It was a sultry Louisiana day in September of 2008 and I remember it as if it were yesterday. I had just arrived home from picking up my two oldest from school and my daughter wanted me to play outside with her. After a few pushes on the swing and a short game of chase, I could barely catch my breath. Now, I had decided nearly two weeks before that I would embark on a weight loss journey which would consist of changing my diet ever so slightly and see what would happen. At this time, I was tipping the scales at nearly 215lbs….yes you heard right, this little 5 ft girl, was 215lbs. As I caught my breath, walked inside and plopped myself on that sofa to watch Oprah, I realized something…..I was missing out on valuable time with my children because I refused to take care of my body.
In that moment I vowed to do something I swore I’d never do again. I vowed to go to the gym. I had paid for several health club memberships over the years and the biggest workout I probably got out of them was when I wrote out the check each month for payment. It wasn’t fun for me because I didn’t see immediate results like I did with all the diet pills I’d taken throughout the years. But then something hit me….Being out of shape wasn’t fun either. It wasn’t fun for me, for my children or for my sweet husband, who, bless his heart, loved me just as much then as ever.
Now the first problem I encountered was that I had nothing to wear...tennis shoes were not in my vocabulary, but I just so happened to have a pair underneath my bed for occasions such as this. Gym shorts? Who wears those dreadful things? They do nothing for a figure, or lack of figure in my case...I guess if I had Jennifer Lopez's body, I'd look good in some gym shorts, but even hers have little Swarovski crystals down the side, at least they are fashionable. Well, I dug some of those up too, and of course they looked as bad as I imagined they would. My bright orange Amite Baptist Church T-ball tee shirt topped off the outfit. Now, the next thing I tell you will definitely be hard to believe, but I am telling you the honest truth. I had to stop at the Dollar Tree to get some Gym Socks. Yes, you read that right...this little southern diva had no need for socks as she doesn't intend on wearing tennis shoes! I had only bought a couple pair over the years, for wearing with boots or helping out with my kids ball teams.
So here I am...scanning my little key fob thingy at the entrance to Anytime fitness. I can see my best friend on an elliptical machine inside the window, who by the way exercises regularly. She's laughing. Probably because shes never seen me dressed like that and she knows how much I HATE it!! I did apply some fresh lip gloss before I got out of the car, and I was very thankful for that as I entered the dungeon of fit little barbies with no make up on whose butts definitely looked like they visit this place more than starbucks. At least my lips were shiny and sweet......that is until the sweat started dripping from them!
Within the first five minutes I was absolutely certain as to the reasons I had avoided these places over the years. Sweat. Men. Barbie Doll Bodies. Sweat. Pain. Sticky Hair. Red Cheeks. Shorts that crawl between your thighs. Personal trainers that get way too personal and have you making a fool of yourself in front of everyone. Oh and did I say, SWEAT! Seven minutes in and I am ready to bolt for the door. I had picked up a pair of headphones as a friend recommended and HgTv was playing on the big screen. Sell this house was not making me feel energetic enough to finish this 35 minute elliptical session I had keyed into the machine, so, I decided to try something else. Aha, there we go, Food Network! Now that's my channel. As I'm watching Rachel Ray whip up something tasty, it occurred to me that it might make me look extra fat and unhealthy to those around me if I were watching food network at that moment, so....I sucked in my tummy extra hard and searched the monitor for some music.
I landed on some dance music, now that made me wanna work out. Ten minutes in and its really burning, but I can do this with good music. Has anyone ever watched BET channel on tv? Well, you should check it out sometime, it will give you some insight to other cultures. At this point I’m thirteen minutes in as I look over at my friend and mouth “I cannot do this” to which she mouths back, “Yes you can”, to which I mouth back, “See, I can't be good at everything”, to which she just shakes her head. I can not be a quitter, is what I kept telling myself. My friends will never let me live it down if I get off this machine. “Focus on the rap music and pretend your in this video shaking your butt with all those girls“. Eighteen minutes in and I find myself realizing that maybe I can do this.
Twenty Four Minutes. Why on earth do people enjoy this? I liken it to being held down and fed flies. No, I take that back, eating flies would be easier than being on this machine. Oh, and I should add, every time you try to take a break or slow down...All Cap letters pop up on the screen, screaming at you to speed up....I feel like I'm back in 9th grade with my coach yelling “Faster Kiesha...those short legs can go faster than that!” I wanted to punch her, and I wanted to do the same to that darned machine!! By some small miracle I managed to finish the whole Thirty five minutes I’d programmed in, so, just for fun, and because the scale was by the weights that we were moving to next, I decided I'd step on the scale and see what my 35 minutes of hell had gotten me. Drumroll……NO WHERE!! It had gotten me two more lbs than my scale at home had!!!! Now, explain to me the fairness in that! I come to the gym because I want to lose weight and I GAIN IT instead!!! I thought "No wonder people don't stick to this torture"!
