(Maintaining Me) RE-Creating Me

My Journey - Who I am and How I Got Here

I’ve been slacking lately and needed a pick me up, so I invaded the dirty garage to dig out an old box of photos.  So, here I am in September 2000 (one year before weight loss, at least 245 pounds). 

The pics are pretty crappy … they are scans of old photos that I was standing with other people in and they are cropped out.  So hard to imagine that that was me.  I am printing these and putting them on my fridge and pantry door!

And, today!

So, this is what I have to remember when I don’t feel like exercising or I want to eat that second helping of something I don’t need or I am thinking of chowing down on the kid’s snacks.

My Journey

First a little background, which I believe directly ties in to my disordered eating and why I have a problem.  I grew up in a dysfunctional household.  My mother was both anorexic and bulimic at different points in her life, and I was always chubby growing up.  I remember my pediatrician lecturing me in 3^rd grade because I weighed 86 pounds, and I remember weighing 125 pounds at twelve years old and thinking, “All I have to do is stay this weight until I am an adult and I will be a normal weight.”  Easier said than done!  My parents had various chemical dependencies, and life was always a struggle.  We moved 10 times from the time I was 11 to 15, sometimes not having a place to live at all in between homes.  I moved out by 16 years old, living with the family that I babysat for.  They then told me that they needed me because of the overlapping shifts they worked, and they did.  But in retrospect, I believe it was just as much that they wanted to rescue me from the home I was living in, if not more that reason.  I am forever grateful to them for that.  Unfortunately, that didn’t “save” me. 

 

So, for some reason, food was always important to me.  It always seemed to be the highlight of my day.  There were times that we went without, and I suppose that could be a reason I had such an unhealthy attitude towards it.  And then there were times that we had plenty – and our portions were out of control.  When I was a kid, if we had a half gallon of ice cream (that then came in only squares), there was no couple scoops in a bowl.  My mom would open it right up and slice the entire thing in 4 slices, so essentially I was eating four servings at once!  We’d also order two pizzas and divide them up – 4 slices each!  I do recall sneaking food as young as 9 years old too.  I guess it could be comfort to me.  I don’t think I am one who falls into the category of “being fat as a defense mechanism against men” by any means, just that I turn to it for comfort.  It almost could have been my drug of choice – the path I chose other than other drugs that my parents chose to abuse (alcohol, and other).

 

Moving on with the story … I got a job right out of high school and planned on enrolling in community college.  Then I got a promotion at work and decided to wait a bit longer.  I hovered around 150 pounds at this time – but it wasn’t a “fit” 150 pounds, I was still a size 14.  I wanted to be skinny, and I would go on crazy diets – pretzel diet was one, eating nothing but pretzels and water.  Really effective!   I soon found myself at 170 pounds, just slowly crept up on me.  Then, I got pregnant with DS, a true life changing experience because I knew I wanted to give him everything I never had, I wanted to be the mother I never had, I wanted him to always have everything he needed and some of what he wanted.  Also – a weight changing experience – as after childbirth I weighed 210 and only went up from there.  DS’s father and I eventually went our separate ways (but we maintain a good friendship to this day, and I like to think we are pretty good co-parents).  When DS was 2 years old (and I was floating around the low 220s), I met my soon to be DH (and later to be XH).  He was absolutely wonderful to DS, and I grew to love him for that reason (and probably that reason alone).  He seemed to be a solid provider, and I felt like our family was complete.  We got married in 2000, me weighing in at 245 pounds. 

 

As cliché as this sounds – September 11, 2001 was a pivotal day for me, as so many, but for a different reason.  I was sitting in my office when the first plane hit, 90 minutes away from where I sat.  At first my coworker and I heard it on the radio and thought it was some sort of really horrible joke the station was playing … and then we found out sadly, it was not.  I did a lot of thinking in the next couple of weeks and realized how much I was taking life for granted.  I was so large that I could no longer sit on the floor and play with DS, who was then 5 years old.  Both of my legs would fall asleep.  And I certainly couldn’t run with him!  Practicing T-Ball was out of the question.  I wanted to be healthy; I made a vow to always be there for him.  He also wanted a sibling and DH wanted children also, and I wasn’t exactly in the best shape for pregnancy.  And I was embarrassed.  I was avoiding social situations at all costs because of how I looked.  I was horrified when we ran into DH’s coworkers at the mall because I felt like they were wondering why he was with someone so fat.  And the icing on the cake: getting out of the mall elevator, I stood and faced a guy I knew back in high school.  He looked at me in disbelief and said my name like a question, “Kelly? Kelly ****?” and I said hello, and he laughed out loud, shook his head, and turned and walked away.  So September 26^th, 2001 I made a choice.  That choice was to change and to LIVE.

 

I decided that no matter what I did, this clearly had to be a life change for me, so counting calories was the way to go.  I didn’t want to banish any particular food from my life – newsflash: I love food!  And I knew I couldn’t live like that.  Everything in moderation became my motto.  I started out by doing Leslie Sansone Walk Away the Pounds tapes.  I do believe these helped to change my life.  I was far too heavy to start out doing anything like The Firm or Tae Bo.  I was winded just doing 1 mile with Leslie!  I bought myself a treadmill (which I still have!) and used cans of veggies in the kitchen as weights!

 

Another cliché here, but it is so true: I had tried so many times to lose weight, but this time I knew it was it.  There was no question about “if” I would succeed, ever!  I just knew that the time had come.

