Hi gang!
I have a treat for you today!
Colva, a friend of mine from grad school, shared her wellness story with me and I am so excited for all of you to read it! She is such an inspiration. Enjoy!
Take it away, Colva!
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When Mary asked me to write about my health and weight-loss
journey for her weekly
Work it Out Wednesday post
I set about asking myself what I’ve learned from this experience and
what I think is important to share.
I began the adventure I’m on now in February, 2014. It
started after a visit to the doctor. In the moments before I got on that
digital scale, I knew I was fat, really fat. I’ve been fat my whole life, I’ve
dieted off and on since my teens, and sometimes I’d lose weight and sometimes I
wouldn’t (I was a bad dieter, lacking the misery to make self-punishing
starvation really viable). However, I’d learned to accept my body despite its
flaws, and was grateful for how good of a fat body it was (well proportioned,
pretty strong, pretty for a fat girl).
I weighed in at over 400lbs that day.
Despite being in, what appeared to be, surprisingly good health, I went home
that evening and resolved to change my life and to lose weight, permanently,
safely, the right way – no starving myself, no pills, no hating myself because
of my body. 403lbs, to be precise, is a
lot of weight, and even though on a 6 foot frame I didn’t feel like it was dragging
me down, I knew, and had always known, it could eventually be a problem. I
figured at 28 it was better to do it now than later. I resolved that day that this
would be a part of my own long-term, self-love journey. I’m not doing this
because I hate being fat (I don’t), or because my fat is killing me (it’s not). It’s
because I like challenges, I like reaching my potential, and I care about myself
and my body enough to do whatever it takes to let it be the best body it can
be. Far from trying to squeeze my fat body into a social norm, or desirable
category, it had, and has, nothing to do what what people think, this is about
what I think.
Four days later I joined a gym. It was terrifying. I felt
exposed and vulnerable – previously I didn’t wear sneakers in public and I wasn’t seen out
without make-up. After a lifetime of being a funny, smart, fat girl meant I wasn’t
someone who played sports or worked out; that stuff was for other people. It wasn’t
for me. But I did it anyway. I started personal training. Like all of the activity
I was suddenly doing, it was hard and it hurt. The first week after my first
training session was an epic wake up call – I could barely walk or sit down,
and I realized that 30 minutes of moving my own body around had hurt me.
I resolved then and there to stick with it. I changed my diet: I
started counting calories, 2,300 calories a day in the beginning, which now
seems excessive. I ate vegetables and less processed food. I got a cheat day
each week (I invariably used it to eat pizza). I started to work out every day,
and twice on Thursdays. 8 hours a week. I started losing weight fast. I made
spreadsheets and kept track of every calorie, every meal, every step, every
mile, every weight I picked up, and every pound and inch I lost.
Turns out the
process of making endless spreadsheets appealed to me. It made me feel like I
could control something that was so hard for me, and had controlled my life for
so long. I celebrated my little milestones, 10, 25, 50 lbs enthusiastically.
Weeks turned to months, the need for spreadsheets declined,
my calorie requirements plummeted (I eat 1,550 calories a day now), struggles
became habits, the workouts hurt less and helped more. Working out eventually
became a way to clear my head, a personal time to think about my life and my
goals. I learned to love the rush of beating myself, and value the rush of
endorphins to manage stress.
I’ve been doing this for over a year, I’ve lost over 100lbs, and I
am much faster, stronger, lighter, and smaller than I’ve ever been. There are still
struggles and I plan my whole life around my workouts and eating. I’m sure people
think this is a drag. I stopped drinking alcohol, which makes me feel a bit
spare in social situations. I don’t get to sleep in on Saturdays; instead I go
to a grueling boot camp class. My body does weird things, fat redistributes
itself, and some weeks I don’t lose weight,
some weeks are great and some bad,
but I keep doing it because this is what I do now. I get angry when I’m hungry
because I’m at the point where I need very precise nutrition to be able to work
out as much as I do (now about 10 hours a week). It’s not all flowers and
rainbows and clothes that are too big, and bones I didn’t know I had (I can’t
count the times I’ve laid in bed poking my body and wondering if it was always
so bumpy under the fat, a whole physical architecture I didn’t know I had.)
At the end of the day, even after losing 100lbs, I am fat. I
am still 300lbs, I still wear plus size clothes. I still have miles and miles
to go. I am happy about that. I’ve learned to accept this huge body and respect
its abilities. I like feeling strong, and seeing even incremental
demonstrations of progress; climbing stairs at work, being less stressed, more
focused.
I’ve learned that a weight loss adventure is not about finishing. It’s
not about being “done.” Life isn’t about being “done,” done with your workout,
done with your calories for a day, done with your weight loss, it’s about
process. Even a bad day is a good day when it’s part of a process. Every day is
a part of a bigger picture now, and even as my body changes and is sometimes
unfamiliar, and I am conscious of it in ways I’ve never been, I know my body
and self better than I ever have, and have never felt more capable.
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WOW, right?!?! I am so proud to know someone so strong and determined. Colva is such an inspiration and I love following along on her self-love journey. Her story is so powerful. She defines beauty, both inside and out.
Please share your support for Colva and I will pass your kind words along to her!
Have a good one!