To ensure that I did just that, the sticking to it I mean, I signed myself up for some sessions with the personal trainer. Not the bouncy, energetic, 'let me see how much humiliation I can dole out today' trainer. No, I went for the calm, assertive, not so bouncy cheerleader type....mostly because he was a guy and I thought if I cried he would go easy on me!
Hiring that trainer was the best decision I ever made. It made me accountable, and forced me to learn about a healthy lifestyle. Now, those who know me know that I am not the type to just function through life off of someone Else's knowledge. I have to research and learn for myself. I have to know everything about everything before I pour my heart into a task. So that’s exactly what I began to do. Research. Research. Research. The knowledge that I gained about food, sugar, carbs, fats and calories was immeasurable. I had been doing it so wrong for so long.
Slowly, then very quickly, the weight began to melt away. Pound after Pound until nearly a year went by and I had lost over 55 of them. Not because I wanted to fit into a size 6. Not because I wanted to look better than the barbies in the gym. But because I loved my children, and had a zest for life that I could not obtain while wearing a size 18. I had to love myself enough to achieve my goals and the journey I had started was built on that, not on superficial gain. That reason alone is why it worked for me. We are not promised our next breath in life, but we can ensure that each breath we take in this life is a healthy one. I have felt better, been more energetic and less stressed from the moment I walked through the doors of the gym. That alone makes it worth it for me.
More than anything else I want to honor God who gave me this life by taking care of the body he provided me to live my life in. After YEARS of fad diets....DIET PILLS of EVERY kind.....low carb...no carb....the grapefruit and cabbage soup diets..Weight watchers..starving myself.....binging....and any other weight loss plan known to man, I realized that what I knew deep inside my heart the WHOLE time was exactly what would be the thing to work for me. I believe that if I focus on all that I have gained, then the loss will naturally follow. If you are doing what is right for your body then there is no way you can fail at this. It is a matter of learning the concepts and returning to lifestyles before fast foods and processed foods....life before hydrogenated oils and corn syrup. Life before 1 point weight watcher cookies that cause you to gain instead of lose.
What I have "GAINED" from this is so much more important to me than what I have "LOST". I have gained knowledge which has resulted in power. Power to overcome what I considered the biggest obstacle in my life. Weight.
Are you thirsty?
Monday, April 26, 2010
Thursday, April 22, 2010
The Story of "The Thirsty Mom"
Do you ever find yourself thirsty for more? If you answer "No" then you may as well stop reading now. If your answer is "No" then this blog is not for you. If your answer is "Yes" however, then I may have some great insights for you or at the very least a shoulder to lean on.....someone to feel your pain.
I'm a mom to three wonderful children. These children can ignite crazy mad love within the very core of my soul. They also ignite a fire that can drive me insane or at the very least into the back corner of a dark closet. I always wanted to be a mom. I can remember at 12 years of age overhearing a friend of my moms telling her she should watch me closely as a teenager because I loved children so much I may try to have one early. At 17 I met the love of my life......he was eleven years my senior and everything I wanted in a man. Scratch that.....he was handsome and nice and that's about all I knew at that time. However, I was in love nonetheless. I wanted to spend every waking moment in his arms and couldn't wait to get my senior year over with so that I could get married and live happily ever after. That is what all 17 year old girls want right? Well, that's what I thought. A true south Louisiana girl, I grew up wanting to be like my grandma and mom. College? Who needs college when you have this older man who makes lots of money and wants to take care of you? Well, that's the way I remember it anyway. Lots of money turned into very little to a 19 year old newlywed with these things called bills that she'd only heard her parents speak of in hushed tones.
After a 10 year whirlwind of a marriage, 3 miscarriages, 3 children and the death of my husbands mother I surely found myself wanting more. We were stuck. Caught in the web of the everyday monotony that so many couples find themselves in today. We fought over the silliest of things and the crazy wild love I'd felt at 19 soon turned into bitterness. I was doing the "stay at home mom" thing which mostly included "staying at walmart or the mall" and neglecting the things that needed to be done during the day before kids get home from school. He was working for himself trying to make a business survive in an economy that was slowly rolling downhill. On a night I like to call "as bad as it gets" we had a decision to make. Get in or Get out. We no longer wanted to fight about who forgot to close the bag of chips or who was washing the dishes, or who invested more time in the kids......we were done fighting. I was exhausted.
