It's Easier Than You Think to Lose Weight on a Healthy Plant Based Lifestyle.....

Starting and maintaining a healthy lifestyle has been easier than I thought it would be, despite being an extremely large chunky monkey.  I am now nine weeks into the Vegan/Gluten-free lifestyle and, as of this morning (Feb 12, 2016), I have lost 44 pounds. 
My cravings and desires to gorge, for the most part, have subsided. However, it still feels kind of surreal to think that it has been over two months since I have ingested my drugs of choice - creamy stringy fat filled cheese and sugar laden snacks!    
This past week for the first time in a long time I battled genuine hunger and it scared me. I immediately being to think...What if I am not able to get it subside?  How will I alleviate it and still keep my healthy portions in check?  To combat the hunger, I decided to not deny myself extra healthy food options that day. I steamed a package of edamame and enjoyed them with a spicy V8, the extra fiber and protein did the trick and I was left satisfied. Whew...relief set in as I realized that real plant based food was able to offer satiety! 

To help me stay focused on my journey to health I daily take time to educate myself on the effects that my massive weight is having on my body.  Everyday I watch episodes of "Supersized versus Superskinny" and "My 600lb Life" - these reality shows show the stark reality of how crippling obesity is and are the perfect motivation to help me continue my new lifestyle.   

If you are struggling with your weight and wanting to make a change, I encourage you to daily take time to see the mammoth struggles super obese individuals face, there are 1000s of shows and clips on youtube to watch.  These shows and clips help keep me away from the mentality that I am already fat...."what is one more pint of ice cream!"  Because we all know that "one bite of your favorite binge food is too much as a 1000 bites are never enough."   

Wishing you prosperity in your journey!

Sharon 

When Convenience Becomes Inconvenient!

I can remember a time in the early 90's when there was not a bathroom scale that went high enough to weigh me, most maxed out between 300 - 350 pounds, and even the doctor's office did not have scales that would register my weight.   

In my early 20s I was probably 
well over 400 pounds...but I could not tell you for sure because there were no scales around to weigh me.  What I do remember is that I could not buy pants to fit me.  I had gained the bulk of my weight in my waist, hips and thighs, so to keep myself clothed I would go to the fabric store and purchase three yards of fabric and my sister in law would sew the 108 inches of fabric into a skirt and add an elastic waist. Like thousands of overweight Americans, I had maxed out of the obese & morbid BMI categories into the SUPER obese -  A BMI of ≥ 45 or 50.

Fast forward 20 years and the world is striving to accommodate the SUPER obese!
Thanks to plus size mail order catalogs we can easily order clothes for our ever ballooning figures. The wide array of plus-size clothes range from XL to 8XL and up! Now don't get me wrong when I moved into the 6XL size category I was glad to have nice clothes to choose from, but what good are stylish clothes if my mobility was decreasing to the point that I was on short term disability and spending the vast majority of my time in my house because it was too painful to walk? 

With a plethora of greasy fast food takeouts & home delivery options, plus the calorie-laden junk food snack options available via Amazon for front door delivery....we can satisfy our unhealthy food cravings without even leaving the confines of our oversized power recliners. And while convenience is an expected way of life in the 21st Century...what we blindly ignore is that shoveling copious amounts of fatty, sweet and salty convenience snacks into our mouths will soon leave us unable to freely move and care for ourselves! 

When an individual is super obese life soon becomes a great inconvenience and not only for ourselves but for our friends and loved ones whom we start to lean to aid us in our daily tasks; such as grocery shopping, walking the dogs...etc.  It is an escapable consequence that with a BMI > 45 our weight-laden frames will wear out and give under the weight.  Our joints will no longer be able to support the mounds of fat and movement will become agonizing and arduous.   Additionally performing the simplest tasks such as showering and cooking will become exhausting! 

While some SUPER obese individuals might limp along for years, fooling themselves that they can have their cake and eat it too...it will only be a matter of time before they are stopped dead in their tracks...and most will not have years before the effects of the weight exacts its toll and the body gives out.  No matter how "lucky or healthy" we think are....we will all pay the piper and before we even know what happened we will either be house bound or living a very limited and pain filled existence.  

