Then and NOW

I have thought alot about this post for the last year(exactly one year from today). I had always told myself that I would write/post it. Now that the day is here, I am having very mixed and very overwhelming emotions about this post. I have decided to write/blog it. Maybe it will inspire someone else??? It is coming straight from the heart, so please be gentle(typing that for myself). In October of 2010 we had the chance to meet up with the darling Janea Greene of Janea Greene photography. I had won a free photo shoot off of her FB/blog. I was super excited and very ready for some new family photos. We met her in downtown Roseville and I instantly knew it was going to be fun. I knew she was going to capture some amazing photos of our family and she did. When we got our CD of images from Janea, I was "ooohhhing" and "ahhhing" over each and over one. The lighting that day was perfect and the boys had instantly warmed up to her.

























There was one photo that I was super excited about. She had the boys jump up on this teal-ish colored dumpster that happened to be behind one of the downtown stores. I was thinking, "The dumpster??? Okay. Lets go for it." As I was scrolling through our new family photos, I came upon the dumpster photo. The boys looked darling, John looked handsome and when I looked at myself, I literally lost it, tears and all. I exclaimed "Who is that girl? There is no way that that is me! No Way!" Let me just say, I am one who has a very upbeat, positive outlook on life. I am happy, I am not the woe is me type of person. But as I looked at that photo, I became very critical of myself and wondered how I had reached this point/weight in my life.














As soon as I finished looking at all of our new darling photos, I immediately began looking for the soonest/closest Weight Watchers meeting. Mind you, the meeting that I attended was one day before my 36 birthday(exactly ONE year ago today). When I told John what was I was doing, he asked if i wanted to wait until after my birthday to join Weight Watchers so I could fully enjoy my birthday and the treats. I told him "No way! If I am going to do this, I am doing it right now. If I can make it through my birthday week, I can make it through anything." I told myself that I was just 4 years away from turning 40 and if it took me 4 years to get it all off then so be it. BUT there was no way I would enter into my 40's with that extra weight on me. And so the journey began. I will be totally honest. There have been a ton of tears(usually after insane workouts),hard work, bad habits kicked to the curb, early mornings at the gym, days where I didn't want to go to the gym, treats staring me down(hello National Chocolate Chip Cookie day), self doubt, discouragement, clothes that were still too tight and the list goes on! I decided to approach this journey, one day at a time and as a lifestyle change, not a diet.

With the combination of Weight Watchers, awesome WW leaders, Fitness MD, My encouraging(keep me on track/task, whose name I am most likely to curse on any given day)trainer(David), a supportive family, lots of self pep talks, and HUGE desire to do this...I have and I am continuing to do so each day.

Now this blog post, in a sense, is another pep talk and reminder to myself that I can anything I put my mind to. I think the thing that I wanted to share the most is that we can do hard things. With lots of work and determination, we can make things happen for ourselves.

Now that a full year has gone by, I can look at that photo above and be thankful that I had the inspiration to make some changes in my life. I certainly did not look at that photo last year with that same mind set. I wanted to light it on fire and pretend that it did not exist :-). I am super excited to see what my 37th year of life has in store for me...starting tomorrow.

p.s. As of today, I am down 65 lbs. and still going strong. What a difference a year has made.