 

Several months later, I found that I had dropped enough weight and become fit enough that the 3 mile Leslie tape barely affected my heart rate, so I moved on to things like The Firm.  I still counted calories.  DH lost twenty pounds without changing anything – just by eating what I prepared for dinner, which was now healthier.  This motivated him to also lose weight, and he ended up 80 pounds lighter.

 

During my weight loss, we had undergone some fertility testing and found out that DH was unable to have children without doing In-Vitro Fertilization using ICSI, which means they literally inject the sperm into the egg to fertilize it.  This became just another reason for me to get healthy.  Finally, 8 months later and 82 pounds lighter, we underwent our first IVF/ICSI procedure.  We transferred three embryos, and I became pregnant in the first cycle.  All three embryos implanted, but we lost one between 9 and 10 weeks.  9 months later, we had beautiful boy/girl twins.  My doctor wanted me to gain 60 pounds on this pregnancy, which was very scary to me.  I did gain 50 of the 60, topping out at around 214.  By the time my eight weeks maternity leave was up, I was back down to 170.  By October of that year, I had gone below my goal of 150 – weighing 138 pounds. 

 

During the next year, we bought a house and I maintained my loss within 5 pounds of my low, but I found it very difficult to maintain at less than 140 pounds.  My body’s natural weight seems to want to be around 145, which is a heck of a lot better than 245, but I am always still struggling to weigh a little less.

 

In the summer of 2004, our first summer in our new home and the twins being 15 months old, my life changed literally overnight.  My husband informed me that he had cheated during his work hours (he worked 3^rd shift) and that he felt like I didn’t need him enough.  Well, he was right.  I didn’t need him.  I kicked him out, and now manage to have a great career as a Senior Human Resource Administrator, a nice home, and three absolutely wonderful children.  And – sorry, I have to add this – I am still thin, and he is not!  So there!   

 

Maintaining sure has been a struggle.  I do believe that maintenance is more difficult than the actual weight loss itself.  It is like “dieting” (sorry, I hate to use that word!) without the added benefit of seeing the scale move down.  However, it is necessary.  You cannot lose the weight and then return to the way you ate before and expect to keep your new, healthier body.  When I was heavy, I couldn’t understand why I was as big as I was because I didn’t feel like I ate that much.  Looking back now though, I know exactly where I went wrong. 

 

A Day at 245 Pounds

 

1.    I skipped breakfast every day (started the cycle, as I note below)

2.    I brought a lousy sandwich in each day with not much nutritional value

3.    I didn’t bring any snacks, so EVERY day I ate out of the vending machine, sometimes twice!  Snickers, Ring Dings, you name it!

4.    I hate a HUGE dinner because I was starving by this time!  A lot of dinners didn’t have any vegetables, and I certainly didn’t go light on the butter!

5.    Every night, regardless of whether or not I was hungry, I had a ritual of eating junk food.  I looked forward to it like you wouldn’t believe – Sadly, it was the highlight of my day.  A typical evening would be a bowl of chocolate ice cream with a bowl of Doritos. Lol!  Or, on weekends, X(then D)H and I would eat a whole batch of toll house cookies between the two of us.  In doing this, I was still stuffed in the morning and never hungry for breakfast, which would again set me up for failure.

6.    No – and I mean NO – physical exercise.

A Day at 145 Pounds

 

1.    I start each day with a glass of water and a healthy breakfast.  Egg Beaters, Nutrigrain Waffles, cereal or oatmeal, etc.  And coffee – one thing I can’t/won’t give up!

2.    I bring healthy snacks to have during the day: fruit, almonds, granola bar, etc.

3.    I usually eat a Lean Cuisine for lunch.  I am not promoting to live on frozen meals, this is just what works for me because I don’t have a lot of time to prepare different lunches and sometimes I want more than just a soup or sandwich. 

4.    I cook healthy dinners.  I think I still eat pretty much what every family eats, I just make it with less oil or butter, and I rarely ever fry anything.  I buy 96% lean ground beef, skinless chicken breast, or turkey burgers.  Veggies are a must at every meal!  I use skim or 1% milk and lowfat cheeses.

5.    If I want a dessert/snack in the evening, I will measure out a half cup of ice cream (Edy’s Light Slow Churned anything! Yum!) Or have a little chocolate, or pretzels, crackers, etc.  Evening is STILL my trouble zone, but even on my worst nights I don’t eat like I used to!  (Except maybe during PMS, lol)

6.    I exercise.  Firm, Turbo Jam, and the faithful old treadmill that I still have from 2001!  I just recently joined the gym which I am really enjoying, but I lost all my weight without a gym, so a gym membership is not required.  Even on days that I do not have exercise scheduled, I take the kids for nature hikes and do things I would have never been able to do when I was heavier.  It is super important to make time for yourself and exercise.  It is so easy for us moms to dedicate our lives to our children and have “no time” for ourselves, but it can – and must – be done.  Even when the twins were 3 months old and DH was working nights and I was working FT days, if I had to exercise at 9:30 pm, I had to … no question.  Now it is easier that the kids are older, but it is still a juggling act to get it all in.  One word: schedule!

 

And, that is how my life has changed.  I can’t imagine going back – I know in my heart, I never will.  I do have rough patches – I especially struggle with PMDD.  The medications didn’t help much so I am doing it sans meds right now, but I often have bingeing issues during that time that I am trying to work through.  My life, as always, is a Work In Progress.

 

So, today, if the elevator opened and that jerk from high school was standing there and said, “Kelly?  Kelly ****?” he would be there with his jaw dropped.  And me?  I’d laugh, shake my head, turn and walk away knowing what a better person I am.