My "story"

My story is posted on the Square1 website (http://www.square1club.com/, click on meet a member) but it was edited beyond recognition. I was sifting through old files today and came across the original. With a few edits to update it to current day, here it is in its entirety.

A common saying at most Weight Watcher meetings is, “Nothing tastes as good as thin feels.” This may be inspiring for those people who have been thin before and are trying to get back there. For someone like me, who was nine pounds at birth and never thin, it’s meaningless. I knew donuts tasted good. I still don’t know how thin feels. But now that I know how fit can feel, I can tell you that it is definitely better than any donut!

Unlike most people I wasn’t big on trying fad diets. I didn’t yoyo diet, I just consistently gained weight each year from the time I was born. I tried to diet once, when I was 9 or 10, but it lasted maybe two days. I ate saltines and apples and I felt terrible. I didn’t have the tools I needed or really know how to lose weight. In college I tried Slim Fast for about two weeks, but halfway through the day I would give up and stop at the Steak & Shake drive thru.

My first moderate success was with WeightWatchers my senior year of college. When I joined I was 317 pounds, and by December of that year I was down to 280. I attended meetings with one of my roommates and another good friend, and the support from them was great. We worked out together at the campus rec center, cooked and shopped together, and we had a big group of friends cheering us on. People started to notice and I felt great in my smaller jeans. That January our schedules changed and I had to go to meetings alone, and the weightloss stopped. That spring I moved back to Omaha, started working in a group home where I was surrounded by candy and junk food all day, and quickly found myself back up over 300 pounds.

For a few years I was able to maintain my weight between 300-320 pounds by halfway-trying to eat right, occasionally going to the gym for 20 minutes on the elliptical, and going to WeightWatchers every week. Then, a series of health issues hit. First, in the summer of 2006, I had a lump removed from my leg. The pathology reports were inconclusive, but it looked like lymphoma. I was sent to an Oncologist for countless tests. I spent the entire summer thinking I had lymphoma. I never did get a real diagnoses OR an all-clear. I quit WeightWatchers, fell into an even deeper depression, and did nothing but eat all day. I got up to about 340 pounds.

In addition, I had other health problems to deal with caused by endocrine issues. I had extra heavy and extra frequent periods, which caused anemia and made me tired and weak all the time. On Christmas day of 2006 I ended up in the ER when I lost so much blood I passed out. The ER docs did a biopsy, and sent me to yet another Oncologist. The possible lymphoma wasn’t my only issue, I was now dealing with pre-cancerous uterine cells.

The doctors told me the cells were caused by excess estrogen. What I didn’t find out until years later was that the estrogen was caused by excess fat. I always thought of fat as just this covering that gets in the way and makes you unattractive, but it’s so much more. It’s living breathing tissue! It creates hormones and alters your entire body chemistry. I was so depressed about the possibility of having one cancer (lymphoma) that I ate my way closer to another cancer (uterine cancer).

Because the cells were caused by an excess of estrogen, the treatment is an estrogen blocker, Megestrol Acetate. Unfortunately this drug is also an appetite stimulant. It’s given to AIDS patients to help with AIDS Wasting Disease! I managed to stay on the drug for six months, long enough to temporarily rid myself of the bad cells, but also long enough to gain an additional 60 pounds. Eventually I told my doctors enough was enough and got off the drug, but the damage was done. I was hovering around 400 pounds, extremely depressed, and had basically given up on life.

In January of 2010, a follow-up biopsy showed that the cells had returned and this time I would need surgery.  My entire family sat all day in the waiting room wondering if I would be okay, and what the doctors would find. After a bad reaction to the anesthesia that left them waiting hours longer I was so wracked with guilt I knew I couldn’t put them through that again. The kicker was when my mom came back to talk to the surgeon. She asked if there was any way to prevent an occurrence. The surgeon told her the only way was for me to lose weight. I knew that, I had always known that, but to have a surgeon tell that to my worried mother was heartbreaking. I couldn’t believe I had put my family through that.

I began searching for a way to “fix” myself. I was seeing a therapist, looking for a new job, and trying the best I knew how to deal with my issues. I knew exercise would be key, so I started looking around for a program. Joining a gym never worked for me in the past. I would stop after 15-20 minutes. I needed something more structured to keep me going. And it had to be fun. I loved being active as a kid even though I was always overweight and slower than the other kids. I was always on my bike or in the pool. I took dance for 11 years, swam competitively from age 4 to 14, and participated in roller skating competitions. I needed to find something I loved as much as I had loved those activities as a kid. I had heard about Marty’s bootcamp when he and Amy first moved to town, but at that time it was only in the evenings and conflicted with my work schedule. I looked him up again and was happy and nervous that he had morning times available.

