Remembering The Fat Old Days

Been feeling a little bummed lately about gaining a couple pounds and struggling to lose them again, despite all of my exercise and ridiculous endeavors. But looking back on a picture like the one above (from about 4 years ago) actually made me take a breather and remember how far I've come. So while the scale may say three pounds more than it did earlier this summer, it's nowhere close to the nearly 70 pounds more I was in this photo. So I'm putting this picture as my desktop background, in hopes that it will keep me going through marathon training (which is going terribly) and through the winter when the mere idea of going to the gym seems like a struggle.

Packing on the Pre-Pregnancy Pounds

I wrote about how after the birth of my beloved daughter, I ballooned up to 260 lbs... but it wasn't like I had the most svelte figure on the planet before that.

My freshman year of college, I weighed about 165 lbs and was probably in the best shape/size of my adult life (so far!). I've been told by countless doctors, fitness professionals and just random strangers that I'm either a "good solid girl" or that I "carry my weight well" or that I "don't look as heavy as I am." They are all well meaning compliments, that haunt me. But still at 165, I was working out because I was taking a fitness class, and the fitness center was completely on the other side of campus. I walked all the way there regularly and I was hooked on the rowing machine. Then again, the workout only balanced my really healthy diet of Doritos, pints of Ben & Jerry's and pizza. God, I miss my teenage metabolism.

After my freshman year in Long Island away from home, I moved back to Maine to finish school because of financial reasons. There I worked many hobs, was in a long distance relationship with my Hofstra boyfriend, went to my classes and rode my bike a lot because I was sharing a car with my dad. And that Renault wasn't exactly what you'd call reliable. So while I might have eaten more than my share of donuts while working at Tony's Donuts, I was constantly on the move. At one point, I had mono, but was too busy to even notice.

It wasn't until I moved down to New Jersey that the pounds really started to gather up. I lived in Hoboken where restaurants and bars rule. I knew about the cannoli's at the Cake Boss' shop... long before he had his TV show. And while I did walk to the PATH train in the morning, and around the city, there wasn't exactly a lot of energy being expended. Particularly a problem given the amount of high calorie foods that were being consumed.  The pizza place knew my order of chicken parm hero and french fries by heart, and the chinese delivery had my sweet and sour chicken order at my door before I'd even hung up the phone. My then-husband had a miracle metabolism and could eat copious amounts of fast foods without ever gaining a pound, I was not so lucky.

I tried joining several gyms but would go for a bit and get bored quickly and stop going, or think that a once a week circut around the gym was going to make a difference. But I was exhausted (found out for a while at least, that it was due to the mono still in my system), and just really busy taking advantage of city life. Or at least seeing <I>Rent</I> once a week. Clearly, my priorities were in check.

After a trip to Orlando in November of 2001, I returned home with a lower back injury. I have a very high tolerance for pain (and a dislike of doctors) but I had slipped some discs on a ride (or a combination of rides... I still blame Back to the Future) and could barely move. I had to go to physical therapy for a bit, and distinctly remember a fit looking guy (who had something wrong with his shoulder) telling me that back injuries happened to people with weak core muscles. Gee, thanks for the unsolicited advice. Telling a girl who weighs over 200 lbs. that she should do crunches, while she's sitting there in pain is exactly the right thing to do. Like I wasn't aware that my stomach was one giant roll, or that none of my pants fit and I had to start shopping in the women's section.

After that stint in PT, I did start exercising more. I mean, I was already at the gym, it was hard to come up with excuses not to at least make a half-hearted effort. I tried Atkins briefly, which was  bad idea as I lost weight and gained it back the instant I decided that I missed potatoes too much.

The pounds kept piling on, and when I first saw the scale cross over 200, I was convinced I could stop it. But Italian food tasted good, The person who invented vodka sauce is some kind of evil genius. I liked going out with my friends and having drinks and not worrying about every morsel that crossed my lips.

Then I moved out of Hoboken to a Jersey suburb, and I quickly realized that the small amount of walking I did was at least slowing my weight gain, while living in the suburbs and driving from place to place didn't offer any of that inadvertent exercise. I was working a crazy amount of hours, sitting on a bus, getting home to do projects around the house, like yardwork, watching TV and then passing out. Still, I credit the yard work for keeping my weight around 205.