A couple of months ago I stepped away from convenience food and embraced a healthy vegan/gluten free lifestyle.  I actually cried the night before I started my healthy lifestyle as I ridded my kitchen of the unhealthy food items.  I was freaked out about the thought of giving up my favorite junks.  Would I fall of the diet wagon as I had done millions of times before.   Would the eating plan be impossible to maintain? However, as I got into the groove of the new lifestyle, the opposite occurred, I realized it was much easier than I anticipated!   Now when I am hungry for a snack I reach for an apple or carrots with a small side of hummus. 

I have since lost 40 pounds and I am feeling the positive effects.  And most of all, I am starting to understand that true convenience is being able to properly care myself!

Wishing you prosperity in your journey!

Sharon 

A Lot to Lose

It's been two years since I last blogged and during my absence I have fallen off and on the "dieting wagon" more than once. 

I started and stopped Weight Watchers, Fooducate, bi-weekly visits with a personal food coach and veganisn.  During my failed dieting attempts I gained and lost the same 30 pounds over and over and in the end I still sport the same weight as a very healthy female adult grizzly bear.

Recently I read a meme that said, "I would do anything to lose weight besides exercise and eat healthy."  For me, there has never been a finer truism.  

Sure, I would prefer to be slender and sexy and have optimal health, but the reality is that I have not learned yet to not equate food with love and comfort and thus I continue to battle weight.  Deep down in my soul I crave and yearn for sweets and rich highly processed fatty foods. Even though I am a vegetarian I rarely eat fruits and vegetables.  And since I do not hibernate during the winter months there is no way my body can burn all of the junk food and soda I consume.  Once again I am realizing that I am going to have to feel the temporal pain of junk food deprivation and embrace a whole food eating lifestyle for the remainder of my life....if I want to stop the damaging effects of morbid obesity and the rapid march towards an early demise.   

The funny thing is....whenever I start a healthy eating plan within days I start to freak out and have panic attacks and most of the time I run for the Swiss Roll laden hills.  I try to live in the moment and not think about the fact that I am NEVER again going to have xyz food! I know logically I will be healthier and happier eating whole foods, but, on a base level, my mind is frantically wanting to cling to the unhealthy way of life. 

Health wise my back is against the wall and the clock is ticking away. Almost everytime I visit the doctor, which is all too frequently, I discover I have a new comorbidity.  I am to the point that because of weight I am unable to have some diagnostic tests ran at the local hospital and unless I want to start getting my MRIs ran at the zoo, I better start paying attention to what my body is telling me.  While many of the comorbidities are reversible with weight loss, some of my health issues, such as compound fractures due to the excessive weight on my spine, will leave painful lasting mark.  

Thankfully in my life I am blessed with an amazing set of loving and selfless friends and family who care more for me than I care for myself.   Recently one of these friends accompanied me to an appointment with one of Houston's top bariatric surgeons.  The reason for the visit was to the discuss complications from a previous unsuccessful bariatric surgery that was preformed 12 plus years ago by another surgeon.  

During our office visit with the doctor, he emphatically said I needed a radical 2nd bariactic surgery to fix my first unsuccessful bariactic surgery.  I told him that I did not want to have another surgery, but instead wanted to start a healthy vegan eating program and to work hard to emotionally get to the root of my compulsive overeating.    He looked me straight in the face and said "it's IMPOSSIBLE at your size for you to lose your weight by healthy eating!"   And he went on to add that, "at the rate you are going you have about five years to live."  

WOW!  Never had a doctor told me I could NOT loss weight and the strangest thing happened....I left his office motivated to show him wrong.  My friend who had accompanied me to the appointment, together with her husband, graciously offered to open their home to me for a month to help me start on a real food healthy eating program.   Despite it being two weeks before Christmas I took them up on their offer and on December 7th I started.   

The company is amazing and the food has been yummy but emotionally it has been very hard...I am grieving my old comfort foods.  But I am actively working on my emotional issues and ready walk through the pain, sadness, anxiety and panic I experience while adjusting to new lifestyle...because I know it is going to open up a whole new world for me.

Next week during this journey I want to delve into and blog about all of the things in life I will be able to do at a healthy weight. 

Love and peace!