After "as bad as it gets" calmed down....my home was very quiet. I took a long hot bath, still crying and stepped out to face myself in the bathroom mirror. After wiping away the steam I took a long hard look into that mirror. As crazy as this may sound, that bathroom mirror changed my life. It was a typical steamy Louisiana night in early July and as I gazed into that mirror at the child looking back at this woman, I asked myself one simple question.
"If it never gets any better than it is right now.....is this how you want to feel in 20 years?"
You see, its easy to say things are bad but they will get better. Its easy to say to yourself, we are just caught up in life, bills, money problems, family issues or whatever else it is you are battling....its easy to say "Next year will be better", "Next year we will have more money....more time....happier children....etc..." But what if next year its not better? Can you live with that? I couldn't. Let me just say, I wouldn't.
After that fateful night and my fateful question I then began to ponder my life as I knew it. What had I done that landed me where I was? I had to go back to the start....back to my senior year and this man I believed God had surely placed in my life. Did I love him? Yes. Did I love myself? I presumed to love the version of myself I'd created for the world to see, sure.....But "Who was I anyway?" A mom. A wife. A friend. These were all I could come up with but there was one problem. These are the things I was to everyone else. Who was I to ME? And more so, who was I to God? This began my quest to discover the meaning of my life, not the meaning of life..but the meaning of MY life.
Over the last three years something phenomenal has happened. I'd like to call it a miracle. I have started to discover myself in ways that I only dreamed possible. The confidence I faked for so long is now genuine and real. The unhappy marriage is now a happy one. The unorganized chaotic home is now on its way to becoming a place that a child would want to grow up in. And the answer that I was looking for all along was literally right in front of me the whole time. The answer stared me in the face every morning when I brushed my teeth, and at night when I stepped out of the shower......yep, every single time I peered into that bathroom mirror the answer was staring back at me. Peaking into the depths of my being and begging the question.....Are you happy? Truly happy? The answer my friends was ME.
When I thought of all the things that had gotten me to this place in my life, something occurred to me. If I wanted an opposite life, attitude, husband, children.......an opposite me......then I had to do the OPPOSITE of everything I'd done that landed me here. So I started, slowly at first, to undo all that I had done. Instead of complaining about who was going to wash the dishes, I did them myself. Instead of begging him to help me with bathing our children.....I did it myself. Instead of asking him repeatedly why he had to go to home depot after work instead of coming home, I said "Alright darlin', see ya soon". Instead of going to bed and scooting as far as I could to the other side because I was determined not to give myself to a man who I felt wasn't giving himself to me, I drew near to the warmth of his body. And do you know something? It felt fantastic.....I had been punishing myself for so long. So instead of doing what society had taught me to do, instead of trying to "teach my man a lesson." I did the opposite. Do you know why? Because I realized something.....all those women on the talk shows, and all those women in my life, the ones who said "Girl, don't be a doormat! You gotta whip that man into shape." Those women were unhappy, and bitter. Logic told me that I didn't want to be one of those women.
So you are thinking to yourselves now.....I know I can almost hear you....you are thinking to yourself, "I am not going to just do it all and allow him to do nothing. So if that's what you are suggesting, forget it." I want to be very clear about this. A funny thing happened when I started to change.....and therein lies the miracle. He changed. Yes girls, you heard me right.
He C-H-A-N-G-E-D. He was so very humbled by my attitude and actions, that he wanted to love me with his own actions. He started asking if I needed help with more things in the evenings. I noticed that I didn't need to ask so often anymore, I found he just began doing tasks that needed doing. You see, Love is not just a feeling, its an ACTION. You show it more than you say it. What do your actions say? Now I'm not saying this works in every case but I am saying this...."What have you got to lose?"
A dear friend taught me this, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different reaction. Do you feel insane at times? Are you thirsty for more?
I'm a mom to three wonderful children. These children can ignite crazy mad love within the very core of my soul. They also ignite a fire that can drive me insane or at the very least into the back corner of a dark closet. I always wanted to be a mom. I can remember at 12 years of age overhearing a friend of my moms telling her she should watch me closely as a teenager because I loved children so much I may try to have one early. At 17 I met the love of my life......he was eleven years my senior and everything I wanted in a man. Scratch that.....he was handsome and nice and that's about all I knew at that time. However, I was in love nonetheless. I wanted to spend every waking moment in his arms and couldn't wait to get my senior year over with so that I could get married and live happily ever after. That is what all 17 year old girls want right? Well, that's what I thought. A true south Louisiana girl, I grew up wanting to be like my grandma and mom. College? Who needs college when you have this older man who makes lots of money and wants to take care of you? Well, that's the way I remember it anyway. Lots of money turned into very little to a 19 year old newlywed with these things called bills that she'd only heard her parents speak of in hushed tones.
