Reached my first goal weight - and some NSVs, too!

00Melyanna00

Last week I have reached my first goal weight, which is the weight I knew would make me feel comfortable again. It’s been a three months long journey that is still in progress, as I have a new goal (the weight that I believe is right for my bone structure, to have a safe and good body fat percentage and to improve my running) and then I will have to maintain what I fought for.

However, I strongly believe that our weight does not define us. It does not say what kind of persons we are and certainly does not make us good or bad.
My body is my temple, but it’s not who I am, so here is a list of the things I’ve done in the past three months – I believe that this list does a much better job defining me, than my stats will ever do.

1) Met online friends here on MFP. Persons I really admire and that I am honored to be friends with; persons that inspire me to keep working on my health, to keep facing difficulties in my life with courage and strength; persons that, in sharing their thoughts and struggle, helped me becoming a better person.
2) Helped people with a little advice (the little I have to give) here and there and in general with my support. I really hope to be able to keep doing this in the future and to get better at it.
3) Brought my heart rate at rest to a healthy level. I was on beta-blockers before, but I don’t need them any more now.
4) Fixed my digestive system, so I don’t get heartburns anymore and I can go to sleep without taking any drug to help my digestion.
5) Took up running. I can run for more than 50 minutes without ever stop and my goal is to be able to do a 10 Kms run in one hour or less. I can’t wait for my parents to get a dog, so I can take him/her out for a run every day. I also want to subscribe to at least one charity run per year. When I first joined MFP, running for more than 30 seconds was too much for me. I still can’t believe I made so much progress!
6) Subscribed to a yoga class. I love yoga, I love doing it and I love feeling self confident enough to be in a class with other people and have a good time.
7) Stopped stressing about work when at home and generally learned how to dedicate enough time and attention to my health. The main reason I had become out of shape was that I didn’t want to find the time to dedicate to my health, because I thought other things were more important (mainly work – I truly was a workaholic). Nothing is as important as our health, so it is important that I take those 30 minutes for myself every day and run, go for a walk or train. No matter if people think I have better things to do and if require my attention: those 30 minutes are for myself and are important.
8) Overcame the hatred I had for my legs. Yes, all my body fat is collected there. Yes, after I had hit puberty, they never looked lean, even at my lowest weight. But who cares? It’s thanks to my legs that I can go everywhere I want to, that I can swim, walk and run, and I am really thankful for all this. I can wear skinny jeans tucked into my wellies when it rains now, without feeling self conscious about my legs. I can go to the pool wearing a swimsuit - if other people notice and care about my cellulite, stretchmarks and big legs, bad for them, they should definitely get a hobby.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, yes, I do have a new goal weight, but I am more relaxed about reaching it, since I feel rather good already. I’ll get there and stay healthy, because my lifestyle is better than it was before.
The next challenge will be to learn how to listen to my body and only eat when I am hungry. I am still an emotional eater, I haven’t conquered this yet, and counting calories helps me understanding when to stop and what I can or can’t eat. But in the future, I want to be free from calories counting and to be able to maintain a healthy body without worrying about the numbers on the scale and without counting calories.
I am already working on it – reviewing the foods I logged in the past months and learning how to balance my meals without looking at the numbers. I am confident I will soon learn to enjoy food, but to make sure it’s not replacing something else.