It's been a year!

Yesterday marked the one year of actually giving a damn about my health.

A year ago I had just gone through a break-up. I wasn't exactly at my heaviest weight, but certainly not my lightest, and I was miserable. The buttons on my size 12 dress pants were threatening to pop off because they were under such strain. I had a small selection of clothes I could wear that hid the fact that my stomach hung over my pants in every direction, and even those didn't hide it well. I was lazy. I would go home, change into my pajamas and curl up on the couch in front of the tv or with a book. I was prediabetic from age 8, always overweight, and had virtually no self esteem.

I talked two of my coworkers into signing up for memberships at the Gilruth, a NASA center that the place I work for has a partnership with. Why I had never taken advantage of that before in my (then) eight years with my employer, I have no idea. I think the level of miserable I finally hit kicked my rear into gear.

A year ago, I wouldn't have believed that I would still be going. Hell, even my mother didn't believe it. I asked her to join the gym with me in the beginning, but she wasn't willing to pay when she didn't think I would keep up with it. I really don’t blame her – I talk big and I talked about losing weight often. About ten pounds down I had gone to see my gynecologist to see if there was anything he would recommend for me because of my issues with PCOS, but instead of getting any kind of answers, he said "good luck." Not in the supportive, kind way you would expect from someone with any kind of bedside manner, but with a "yeah, right" kind of tone. Then he proceeded to tell me that it would be the hardest thing I would ever have to do and though he has patients who could lose 15 pounds in a month, I would never be one of them. That physical or emotional trauma would make me lose weight, like a car accident or being stranded on a deserted island or (wait for it) being put in a concentration camp. Then he proceeded to tell me that I needed to go to the gym and while I was there, picture all of the things that I ate so that I knew exactly why I was there working so hard. Seriously? :noway:

Anyway, I'm posting in Motivation and Support instead of Success Stories for a reason – it’s been a year, but I'm nowhere near where I want to be. Yes, I've had success... but in the twelve months that I've been trying to get myself into shape, I spent six of those in what feels like a never-ending plateau with no change whatsoever (scale OR inches). But it’s been a year, and the wonderful people that I have met here (and those I casually stalk in the forums) have been huge motivators for me. I’m not where I thought I would be after a year of hard work, but seeing how far I have come is motivation for me to keep going and gives me the determination to finish what I’ve started.

My current routine is just that – routine. I do the same thing week after week and I think I am in need of a change if I want my body to continue to change. Right now I do an hour and a half on an adaptive motion trainer, two hours “shaking booty” in a dance class, three hours body pump, and one hour of kickboxing a week (on a good week). I'm looking into hiring a trainer for a few sessions so that I can get into lifting and make sure that I'm doing it right.

Onto the photos!


First pic taken May, 2012, second in December 2012


First pic, unknown date and probably my heaviest; second picture May, 2012; third picture in December 2012


Taken this morning. Sorry for the poor lighting and the scuffs all over the mirror. If I had thought about it at home I would have taken it there!


For potential FAQs:
-Start weight was 174, current weight is usually somewhere around 141, though I range between 139 and 147 pretty regularly with water weight (which to me is a bit extreme, but I don’t eat poorly enough to gain six pounds overnight, then drop it two days later).
-I’m 5’3”
-I wore XL tops and size 12 pants, now in M tops and 6 pants (though those also range anywhere from a 4 to a 9 depending on brand)
-I think my diary is open, but if you look at it you won’t get anything. I have a terrible habit of logging my food. I do overeat occasionally, but I’m usually pretty good. I’m hoping to get my butt back into gear and log more!

Thanks for listening!