After a 10 year whirlwind of a marriage, 3 miscarriages, 3 children and the death of my husbands mother I surely found myself wanting more. We were stuck. Caught in the web of the everyday monotony that so many couples find themselves in today. We fought over the silliest of things and the crazy wild love I'd felt at 19 soon turned into bitterness. I was doing the "stay at home mom" thing which mostly included "staying at walmart or the mall" and neglecting the things that needed to be done during the day before kids get home from school. He was working for himself trying to make a business survive in an economy that was slowly rolling downhill. On a night I like to call "as bad as it gets" we had a decision to make. Get in or Get out. We no longer wanted to fight about who forgot to close the bag of chips or who was washing the dishes, or who invested more time in the kids......we were done fighting. I was exhausted.
After "as bad as it gets" calmed down....my home was very quiet. I took a long hot bath, still crying and stepped out to face myself in the bathroom mirror. After wiping away the steam I took a long hard look into that mirror. As crazy as this may sound, that bathroom mirror changed my life. It was a typical steamy Louisiana night in early July and as I gazed into that mirror at the child looking back at this woman, I asked myself one simple question.
"If it never gets any better than it is right now.....is this how you want to feel in 20 years?"
You see, its easy to say things are bad but they will get better. Its easy to say to yourself, we are just caught up in life, bills, money problems, family issues or whatever else it is you are battling....its easy to say "Next year will be better", "Next year we will have more money....more time....happier children....etc..." But what if next year its not better? Can you live with that? I couldn't. Let me just say, I wouldn't.
After that fateful night and my fateful question I then began to ponder my life as I knew it. What had I done that landed me where I was? I had to go back to the start....back to my senior year and this man I believed God had surely placed in my life. Did I love him? Yes. Did I love myself? I presumed to love the version of myself I'd created for the world to see, sure.....But "Who was I anyway?" A mom. A wife. A friend. These were all I could come up with but there was one problem. These are the things I was to everyone else. Who was I to ME? And more so, who was I to God? This began my quest to discover the meaning of my life, not the meaning of life..but the meaning of MY life.
Over the last three years something phenomenal has happened. I'd like to call it a miracle. I have started to discover myself in ways that I only dreamed possible. The confidence I faked for so long is now genuine and real. The unhappy marriage is now a happy one. The unorganized chaotic home is now on its way to becoming a place that a child would want to grow up in. And the answer that I was looking for all along was literally right in front of me the whole time. The answer stared me in the face every morning when I brushed my teeth, and at night when I stepped out of the shower......yep, every single time I peered into that bathroom mirror the answer was staring back at me. Peaking into the depths of my being and begging the question.....Are you happy? Truly happy? The answer my friends was ME.
When I thought of all the things that had gotten me to this place in my life, something occurred to me. If I wanted an opposite life, attitude, husband, children.......an opposite me......then I had to do the OPPOSITE of everything I'd done that landed me here. So I started, slowly at first, to undo all that I had done. Instead of complaining about who was going to wash the dishes, I did them myself. Instead of begging him to help me with bathing our children.....I did it myself. Instead of asking him repeatedly why he had to go to home depot after work instead of coming home, I said "Alright darlin', see ya soon". Instead of going to bed and scooting as far as I could to the other side because I was determined not to give myself to a man who I felt wasn't giving himself to me, I drew near to the warmth of his body. And do you know something? It felt fantastic.....I had been punishing myself for so long. So instead of doing what society had taught me to do, instead of trying to "teach my man a lesson." I did the opposite. Do you know why? Because I realized something.....all those women on the talk shows, and all those women in my life, the ones who said "Girl, don't be a doormat! You gotta whip that man into shape." Those women were unhappy, and bitter. Logic told me that I didn't want to be one of those women.
So you are thinking to yourselves now.....I know I can almost hear you....you are thinking to yourself, "I am not going to just do it all and allow him to do nothing. So if that's what you are suggesting, forget it." I want to be very clear about this. A funny thing happened when I started to change.....and therein lies the miracle. He changed. Yes girls, you heard me right.
He C-H-A-N-G-E-D. He was so very humbled by my attitude and actions, that he wanted to love me with his own actions. He started asking if I needed help with more things in the evenings. I noticed that I didn't need to ask so often anymore, I found he just began doing tasks that needed doing. You see, Love is not just a feeling, its an ACTION. You show it more than you say it. What do your actions say? Now I'm not saying this works in every case but I am saying this...."What have you got to lose?"
A dear friend taught me this, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different reaction. Do you feel insane at times? Are you thirsty for more?
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