It took me a few more weeks to get up the courage, but I finally showed up for my first bootcamp on April 20^th, 2010. Since that day my entire life has changed. I’ve lost 80 pounds and no longer have to special order my clothes (at my heaviest, even the plus size stores didn’t carry my size). I’ve completed races from 4K to 13.1 miles, done a vertical stair challenge, and participated in my first triathlon. I’m studying for my ACE trainer certification so that I can help other people like me, and I’ve become a licensed Zumba Fitness and Zumba Gold instructor. I fell in love with Zumba because I love how exercise can be fun! It really is like a party, and I love sharing it with people. It makes me feel like I felt as a kid in dance class. I was never the best dancer, never had a dancer’s body, but it felt so great to move to good music and just have fun with my friends. That’s what exercise should be about!

Everything about my life has changed, but the biggest difference now is that I have hope. When I smile it’s a real smile, I no longer have to fake it. I am surrounded by the best support system, I know that my fellow bootcampers will be there for me and I love being around to help support them. At each race I sign up for I know I will have a group of friends at the finish line, and that’s what keeps me going.

I still need therapy and medication, and I probably always will struggle with that. But the difference now is, I DO struggle. Instead of hiding behind fat and hiding in my house I get out and face the world. I take on new challenges. I’m not afraid to fail anymore. No matter how slow I run I am still running faster than the people at home on their couches. I am a work in progress, but I’m progressing every day. J

Addiction

So most of my days at work are spent processing insurance claims of course. But between claims, or when the system is slow, or during breaks I spend the rest of my time talking with Amanda. Sometimes it’s hilarious, sometimes it’s sad, sometimes it makes me wonder, and sometimes it makes me think. Something I sent her this morning, however, is really making me think. Here is what I said. (If you’re not familiar, Carmen is the therapist Marty referred me to).

I keep thinking I need to figure out “why” I got fat. Like what triggered it. Something Carmen said last night makes me think I may never find an “answer” because there may not be one. She was talking about a story in the Cocaine Anonymous book. This guy was addicted to candy. He remembers the first time he was ever given candy, as a really little kid, and after that it was all he could think about. Candy. And then candy turned into alcohol which turned into cocaine.

I don’t remember the first time I felt addicted to food, but I remember some things. Like….I vividly remember moments that revolve around food. I can tell you what there was to eat at most important days in my life. The day we sold our house on Nina Street I ate an M&M cookie from Bakers at Frederick Square. The day my Aunt Marge drove us (my sisters and me) with Aunt Nancy back from Indiana to Omaha I had Pizza Hut spaghetti with meat sauce for lunch, and then chocolate milk and an m&M (again) cookie from the gas station at Little Amana (exit 240 on I-80). The day those pictures of younger me in the swimming pool were taken (they’re on facebook) I ate half a package of keebler m&m cookies, and I can still tell you how they tasted, I remember it so vividly. I ate some of them IN the pool. Those are my biggest m&m cookie memories. I have other memories based on other foods.
And I used to steal candy. Every single time we went to Bakers I would take a piece of toffee from the Brach’s Pick-a-Mix. Then while the carryout boy would put the groceries in the blue chevy astro van I would sit in the back seat and eat it real quick before my mom got in the car. Then I would eat my purple safety pop that the cashier always gave me.

So anyway…the point is, there may not be an answer. I may just be an addict. I don’t like that….but I think I’m starting to accept it.

So…this is something I think I may need to explore further. But I wanted to save that part of the email here, for my own reference. The past few weeks my therapy appointments hadn’t really been productive. I can tell I’m making progress when I feel terrible after. I don’t even know how to describe the feeling I feel after I leave a session, but it’s….it’s not good, it’s an awful feeling, but I know that it’s good FOR me.

The past few weeks I was frustrated, trying to figure out what was “wrong” with me, why I am the way I am, what triggered it. Figuring out last night that maybe there was no trigger, maybe it just is….it doesn’t make me feel better right now, but I think it’ll make me feel more peace in the future. If I can just….accept that as the case, that there was no huge trauma that caused my food issues, that I’m just an addict….then, maybe I’ll be able to figure out what I need to do to heal the addiction. Maybe.

I sure hope so, because the out of control feeling I feel so often is pretty scary. The not caring/giving up is even scarier.