But in 2004, I started having some severe foot problems that I ignored for a while. I do really

hate admitting to pain, especially when I just chalked it up to being fat. Problem is, that if your foot hurts, it makes it hard to really exercise. At that point, the weight was just really starting to add up, as I had to stop walking across Times Square to my office, and instead needed taxis. I finally went to the podiatrist who tried giving me orthotics to help my planter fasciitis. It's a foot problem that's normally found in athletes. And when the nurse at the front desk asked me (with a straight face, to her credit) if I was a runner. I laughed out loud, and told her that I only ran when I was being chased. There are times now as a fledgling runner that I think back to this moment and wish I could show my then self what I can do now.

The orthotics barely made any noticeable difference and despite some various treatments and some insanely painful cortisone shots which didn't help at all, by the end of 2004 I was having surgery on my right foot to shave down the giant bone spur and to snip the ligament (tendon? I'm not good with this medical stuff) to prevent a recurrence of this injury. Drugs and whatnot took my weight up into the 220s, a place where I never thought I'd be. And though it took a good month before I was really fully mobile, but after that I felt pretty great.

I started feeling like I could exercise, and was inspired by this new lease on life... and then ended up pregnant a few months later. So any weight loss was put on hold. I distinctly remember standing on the scale of the doctor's office during my very first visit and it reading 216 lbs.

So much as I'd like to blame all of my weight on having a baby, and all the stresses that came after it, the pounds didn't exactly happen overnight.

Today I Am M

 I got a sweater for the holidays from Ann Taylor Loft, and while it was a size Large, it was enormous. Even though the style was slouchy, it was really like I was swimming in it. So I headed back to the store to exchange it, they didn't have that same sweater, but I had Isabel with me yesterday as we picked out a new sweater. She was so excited that it was an "M", and even happily told my mother that mommy got an "M". I had to explain to my mom that this meant Medium.

I realize that Ann Taylor Loft sizes tend to be cut on the generous side, but still, I can't even remember the last time I had a shirt that was a medium. I thought for me the big milestone was getting a shirt that didn't have an X in front of it, but somehow one that doesn't have an L involved at all is even sweeter than I could have imagined. And it is reassuring that while the scale has been stubborn the last few week's, all this hard work has really been paying off as I'm toning and shrinking.

Where the Fun/Pain All Began

My trainer asked me the other day why I was always so upbeat and positive as she was torturing me with yet another series of grueling bicep exercises, and I explained that I used to be a lot fatter, and had changed my life in the past year and a half and had no intention of going back there. I promised to bring her a picture, the one that I keep in my kitchen as a reminder to myself of where I started. I also brought it to my weight loss consultant, and she told me that I looked now like I could do a commercial, with this as my before picture, even though I'm not at my goal weight. Between that and the fact that my email is currently flooded with offers for diets and fitness programs because of the new year, it got me thinking about the fact that it isn't a date on a calendar that makes you want to go to the gym regularly or to stick to a healthy eating plan. It's something bigger. For me, that something bigger really started with this picture.

In this picture from early April 2010, I weighed in at over 250 lbs (scary to admit that in "public"... even to virtual strangers). After my kid I had gone up to about 260, but had lost nearly 40 lbs with the help of a nutritionist, but due to being unhappy and getting divorced and coping with being out on my own for the first time really in my entire life… I had gained it almost entirely back. This trip to the Botanical Gardens in Brooklyn, was one of the first things I did post-splitting up with my husband that was entirely on my own. It seems small, since it was only a trip on a bus and subway, but I'd never been to the park at all... much less alone. The picture was taken by a kind stranger, and I actually thought that I looked very cute that day. But the best part was that once I got out there, walked the gardens, I headed out into Prospect Park and just walked for several hours. Just wandered all around, watching people run, play various sports and enjoy their afternoons. It was eye-opening in a lot of ways, as I'd long been content to let other people make the plans and just follow along with them. Just being outside with no set schedule, wandering with some quiet time to reflect, was fantastic for me.

Going to the park by myself, in an unfamiliar place, gave me the push to book a trip to Costa Rica that I had long wanted to do and had been pondering for a while. Right after this day in Brooklyn, I got my passport (for the first time ever… the only places I'd previously been were Aruba, Mexico and Canada, and at times when you didn't need a passport to travel to them). Yes, it is a leap to go from traveling to a borough 20 miles from my house, to leaving the country on my own, but I had a renewed since of (perhaps misguided) confidence.

