How I Lost Over 60 Pounds and Kept it Off

My mother was diagnosed with diabetes several years ago. When the doctor issued the diagnosis, she had little problem changing her habits in accordance with his instructions. When she got home from her appointment she called me over to her house. When I arrived she already had three plastic bags full of food sitting by the front door. She answered my puzzled look by telling me that I needed to put the bags in my car. She couldn't eat any of it per the doctor's orders. She didn't want to just throw it away so she was giving it to me and the kids. I watched her empty her pantry, refrigerator and freezer. What remained was virtually nothing. My poor mother had to give up most of the foods that she loved.

At the time, I carried an extra 60 pounds on my small, 5'3" frame. I have weighed as much as 218 lbs but, at the time, I was hovering between 180 and 190. As I watched her hand over all of her ice cream, potato chips and other junk food, I made a conscious decision to change some of my own bad habits before I had to do the same. I wanted to improve my health and set a better example for my family. Plus, I didn't want to ever have to give up chocolate. Sitting at my computer desk that night, reading about diabetes, I resolved to kick my Coke habit and jumpstart my sedentary lifestyle the very next day.

Coke Addiction

I expected that kicking the Coke addiction would be the most difficult step. I had spent most of my life indulging my desire for soft drinks without regard for its affect on my health. My mother started allowing me to drink Cokes for breakfast when I was no more than ten years old. The philosophy she learned from her own mother was, "Anything for breakfast is better than nothing for breakfast." I could have pretty much whatever I chose as long as I ate something before school in the morning. Chocolate cake, King Dons and Chips Ahoy cookies were all up for grabs.

None of it had a detrimental affect on my weight until I made it to puberty. Then it was like the extra pounds just fell out of the sky and landed square on top of me. I battled a weight problem up until this time when I decided not only to lose weight but to change my lifestyle altogether. I went from a size sixteen to a size ten in about twelve months and that is where I have stayed for the past two years.

Bad habits cannot just be changed or eliminated. Bad habits must be replaced with good ones. That next morning when I woke up, after committing to make such important changes the previous day, I didn't want to go through with it. It would've been so much easier to just reach for a Coke and a piece of chocolate pie with a heaping spoonful of Cool Whip - my own personal breakfast of champions for at least 3 years.

Instead I forced myself to fix a glass of unsweetened tea. Then I cooked scrambled eggs, made with low-fat cooking spray, and dry, wheat toast. My new and improved breakfast of champions proved to be pretty good and I adapted to it quickly thanks to the healthy dose of protein provided by the eggs. It may not be the healthiest breakfast ever conceived but it is better than what I was doing before. One way to ensure that you stick to your desired plan is to stop buying anything that you do not want to consume. If it ain't there you can't eat or drink it. Soft drinks are a main culprit for many weight problems.

Walk it Off

Exercise may as well have been a four-letter word to me when I was growing up. As a child, I avoided Phys Ed by working in the library or faking a stomach ache. Sports and physical activities, like kick ball, were intimidating because I wasn't very good at most of them. Other kids rarely wanted me to be a part of the team due to my lack of confidence and knowledge. That was fine with me back in the day but I unknowingly set myself up for a lifetime of bad habits regarding intentional exercise. Namely, I never got any beyond chasing my kids around the house every day which was quite a bit, mind you, but not enough to qualify as intentional.

I wracked my brain trying to think of some form of intentional exercise that I could tolerate. Swimming was out of the question though it would have been my top choice. Access to an affordable swimming pool is non-existent in this part of the country. I had a ten-speed bike but keeping it in operable condition proved to be nearly impossible. It finally collapsed into a rusted heap of defeated metal in the front yard. I considered aerobics or an indoor exercise regimen but due to limited space and rotten floors I feared that this option might be downright dangerous. Either internal injuries from head on collisions with family members or property damage might occur when the floor gives way and I fall through it and have to crawl out from underneath my trailer.

Walking was the only logical answer. Walking is something anyone can do. It is the most basic workout and a viable form of intentional exercise. I started off easy with a twenty-minute walk on the level back road of our mobile home park where our trailer is located. Before I started, I would set the alarm on my cell phone to go off when my twenty minutes of torture was complete. I avoided all hills and walked at a steady pace that I was able to maintain for the entire twenty minutes. For the first month, I only walked 3 days a week, once a day. Knowing myself was knowing that overdoing it, right out of the gate, was a surefire way to lead to intentional exercise burnout.

As my tolerance for exercise increased, I found that twenty minutes wasn't enough to raise my heart rate and burn calories anymore. I started setting my alarm for thirty minutes instead of twenty and sometimes pushing myself to walk just five minutes past the intended thirty. I utilized the natural landscape by walking up and down the steep hills around our neighborhood. I had already seen results but the results I was seeing now were not only visible but flattering.

I pushed myself harder and harder and started using a long set of concrete stairs at the front of the park to enhance my daily walk. Initially, I climbed up and down the stairs five times. I eventually worked my way up to fifteen times in both directions. I can run up and down those stairs at least ten times now with little or no effort.

Taking these baby steps should get you headed in the direction of better health and successful weight loss. Walking and eliminating sweet soft drinks and snacks are easy options to try that can produce amazing results for some. All it takes is a little will power and setting your mind to change what you can. Results may take some time but with patience and dedication to replacing bad habits with good ones, the results can be life-changing.