I was asked how I got started in my weight loss journey. I must tell you it took me years to actually start my diet, five to be exact. I would start, give up, and try again, then give up all because my heart and soul was not into it. I knew I need to to lose the weight and I wanted to, but just didn't have the will to. There were three thing keeping me from dieting that needed to be addressed: my relationship with myself, my relationship with my husband, and the foods I kept in the house. I had some inner demons the Lord needed to deal with (don't we all). Self doubt, low self-esteem, depression, not caring about whether I lived or died, those are just a few of my demons. I'm not going to go in all the things in life that got me there, but lets just just say skinny kids can get called names too and be made fun of too. Life can be unjust to everyone and I had many hard times growing up. When I became a Christian at 16 many of these painful things were healed, but I still had some that lingered into my adulthood. These were the ones that had to go before I could lose my weight. You might say the Lord had to cleanse my spiritual house before my physical house could be cleansed. As the Lord worked in these areas, He also worked with my relationship with my husband. You can imagine, if you don't treasure yourself, how can you except the love from someone who loves you. My husband is the most wonderful man on the planet. He has loved me for 32 years through everything I have put him through. When I doubted myself, he loved me, loved me like Christ loves His church. So while the Lord worked on the emotional and spiritual part of me my doctors kept harping to me that I needed to lose weight.
What began my change in diet started with me learning I was a diabetic. There went all the candies, pastries, cookies, everything I liked to bake. I mourned for months. I still ate sugar free stuff up to this point. A few years latter I was told I had to give up dairy products and go soy. Ok, by then I was eating better any way, so this wasn't a big stretch. I had already been to several dietitians for diabetes and kinda knew what I was doing with my diet. My mind was now beginning to put two and two together. Then it clicked when I got my blood work back after having been off dairy for 6 months. My cholesterol dropped 45 points! The doc challenged me with the weight loss word again, If you lose weight then your cholesterol would go down some... That got me to thinking. So I set an appointment with the dietitian.
Still, I had one last obstacle that would keep me from dieting and I knew it, my husband. It would be hard for me to diet if he had his snacks in the house. I am the kind of person that can not have any kind of snack in the house if dieting. I would need his assistance if I was to succeed. My wonderful husband agreed not only to getting rid of the junk food in the house but going on the diet with me! Even though I had been a diabetic for years, he was now paying even closer attention to what we both were eating and enjoying it too. He has lost 35 pounds and I 65 pounds up to this date. There is no junk food in the house. I am emotionally healed now. I think I like myself now. I believe it now when he tells me he loves me. I love my new diet and can't wait for those maintenance days when I get 200 more calories! So, I hoped I answered some of you all questions about how I got started. It all started with emotional healing and the doctor proving to me that what you ate could change your body. Oh, my cholesterol is now 129 and my triglycerides are 65 which just shows you what you eat can change your body. Note I still take chol. meds which the doc was about to take me off of, but decided to wait until I lost all of my weight.
For all of you who are fighting this same battle. There is hope. My heart is now much stronger too.'
Sorry about the very long blog today. This should have been written as a begnning story.