But not only did I want to go to Costa Rica, I wanted to go to Costa Rica to trek through the rainforest and ride along a massive zipline. In short, I wanted to have some wild new experiences, but I had to be in better shape to do most of the things I wanted. I joined the new gym that had opened near my house and started taking Zumba classes and walking on the treadmill. And then I got the bright idea to take a kickboxing class. I had received a flyer shortly after I'd moved into my new apartment, offering a cheap trial class with free boxing gloves and it had been stuck to my fridge for months. I was waiting until I was in better shape to try it, but finally just did it. Nearly thought I was going to die/puke during the first session, and felt sympathy for all of those Biggest Loser contestants who had been tortured during their first workouts, but I got quickly got hooked. I even re-learned to jump rope -- something I had loved doing as a kid. It's easy to forget those simple pleasures as you get older.

Before my trip to Costa Rica, I lost about 20 lbs. But really couldn't seem to lose more. And while I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of that trip (even the scary ones when I got a second-degree burn on an ATV ride and had to use my broken Spanish at the pharmacia), some of the hikes really were exhausting to me. I made it, because of my newfound "I can do anything" spirit, but I was for sure the slowest one in the group.

When I came back, I spent all fall challenging myself with more of my outrageous adventures from whitewater rafting to hiking and even snowshoeing, but I didn't really see much of a change on the scale. Apparently, eating a diet of predominantly baby carrots isn't as healthy as one might think. Go figure. It wasn't until I decided that I wanted to live out my dream of scuba diving when things changed for me.

I went to a small dive shop in NJ and signed up for classes and nearly had a breakdown in the dressing room as even the largest women's wetsuits barely fit. And I broke a zipper trying one on. I was so ashamed that I didn't even say anything about the zipper and just I bought the one wetsuit that did fit, and lamented to the owner that I wanted it to be a smaller size. He happened to tell me that his wife had been helping people lose weight for years. I was skeptical, as I'd worked with a nutritionist before and had also tried Atkins, Weight Watchers and a few of the other fads out there. But I left the shop feeling excited about scuba diving, but guilty about the suit. When I got home, I left a very apologetic teary message on the shop answering machine telling the owner that I'd broken the zipper and that I'd be happy to pay for it, but was just too embarrassed to say anything during the store. I got a very understanding phone message back from him, and shortly thereafter got a call from his lovely wife. She's an LA My Way consultant, and was very sweet, and even though the initial cost was out of my budget by a bit, I took the plunge and went along with her.

Since starting with her I've lost about 40 lbs, lost even more than that in inches off my body, gone down about four clothing sizes (from a 20 to a 12) and have really toned up from eating a healthy diet and exercising. Who would have imagined that a person like me who previously lived for French fries and ice cream, would be living happily on a low carb, low salt, low sugar, high protein diet? But it works for my body, without making me feel like I'm missing out. Paired with all of my increasingly ridiculous fitness and adventure quests, I weigh less than I have in well over a decade and am in better shape than I ever have been. My credit card is ridiculously high because I am obsessed living life to the fullest, via traveling adventures and fitness obstacles, but I tell myself that I'm investing in my future... just not in the traditional sense. I regularly do yoga, I've started seeing a personal trainer, have hiked all over the country with my dad and brother and even recently began running. I am most proud of doing my first Sprint Triathlon in September. I'm not the fastest person on the planet, or the skinniest or fittest, but I am doggedly determined to get there eventually. The tortoise won that infamous race eventually, right?

Making the decision to go to Prospect Park to see those cherry blossoms and almost a year later deciding to scuba dive to be the mermaid I'd always wanted to be, were two of the best decisions I've made in the last few years. They seemed so small at the time, practically insignificant in the larger scheme of things, but they really made a major impact on my day-to-day life and my quest to be the best Angel that I can be. My goal is not to be super skinny or hit some unfeasible number on a scale, but instead to be a fit, healthy and fun mom and strong role model to my young daughter for as long as humanly possible.And she's become my strongest cheerleader and motivator on the days when it gets really tough. You try to say no to a bossy 5-year-old (who likes to channel Jillian Michaels) when they are running behind you in the park and tell you to stop and do some jumping jacks before instructing you to keep running even faster. She keeps me smiling and optimistic even as I face challenges with childcare, long-commutes, a busy work schedule, some taxing workouts and my less frequent (but still occasional) desire to eat an entire carton of cookies & cream ice cream.

The pic below is where I'm at now, still a ways to go (and naturally that's taken from my MOST flattering angle… side angle pictures are still my enemy). And while initially reluctant to share my story, I hope that this, and my forthcoming tales of finding adventure in every day life in order to get healthy and challenge myself, may make some other people realize that they can do whatever it is that they put their minds too, be it lose weight or run a marathon or achieve their dream job and be genuinely happy in the skin that they are in.