I’ve almost been hoping for some sort of repressed trauma to pop up, so I would have an answer. I’m not happy now that I’m thinking there IS no answer, but then…at the same time, I feel some relief that maybe no answer IS the answer. Which means I finally found it. And I actually hope I’m right.

Free at last!

New year’s resolutions aren’t normally something I “believe” in. They don’t usually stick. And the people who invade gyms/weightwatcher meetings at the start of the year were always a nuisance, the lines were always long and everywhere was crowded. But this year I’ve actually made one that STUCK!

We’re now in February so I think I can confidently say that this particular resolution is for the long term. On December 31^st, 2011 I had my last donut. I won’t pretend it was my last donut EVER, but I am determined to go the entire year without a single donut. 366 days since this is a leap year.

I will admit, I am still tempted. I have to see donuts everywhere I go! Krispy Kreme has their stupid “Hot Now!” sign. The cafeteria here has a pile of donuts tempting me five mornings a week. They LOOK good. But I’ve been telling myself, they don’t make me FEEL good. They are not fuel. They are simply wasted calories, and I’m hungry again five minutes later after I have one (or two…or three).

The thought of a donut now isn’t nearly as appealing as it was a month ago. And that’s awesome! It really does get easier as time goes by.

So, on Friday I decided to go one step further. I am now giving up popcorn balls. The pretty colored marshmallow popcorn balls from Vick’s that they sell in the cafeteria here. They’re so tempting with their bright colors and cheap price tag. But, like the donuts, they do nothing for me. They are not “fuel” for my body. They are empty calories. And not just that, but they make my jaw hurt from all the chewing and chewing and chewing! So they don’t do anything for me, they HURT me, and they set me back in my weightloss. It should be a no brainer to get rid of them.

Unfortunately it’s not so easy. I have a serious popcorn ball addiction! They’re all I’ve thought about this afternoon. Luckily, the cafeteria just closed, so even if I decided to give in I could get one right now. So, this being the first really tempting day, I’ve made it through. I know it’ll get easier after this. This week will be hard. I’ll have hard times, hard days. But I can do it!

I have been popcorn ball free since February 4^th, 2012. On December 31^st, 2012 I will be 332 days popcorn ball free.

Perhaps in another month I’ll give up another vice. We’ll see!

Community = amazing.

I posted awhile back about being nervous when Square1Club opened that we would lose some of the “community” element that was so wonderful in our big bootcamp groups. Now that we’re a month or so into it I’m feeling a lot better where that’s concerned. Personally, I’ve tried to make a bit more effort myself to keep in touch with people, especially the ones I don’t have workouts scheduled with every week.

This past Saturday night I had an impromptu dinnerparty/scrabble night. It was so great! It was Angie’s idea, so thank you miss Angie for an awesome idea! We ended up inviting Kevin, Robert, and Amana. So there were 6 of us, like a triple date. Of course, had it been a triple date, the pairings probably would have been something like: Robert and Kevin, Dave and Angie, Me and Hartman, LOL! But anyway, it was a nice little group, just barely small enough to squeeze around my little table.

Amanda was awesome and helped cook. I asked Facebook for chicken suggestions (THANK YOU TO EVERYONE! I’m filing all those ideas away because I’m sure there will be many “next times”) We ended up making a stir fry. HyVee had orange and yellow peppers on sale, so I picked up one of each. I bought yellow carrots because they’re “fancier”, some roasted red pepper for color, and broccoli. It was delicious! Amanda did an amazing job with the spices, considering how little I know to keep on hand. She even made a “sauce” (like she deglazed the pan and everything! Cornstarch was involved! She’s so fancy and knowledgeable, it’s amazing!) and I enjoyed my little cooking lesson (although I felt guilty making my friends do most of the work for a party at MY house. Oh well!)

We played a round of Upwords. Like Scrabble, but 3-demensional, if you’re not familiar. Angie is crazy good at word games. I’m…not. LOL! After that, even though it was late, we started a game of Mexican Train Dominos. Only Dave and I had played before, but the others picked it up really quickly and I think we all had fun. They didn’t end up leaving until 3:30 am!

I don’t normally detail parties on here, but I was remembering how worried I was when the club opened about losing our community. I can now say for sure that that is NOT the case. If anything I’m getting closer to everyone. We get more small group time with certain people so we get to know them even better. I’m loving it!

