Life at the Chicken Coop

Being Me

I don't know why I'm writing this post, but I figure I might as well expose myself and let you see a few skeletons in my closet. One of those is this picture (above) of my friend Nellie and I in Boston, when she came to visit me while I lived there for a year after graduating from BYU. I saw this on my Facebook page last week when I logged on for the first time in years and I about gagged. I hate pictures of me, but I really am disgusted by this one. Not only am I wearing my dad's old ski jacket that at the time was still two sizes too big, but my hair is bleached out and I'm the heaviest of any time in my life. At the time, I knew I was overweight, but was pretty depressed (which is a catch 22) and I drowned my sorrows in my own homemade baked goods. I ran some, but not enough to counterbalance the poor eating choices. [I ran a few times with the Cambridge Runners Club and I asked one of the coaches, who owned a successful running shoe store downtown, if my shoes were the right kind for me. He took one look at them, my favorite pair of Adidas btw, and said, "You're running on marshmallows. For a girl your size, you need stabilizer shoes." Point taken.]
I felt I had to redeem myself by posting this picture, taken this summer. I just couldn't let those Boston people, even if they don't even keep tabs on me anymore, think I was still looking like a beached whale! Don't get me wrong: I am no stick-thin person and never will be, but I have managed to shed about 35 pounds since that time in Boston. My history goes like this: after yo-yoing with my weight in college, it hit an all-time high in Boston and then after losing only 5 pounds on some Chinese watermelon/walnut diet, I decided it was time to get serious about eating healthy and working out. I moved back home to Washington, started working out on a daily basis, met Travis and his ultra-healthy mom and have tried to continue reading about nutrition and exercise since then. I have always been physically active, even ran cross-country in high school, but I think now with three kids I have to put my workouts and somewhat-healthy diet first or they won't happen. I have to be a little more selfish in that regard to make sure I get my needs met first so I can help my family's. I think that is the change. I don't really know. I have heard of many women who can't lose a pound and then they have a baby and somehow their bodies are transformed into lithe little things. I know everyone is different. And, I know that no one is immune from weight gain who doesn't take excellent care of her body and it doesn't mean anything except you just have stored extra calories. I just know I never want to see pictures of myself again like the one taken in Boston 8 years ago! Is that too much to ask?