My Epic Battle

After years of heartache and several failed attempts to lose weight, I'm finally doing it. Over the course of 7 months I've lost a total of 35 lbs. It is only 1/3 of the weight I'd like (and need) to lose, but the fact that I've lost those pounds and have not put them back on again has been paramount. As a much added bonus, I've lost over 14" overall. That's even better then losing pounds if you ask me.

Losing weight has been a battle for me, literally a battle. It's a war that has been going on since I hit puberty, only I didn't know it until a few years ago. I, along with everyone else just assumed that I ate too much sweets and junk food. I have to admit that I did in my later high school years, but I was still very active in athletics. I ate pretty healthy in my adolescent years, my Father saw to that. I wasn't fat, not then at least, but I was heavier then most of my girl friends. Everyone has heard of the freshman 15, but in my freshman year of college, I put on 30lbs and I wasn't eating as poorly. Okay, so I drank a little bit more, had more pop, but I ate well. It didn't matter though once sports was gone out of my life.
Over the next 5 years I put on 40 more pounds. I felt horrible about myself and it showed. But with Mama and Big Daddy's help (who had just asked me to marry him), I lost 35 of those 40 pounds. But as my story had become, I put the weight back on and then some.

I had lost the battle, or at least I had thought so. It wasn't until my female bits went haywire, that I got any answers about why I couldn't just lose the weight I had put on, why no matter what effort I made, I still put on weight. Along came a miracle worker, a doctor who finally believed everything I told him and didn't run a bunch of tests and then never follow through. Thank God for this man, who knew almost instantly what my issue was and without hesitation treated me with great success (with the female bits going haywire stuff mostly). What every doctor I had previously gone to suspected I had, but didn't care to treat, was Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome or PCOS. In layman's terms, I had cysts on my ovaries that were affecting my female hormones. The symptoms are different for each woman and I won't bore you with all of those, but for me, my body wasn't breaking down insulin correctly and it was being stored in my body as excess sugar..much like a diabetic.

PCOS is treatable, but it's something that I will always have. I've done the medication route and it helped, but I wasn't on it long enough to see it's effects with losing weight. Just two short months after starting on the meds I got pregnant with Critter. I likely should have gone back on the medication once I had him, but to this date..well..I'm too stubborn. I really should though. The only other treatment for this syndrome is diet and exercise. That news only magnified the fact that I loathed dieting and exercising.

After O was born I was feeling too stressed from life's curve balls and with being a new mother that I didn't exercise (which would have been the perfect time to work-out don't you think). Since then, I've taken almost a year and a half off from any REAL working out but started back up once my weight started creeping higher and higher.

Now, I haven't been as dedicated as I should have been. It's so easy to get out of a routine of eating well and exercising with all of life's little curves that get thrown at you. The one thing that I've always lacked is self discipline. Exercising, for the sake of exercising is extremely tedious to me, which is why I find it difficult to keep on a schedule of working out as much as I need to.
My other battle is with carbohydrates. Those tasty, starchy, less nutritious bits of goodness. Oh how I crave them! My favourite has to be potatoes..of most any kind. Yummmm. I do try to eat healthy, but I most always falter when I try to keep them out of my diet. I go a little crazy after a while (Big Daddy says it's like a whole other person invades my body), and I end up binging. I know it's worse then just eating small portions of healthier versions such as brown rice, whole wheat pasta and sweet potatoes, but like I said, I just go a little crazy. And while I may fall off the wagon time and again, I do get back on and continue to do what I can.

Which is where I'm at now..getting back on the wagon and hoping for a much smoother ride. Keep your fingers crossed.