I’m also very happy to note that I can host a party and keep it almost completely healthy! I was “bad” near the end and had a few drinks, and the girls each had one. But otherwise, our dinner was mostly veggies, just a little brown rice and some chicken. We measured the oil to keep that in check. We left feeling good and clean and healthy instead of nasty with grease congealing in our veins. A healthy party CAN be done!

Calories CRUNCHED!

Well it's February already. The first Monday in Febraury, in fact. Which means last night was the Super Bowl.
I'm not sure what my readers (if I have any, lol!) would have normally done during the super bowl. Personally I've only been to two parties. One was in college at Steve and Aaron's house, and I recall eating oodles of "bad" food that night. I remember M&M's and Bugles for sure. I think there may have been pizza. I'm not sure.
The other was when I worked in the group home. I took two of the ladies to a Super Bowl party at my apartment complex, "Loser Heights". The Bears were playing so Dave and I wanted to actually watch the game. We had cupcakes I remember. I'm not sure what else we ate that day, but I'm sure either frozen pizza or fast food were involved. We left at halftime so the ladies could get to bed "on time" and so I could leave since my shift was over, but I'm sure we ate plenty of chips and cheese dip and cupcakes in the short time we were at the party.

Last night I found out that the average Super Bowl viewer eats over 4000 calories during the game. This sounds nuts to me, but I suppose if you sit and eat for three hours straight it will easily add up to that. Especially since the typical foods are chips and dips, chili (not the healthy kind I make), pizza, wings, beer, beer, and beer. I could easily drink over 1000 calories of Blue Moon (250 calories per bottle) during a football game. Add some brownies and chips and a half a pizza to that and you've hit the 4000 average easily.
Well this year we decided to do things differently. Square1Club hosted a "Big Game Calorie Crunch!" We set all the cardio equipment around the tv, turned on the game, and got to work. Each station had a sign with the amount of calories a 240 pound person would burn doing that activity for two minutes. We tracked our time at each station and wrote down our calories burned, and Kevin added them all up at the end.
As a group we burned over 23,000 calories! I'm so proud of our group.
I had the third highest total, with 2264. I'm super proud of that!

So not only did we not eat "bad" food during the game (our "refueling station" was stocked with protein bars, fruit, veggies and humus, pistachios, and plenty of water) but we also burned a ton of calories. I love what Marty is doing for our group. We're really making a community and a lifestyle that's so much healthier than we've ever thought we could be. It's awesome. :)

One month down!

Well folks, this is it. The last day of January. And it's 61 degrees outside! What's even more remarkable than the weather, however, is the fact that this is my 31st day without a single donut. As many of you know, donuts are one of my biggest weaknesses. I gave them up for new years and haven't looked back...for the most part.
I will admit to being tempted. Saturday I drove by Krispy Kreme and the "hot now" sign was lit. I had two dollars in the visor of my car, enough for two original glazed sugary puffs of air and fat. But before I could get into the turn lane I remembered: I'm not supposed to be eating donuts. It's not congruent with my goals. So I drove on.
This morning I was tempted again. I was driving to work and had some time to spare. A QT chocolate covered creme filled sounded really tasty. This time it was harder to drive by. Only when I realized I would have to update my "PAL board" and tell everyone what I did was I able to drive on.

This "PAL board" thing is a new thing we have at the new gym. We each get a rectangle of dry erase board, with our picture and name at the top. We have spots for long term and short term goals, spots to track last week's nutrition, spots that show how much weight we've lost this year, this month, and this week, and a "status". The status is my favorite part. We can basically write whatever we want in that square. Mine currently says "Still donut free!" and I sure would like to keep it that way. I PLAN to keep it that way.

In my short term goals I have listed that I want to finish Trek Up The Tower in less than 19 minutes. This is a lofty goal for me, and I'm not sure whether I will achieve it or not. Last year my time was just shy of 23 minutes. And last year I not only trained for it, I had no injuries to speak of. This year I have not trained at all, and have been battling a knee injury for months. In addition, I sadly also weigh around 15 pounds MORE than this time last year. (Depressing? Yes. Discouraging? Yes. Defeating? NO!) This means a very challenging race to the top of the First National Bank building here in Omaha. It's up 40 stories, 870 steps. It's a long, tough race. The elite runners finish in 5-10 minutes. Normal people take between 10 and 15. I will be ecstatic if I just beat last year's time, but finishing in under 20 minutes is what I want. The only way to get there at this point, with my knee injury and with so little time left (the event is on February 25th) is just to push myself harder that day than I think I can go.
Last year I took it fairly easy at Trek. I rested after nearly every flight. At least every other, after about the 20th floor or so. I would just stop for a second, catch my breath, rest my quads, and then move on again. This year I won't be able to do that if I want to beat my time. My goal is not to make it all the way up without resting at all, that would be insane. But I do hope to do at least 3-4 flights before taking my short breaks this year. I feel more fit, cardiovascularly, and I feel like my legs are stronger despite the bad knee. I think I can do it.

