas would be awesome), or at least by the second week in January.  That will mean I have lost 100 lbs in a year.  I believe it is totally doable.

In my meeting yesterday I talked about my ultimate goal.  My ultimate goal is to be happy about my body for the first time in my life.  Sure, I was skinny (normal) in high school, but I didn't know it. I thought I was fat, when really I was just tall.  My friends were just over 5 foot and wearing size 4 jeans; my mom was constantly watching and judging what I ate. I had a terrible body image, which I believe is part of why I gained so much weight.  Since I thought I was fat, what was one more pound?  One more pound eventually became over 100 more pounds.

When I was young, I had an unrealistic idea of what my body was supposed to look like. Today, I am more realistic.  When I reach my goal weight, I will believe I will be happy with my body for the first time in my life.  It won't be perfect, and I will still probably be trying to shape and sculpt, but I will no longer see myself as the fat girl. I can't wait for that day...

Single Saturday #5 - Maybe I'm Worth It

As I continue to reshape my body by losing weight I have started to see dating as a possibility again. I have become used to being single, and I have even managed to convince myself that I'm happy being single. To some degree it is true that I'm happy being single.  There are so many things that I can do as a single woman that would be much harder if I had someone living with me. Sole control of the remote, popcorn for supper (more likely pita bread and hummus), I can leave a mess in the living room for a few days and no one will see it, etc.

The more weight I lose, however, the more I come to realize that I haven't felt like I deserve to date someone while overweight. Even more than that, I can't imagine anyone that I would find attractive, would want to date someone who is overweight. I'm not attracted to overweight guys, why would any man be attracted to an overweight woman?  This has really gotten me thinking about why I am single; was it a choice?

I've never been the type of person who likes to put themselves out there.  In school, I never wanted my friends to know which guy I was crushing on at the time.  I always felt that if they knew, something would go wrong. Maybe they would tell him I liked him; if he didn't like me, that would be disastrous.  I was also afraid that they would constantly be watching me to see how I would react when around my crush.  It just wasn't worth it my mind.  Needless to say, I never told guys I liked them.  Since then I've always said that I'm happy the way I am, but if God wants to send me a guy, I'm good with that too.

There was also that constant belief that no guy would think I was pretty enough or interesting enough to date.  I don't think I've ever really thought that.  I wrote a post once where I had a picture of me in high school, and I still can't believe that I thought guys wouldn't find me attractive.  Besides believing I was overweight, I also had a lot of insecurities about being taller than most of the guys.  Today that wouldn't be an issue; girls are allowed to be tall, but in the mid 90s, I was a freak, and I sure didn't think guys would want to date me.

I struggle with the same issues today, but now I really am overweight...plus I'm getting to the point where most guys my age are already married.  There's no way I will ever find a guy who wants me, so instead I "choose" to remain single.  I don't even try, because I said before: no guy I would want, would want me as I am...

Maybe I will eventually feel worth it.  Maybe I never will.  Odds are I will never put myself out there either way.

I'm Still A Loser...Baby

I have been doing Weight Watchers since the beginning of the year and have lost 60 pounds. I'm not losing as fast as I was at the beginning, but I'm still losing.

I'm only a pound from my next mini-goal of 245 pounds.  At that point I will truly know that I am below 250 pounds, never to see it again.  Then my next goal is to hit the halfway point in my weight loss (66 pounds lost, or 240 pounds). After that, I am setting my mini-goals at 25 pound intervals until I hit my ultimate goal of 175.  At 6 foot tall, that puts me pretty close to my high school weight...and I was skinny then.

At this point, I can now see myself actually getting under 200 pounds. I don't even know how long it has been since I've been under 200 pounds.  I really need to start exercising again so that my weight loss will go faster.  Being on vacation means I don't have much of a routine as well as feeling like "I'm on vacation, so I'm not going to exercise", but I know I need to.

I am starting to really feel and see a change in my body, both in appearance and how I feel.  I am down two dress sizes and have had to buy new clothes.  I've given away three trash bags full of clothes that are too big.  I can see the change in my face.  I am really glad that my face is thinning. It used to be one of my best features.  I can actually start to look at myself in the mirror again.

I would love to hear people's weight loss success stories.

50 Pounds Down!

I weighed in Tuesday, and I finally hit my 50 pounds-lost goal! And I made it by June 1st. It is such a major step in the process. I still have almost 80 pounds to go until I hit my ultimate weight loss goal, but I know now that I can do it!

One good thing about the fact that it is going to take me well over a year to lose all the weight is that I am really given the time to create a new lifestyle change. Already I have begun to see food differently than I have most of my life. Although I still love food, I no longer love to eat. This is a big step for me. I still really enjoy what I am eating if it is something I really like, but I no longer love the process of eating. Part of this is because I don't let myself eat whatever I want, whenever I want, so I guess I've sort of broke the habit...

I have dropped two dress sizes. I started out at a size 24 (I hate to admit that--and almost ready to grow out of that, and I'm down to a size 20) Luckily, I had saved several pairs of pants and a pair of shorts or two from my "skinnier" days as a size 22 in case I ever lost weight, but I've already dropped down below that, so even some of them are becoming too big. Most of my cropped pants are size 24 and can really no longer be worn. I'm glad to need new pants, but hate to spend money one them when I plan to continue to lose weight. Today I finally had to stop by JC Penny last minute and buy 2 pairs of crops to get me by for the summer. Luckily, I found some on sale. I guess it's a good problem to have!

My next mini-goal is to drop below 250, so I am setting that goal at 245 pounds (safely below 250), so I have almost another 10 to go. Then I will be close to having lost half of the total weight I need to lose (66lbs), so that will be the next mini goal, which will be really close to 75 pounds lost which will be the next goal. I find that setting mini goals help me to keep my spirits up and not just see this as a long, long journey.

The Front Steps

This is my latest project. My front steps finally became too rotten to be safely trod upon. I had hired my dad's cousin-in-law back in October to build me a deck, but he never did. He finally had to be called in for emergency construction of a deck. Today he bought the new lumber and tore down the old steps. I tore out the front walk (that's the timbers stacked up) and the flagstone landing because it has to be moved.

I am so excited about my new deck. It's going to be small (12x6), but It's going to have a tin roof on it! I'm so excited about that. It'll mean I will have a place to put flowers without the sun killing them faster than I can keep them watered! I just want a spot to sit and read in the shade. I am really looking forward to reading out there on a day when it is gently raining.

***Weight Loss Update***
I have now lost just over 45 pounds (261.2lbs). I still have 5 pounds to lose in order to hit 50 pounds lost by June. Not sure If I will do it or not; it'll be close. Either way, I'll lose that 50 and once I get to 245 pounds I will have hit my first big weight loss goal!

My sister-in-law had a dream this week that I had lost all my weight. She's never seen me except as over-weight. I asked her if I looked good and she said yes! Can't wait to make that true. Another 90 pounds to go...