Unable to Dodge the Obesity Side Effects Bullet

In my early 20's, when a medical professional told me that at current weight gaining trend, “I would probably have about 10 years to live” - the statement did not even faze me.   For all I cared, he might as well of just casually stated that he preferred to use a Mickey Mouse Band-Aid after giving me a shot.    Years of experiencing life as an ever burgeoning fat kid and adult, who was bombarded by a world of helpful weight loss tactics, had left me with an impregnable adipose casing.  

Oh, I am sure, at the time, I faked interest, but really, who I was kidding?  I had no earthly idea (and still do not to this day have any idea) how to choose life over junk food.  Fear has never motivated me to eat healthy.  Nor has the shame of being unable to fit comfortably in a single airplane seat provided me with the incentive to change.  Even, the thought of dying from obesity, sadly enough, does not scare me into health reformation! 
 
Today, I am 44 years old.  I have outlived his dismal forecast by 10 years, but I have not dodged the inevitable obesity side effects bullet.   Decades before its time, the cartilage in my knees has been replaced by spurs.   Walking from my car to my apartment feels like a marathon.   The simple act of tying my shoes, which I mastered so easily in kindergarten, now, taxes me to the point that it is easier to just wear flip flops. 

You see, what I had not factored into the Doctor’s “death by obesity statement,” was that it will not be one of these "die peaceably in your sleep deaths."    With each passing day, my body tries to warn me and woo me into reformation with its messages of pain.  

At first it whispered, "my knees hurt," and then it politely tried to tell me "I can’t breathe when you walk a flight of stairs.” And as the weight increased and the birthdays passed, the obesity associated pain and discomfort increased to the point where my body now has to shout, just to get my numbed attention. 

Well you know what?  Pain is a powerful motivator for me.   And while I still have absolutely no clue on how to succeed at losing weight, I do know how to pray and today, I am asking God to please do for me what I cannot do – change my desires, soften my heart and cultivate in me a healthy appetite and desire to live life at its fullest for Him – Amen.

Sixteen Candies Meets the Lunch Club

I started high school at the tender age of 13, weighing over 200 pounds and four years later, when I walked across the stage and flipped my tassel, I was could no longer weigh on a standard bathroom scale.

I had pretty much eaten my way through high school with the zest of someone who was training for a Sumo wrestling competition.  My high school mental year book is stuffed with food related memories.   

If I close my eyes, I can tell you with accurate and mouthwatering detail how the food was laid out on the buffet line at my favorite all-you-can-eat pizzeria – but I would be hard pressed to describe the basic details of our school gym. 

When I would go out to eat with my average-weight high school buddies, I always felt comfortable and loved by them and thus felt free to eat with abandonment!  

Many times, after the meal ended and we parted ways, more times than I care to count, I would have to stop alongside the road to throw up, because I had consumed more than my body could process.  It was kind of like I was born without an “over-eating kill switch!”  

As I have gotten deeper into therapy, I have started to stroll through the corridors of my past. Many times I search for the “broken part of me” that is unable to silence my over-powering urge to gorge.  

However, the cob-web covered safety deposit boxes strewn throughout my sugar cluttered mind only seem to contain more questions than answers....

Why I am different than the majority of my friends?   How are they able to stop eating when they start to feel full?  

Why do some only gain 20 – 30 pounds and then stabilize?   

Do I have a weight limit set point?  Will I live to see my set point? Will I have the courage to decide to eat to live and thus enjoy the life that God so richly blessed me with??   

Fears of Famine and a Fully Stocked Pantry

                                                  

I was probably about six years old when I took my first plane ride.  My Mom and I were flying from Dallas to Kansas City, MO to visit family.  I can remember staring out the plane window, in awe, of the dense clouds that encompassed our plane.  And while most kids might have imagined being gently cradled in the softness of the clouds, my mind turned to its favorite subject - food. 

  

Leaning over to my mom, with concern in my voice, I asked, if I were to fall out of the plane, would I starve to death before I hit the ground?  What a strange question, for a child, that grew up in a house of plenty, to ask.  

Our family never wanted for food; however, I am always wanting for food.    Throughout my life, I have always wanted every day to be festival of eating.   I continually crave that full and sedated feeling that we all enjoy after a sumptuous Thanksgiving meal  - but my food induced sedation  came with a high price tag. 

