My 6 year progress story from the heart with pics!

Like many people, I've struggled with my weight my entire life. As a child, my mom worked all the time and my dad wasn't in the picture so eating healthy just wasn't a thought in my household. Instead we ate what was on sale at the grocery store. If it was quick to make, that's what we ate. It was a lot of processed food and unfortunately, fast food. Those bad eating habits transferred over to my teenage years. When I was hanging with friends we would always be scarfing down pizza or something fatty and I never stopped to think about calories or what I was doing to my body. Once I had moved out on my own with my boyfriend at the time, we never cooked and always went out to eat. Again, I still wasn't thinking about how bad I was eating and never realizing that I was over-weight.

In 2005 I moved to Florida with my boyfriend and was working as a server in a sports bar. I worked long hours and would still continue to eat poorly because of my weird work schedule. At the end of 2006, I turned 21 and things got worse. Now when I would get out of work at 1am, I would go out to have "one" beer with co-workers and that of course always turned out to be more than one. I would also be catching myself hitting up McDonald's after the bar because of late night munchies, which now I just cringe at the thought of. What was I doing to myself?! It went on like that for a few more years and other factors played a part like a bad break-up and then later being in a different, emotionally abusive relationship. I was depressed, hated the way I looked and had no love or respect for myself. I was a mess.

In 2009 I moved to California. Once I got out of that emotionally abusive relationship, things really started to change for me. I had positive people around me and decided that I wanted to live a better and healthier life. I wanted to be happy and I was willing to do whatever it took. I started the p90x program, did the nutritional plan and the weight started falling off. I was making progress and I was happy!

Since then and now, it hasn't been easy. Life hands you curve balls and you lose track of the path you wanted to be on. There have been moments where I've been focused on my health and there have been times where I've fallen off. It sucks. The only good thing is that I never gave up for too long and I've never completely lost sight of my path.

The past couple of years have been incredible. I've pushed harder then I ever have and completely changed the way I think. I now know that because life is so unpredictable, there are going to be times where I won't have time to work out. I work two jobs now so it has been a struggle to find time but I've been making sure that I MAKE time. I know what I want and it requires focus and dedication. Before it used to be about which diet would make me lose weight the fastest but now I don't want to be "skinny"; I want to be strong and healthy!

I could go on and on because I'm so proud of how far I have come but the purpose of me posting this is to hopefully inspire and motivate people that have been or are in my shoes. If you're struggling to push yourself or just starting, don't give up! You will have days, maybe weeks where life happens and you can't work out as much as you want. The key is not to give up and throw it all away, but to pick up where you left off. You can do it! Don't focus on the big picture so much and just take it one day at a time. Make each day count! If you can't work out, watch what you eat. If you slip and give in to that cupcake someone brought to work, don't beat yourself up! Instead run a little farther or workout a little longer.

I have to end with saying that this website has helped me so much. I've been on here for a few years off and on, and just recently started logging again. I had my fitbit connected to MFP and when I lost it, I stopped logging. I recently found my fitbit so now I'm back on track! I forgot how helpful it is to log your food and exercise. I thought I was eating pretty well the past few months and logging opened my eyes again. Holding yourself accountable is a great thing.

I'd love to share my stats but I don't have much because when the photo was taken in 2008, I have no idea what I weighed. I didn't own a scale then because I didn't want to know what I weighed. i would definitely say I was close to 200. I now weigh 145.2 as of this morning. I'm trying not to weigh myself too much though because the number honestly doesn't matter to me at this point. I'm working on my strength and I know muscle weighs more than fat. I have a body weight goal but as long as I'm healthy and doing what I'm doing, that number on the scale is not going to define me and you shouldn't let it either! It's JUST a number.

Feel free to contact me if you questions or you'd like to share tips, recipes, thoughts, comments or just to talk.

-Rebecca

Below are photos from my weight loss journey through the ups and the downs.