My long term goal is to complete a Century Ride. For those of you who aren't down with the bike lingo, that's a bike ride of 100 miles. My goal is to complete this on August 25th. That's exactly six months after Trek, and I've scheduled a few days off work to prepare, complete, and rest and recover. I'm hoping some friends will ride part of it with me, or meet me at spots with supplies and cheers. It'll take some planning and coordination, but I'm really excited for this. Luckily the new gym has brand new, really nice spin bikes, so it's easier than ever to train.

In the 6 months between Trek and my Century Ride I have oodles of other events planned that I'm excited about too. In May there's the Lucky Bucket (a 7k trail run, actually called Mud Sweat and Beers) and also the UNO TRYathlon, a miniature indoor/outdoor tri. In June is the Omaha Women's Tri, and the Saturday after that is the Warrior Dash which I just signed up for today. Then in July I have the Papio Tri, and possibly a Cornhusker State Games event (either the Hot Dog Chase again, or one of the open water swimming events or bike events).

All in all this race reason is shaping up to be challenging but FUN. It all starts in three weeks with Trek Up The Tower. I'm getting excited. :)

New beginnings

So my goal was to write weekly, and here I am two days in a row. w00t go me!

Tonight was my first workout at the new gym, SquareOne. I'm feeling a little...melancholy, I guess. Maybe not the perfect word. But what I'm feeling is, I'm really going to miss our big bootcamps at other places. I've been missing the Y and Zorinsky already the past few months. Now I'll also be missing Montclair. Things at bootcamp have changed drastically since I joined 20 months ago, and although each new phase was better than the previous phase I still find myself nostalgic for the old times.

I started off coming in the mornings at the Y. There were usually around 6 people there then. I'd warm up on the elliptical, we'd do a weight circuit, and then we'd finish in the gym with basketball relays or the "card game" or bouncing medicine balls and running in circles.

Then my first competition started and there was an attendance portion, so I tried out the evening sessions. My first session felt like it would nearly kill me. Walking up the huge hill was torture. It was a different group of people (some the same, some different), it was outside, it was so much tougher. After my first day there I thought I couldn't handle it and skipped the next session because I was too scared to go back. Thank goodness for the competition, because something in me wanted to win and it overrode the fear. From then on I didn't miss another session throughout the entire summer, even though midway through I sprained my ankle pretty badly. We had Saturdays at Zorinsky, we ran the "dyke loop" (mile) and beat our times, I sprained my ankle a second time, we climbed what seemed to be a mountain, we freaked out about snakes.

A few months later things changed drastically again, and I wish I had recorded my feelings at the time. I know I was nervous. I felt scared that things wouldn't be as good. Little did I know how much BETTER they would be! The "beginners" (mostly people Marty recruited at the Biggest Loser auditions that were held here in town) merged with our "regular" bootcamp, we started having regular contests, we started having finale parties for the first time. And suddenly I had friends! We moved to Montclair, another venue, another type of workout. We added millions of wall sits, we started running to the "lonely tree", we ran a lot more in general, so many laps around the gym. The workouts at Montclair are some of my favorites. The people I got to know during that time are some of my favorites too. I'm extremely lucky to know them.

And now, the next chapter. SquareOne. Our own space. Kevin and Marty have been working like fiends for weeks now, with occasional help from some of us others, and suddenly we're in and ready to workout there. I wish I could say I'm 100% excited and happy and think that it's perfect. Instead, I'm pretty apprehensive. I'm worried. I hate the unknown, I hate change. I'm scared. Terrified, really. I'm worried that we'll lose some of the magic that is our little family. I'm worried that working out in smaller groups will make us less close. We'll have fewer opportunities to all be together. I hate that I don't know what will happen.

So, I enjoyed my first workout. I really did. And I enjoyed hanging out beforehand in the lobby with Kevin and Robert while another group worked out. And I enjoyed dinner with the guys and Amanda afterwards. But it's not the same, and I'm scared.

I'm trying to remain positive. I know I want and need to support Marty and be excited for him and his new business, and I will. I'll do everything in my power to help make this a success. But I'm scared. And I hate that.