Kelly's Fab Fitness - Simplify your HEALTH!

"Weighing in at 239lbs, I realized that this weight, the weight I thought I would never see in my lifetime, was a choice."

Sitting with my doctor and him telling me that I won’t be able to have kids if I don’t lose weight was a big wake up call.  I sat there thinking about how I stopped weighing myself at 220.. saying, oh it will come off.  I just have to eat an extra salad a week. Take the stairs once in a while… it will come off.  I chose to stop weighing myself, I chose to continue to drink a lot and often, I chose to eat poorly and not work out. I made that choice.

Now, at 239lbs, I had to make a choice to either continue down that path or make a change.  The thing that the doctor didn’t tell me till later is that now that I wanted to lose weight, it would be that much harder because my hormones were completely off track and losing weight with high estrogen means that I have to try harder than most people.

It took me about 4 months and an embarrassing video where my stomach was hanging over a chair to realize that I had to make a real change. It’s not easy, but it’s a choice that I had to make.  I started small, the elliptical machine for 15 minutes and 20 crunches 3 times a week.  I also did Pilates at home with my then boyfriend, now husband.  I quickly dropped 10lbs. 

Thinking that I was doing it right, I kept up with the work out, except for when I was traveling…. Which was every other week for 5 days. I ate OK most of the time, except for when I was traveling. Again, a choice that I was making to not really give it everything that I had.  So I hired a trainer at my gym.  I am not going to lie to you, I cancelled a lot in the beginning as it was hard and it was really early in the morning.  But when I started kickboxing with my trainer, working out became fun. I started to see a huge difference in my body and energy.  I realized that the food that I was eating was actually making me sluggish and not helping my work out.  So I decided to make more of a conscious effort to eat better, even when I was traveling.  At this point working out while traveling still wasn’t my thing.  But my eating better consisted of actually eating breakfast, oatmeal every day. Actually making a point to eat lunch every day and to try to make a healthy dinner, like homemade vegetable soup or salmon salad instead of Turkey Lasagna. (Which by the way sounds healthier than regular Lasagna, but really packs 1,100 calories per serving) I used to skip breakfast, sometimes have lunch and gorge on dinner and snacks all night.  I lost 30lbs. I felt great, confident, and was getting compliments all the time.

But then life happened.  I got a new project that was time consuming, I put work first and me second.  I started traveling more than I did before. And where I was able to continue to try and eat healthy, and I even worked out a bit while traveling, I gained 10lbs back.  I didn’t make my health my priority. Something that you need to do when losing weight.

In March I got engaged.  I was so excited.  I knew that I wanted to lose 20lbs before the wedding but I STILL wasn’t motivated enough to make the real change. The kind of change you need to make to live a healthy lifestyle.  Finally mid-May I got back to working out a few times a week, and eating a bit better.  Still couldn’t kick the drinking on the weekends but I was doing better.  I lost 10lbs pretty quickly and I knew that if I stayed on this track, I could potentially lose more weight than I had hoped. I was pretty excited.  However then my bridal shower and bachelorette party happened.  2 days of bad food, drinking and being EXTREMELY hung over.  I gained 15lbs over the weekend.  Now, for those of you that don’t know, it is physically impossible to gain that much weight in a weekend.  It is generally just being bloated and water weight.

I was devastated. I knew that I would never get to where I needed to be if I kept making exceptions for special occasions. 

Because in reality, every weekend was a special occasion, there were weddings, drinks with friends we haven’t seen in a while, new restaurant openings, red carpet events, birthdays, concerts, etc.  EVERYTHING WAS A SPECIAL OCCASION!!

So I quit drinking… for 1 month… to see how I would do.  I cut carbs to only whole grains and no carbs after 3pm.  I took snacks like almonds and ½ of an apple to work for when I got hungry.  I drank twice as much water to fill up my stomach and I packed on the lean protein throughout the day.  OH and a big one… I cut out most sugar.  If something had more than 10grams of sugar per serving, I couldn’t have it. You would be surprised at how much sugar is in a bottle of natural green tea – 35grams. I even cut my fruit intake to one serving of fruit a day.

It was hard.  I was hungry for a while, but I knew that I was just eating before because I was bored or stressed. 

At the gym I incorporated weight lifting and the stairmaster.  I loved the challenge every day that I was there. Every day I pushed myself a little harder and instead of food being my addiction, working out became my addiction. My before and after photos became my daily motivation. Making connections at the gym became my support group, and writing my blog held me accountable.  I found what I needed to keep me going. So after 5 months of working my butt off, fueling by body with the right kind of food, (Clean eating) I lost 47lbs, (total of 67lbs) went from a size 18 to a size 8, and lost 20% body fat. I went from only being able to be on the stair master for 8 minutes at a level 3 to doing 60 minutes at a level 12, which is 6 miles on the stairmaster.  I went from hating every inch of my body to learning how to love myself.  Even though the failures. I learned how to navigate life with having this new body, one that is smaller, more agile, and gets cold a lot faster!

But that’s the thing about weight loss, it’s a daily choice, it’s a struggle and it’s an accomplishment. 

It’s something that doesn't ever stop. You have to keep going and make the life change to stay healthy.  I still have a ways to go to get to where I want to be. Even with life changing I am making time for my goals and I am ready to face those changes head on.  Who knows, before I get to where I want to be I might get pregnant, and have a whole new struggle to face.  But what I know now is that I can do it, and what it feels like to get to where you want to be and I know that I definitely never want to feel any different!

Come back this Thursday for more information on Kelly's Diet and a delicious recipe! In the mean time you can go check out her blog by clicking on the image below!