During junior high, whenever my Mom and Dad were both at work, I can remember the excitement of coming home from school and finding an empty house and a fully stocked kitchen.   As I look back now, I know that the mass amounts of high carbohydrate foods I consumed on those latch-key afternoons were equal to an average adults’ prescribed daily intake of calories.  

The afternoons of continual grazing wore on, my weight increased and the guilt and shame set in and I began to literally feel sick to my stomach. Why had I had that third serving?  Why had I chased it all down with a pitcher of my homemade extra sugary grape Kool-Aid – the kind that when you finished your glass, you were rewarded with a spoonful of sugary sludge? 

At this point, I think I was too young to battle my internal conflicts with food or challenge myself about my out-of-control eating habits.     I was quickly becoming deeply rooted into a lifetime of vicious grazing and regret eating patterns.    I did not fully understand the seriousness of being a fat child and I had yet to start my first of many failed diet attempts.    

   

While I cannot remember being overly teased at school and I always seemed to have friends, I can tell you for sure, that being larger than the average bear comes with some serious drawbacks.    I could never wear the standard gym outfits.  The desks were always snug and the list goes on…

By the time I was a teenager, I could no longer comfortably ride the amusement park rides.  I keenly remember the last time I rode on a roller-coaster.   I was seated on the roller-coaster and when it was the park attendants turn to lock the safety bar on my seat, he struggled to get it to lock into place.   With one final push, it locked and I was wedged into an uncomfortable and scary ride.
   

One would think this humiliating experience would have motivated me into reformation; however, I think even at that young age, I knew that junk food would always provide a much bigger adrenaline rush than any amusement ride could ever offer!

Going Weigh Back

I really can't ever remember a time in my life when I was not fat.   In fact, I have been overweight for so much of my life, that it has become my normal.     

For me, as I leaf through my early childhood pictures, I find some in which I actually look like all the other kids in my age group.  However, about the age of six or seven everything started to change and I rapidly became the “non-ideal sized child.”   

By then, we had moved to small town about 30 minutes south of Fort Worth, Texas and I was in the 2^nd grade.  In order for my mom to find school clothes to fit my ever blossoming figure; we would drive all the way the Sears Store in South Fort Worth.    Which I must say, I always found to be a treat – because after we would finish buying my non-fashionable husky jeans, we would head for the yummy snack-food counter, conveniently located in the basement of the Sears store.  

How lucky could a junk-food fend kid get – cardboard textured jeans, that sort of fit, and a bag of sweet and tangy sour cherry balls, all in one trip.  To this day I can still smell the fresh popcorn and taste the tartness of the cherry balls. 

During the 70’s, when I was a pre-teen, Sears was really about the only store in our area that carried clothing in my size.   In fact, recently I was checking out the current on-line trends for children’s plus-sized clothing and was totally dumb-struck by an asinine advertising approach that one dot-com store is using to promote its Husky wear. 

The tag-lines under the clothing read, “It’s not easy buying clothes for your child when they are not the ideal weight for their height.  Husky clothing is difficult to find at most stores, so when you do find boys' husky sets, it's a blessing.”   Somehow, I doubt promoting plus-sized kids clothing as the saving grace for the parents of a 200 pound under-height adolescent is a good thing, especially for their child’s self-esteem. 

Growing up as a fat kid, I remember all too well how it felt awkward and embarrassing to wear Husky pants and I am pretty sure I never thought – wow I am so blessed to be too short and too wide!

So why was I one of the unlucky 7% of the children in the 70s and 80s to struggle with obesity?   Did I subconsciously think it would be easier to struggle with the challenges associated with obesity than struggle to give up junk food?

I am always amazed when someone can eat just one piece of candy and not spend the rest of the day jonesing for more – whereas if were to have ten pieces of candy or even more, I would still send the rest of day dreaming of candy.  

Sadly, I have yet to reach my satiety point when it comes to sugar!  And I am quickly coming to realize that what my therapist says is true, “One bite is too many and a 1000 is never enough.”   

Doing What I'd Rather Not

Mark Twain once said, "The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don't want, drink what you don't like, and do what you'd rather not."   I think the key word in this quote is “you” or in the first person “I/me.”  

What I crave is not what I need to survive. What I feel driven to eat, of my own free will, actually slows down my life forces and leads me to state of comfortableness.  In fact, even I am shocked that I am still alive to tell my story. 

I will choose a pint of blackberry ice cream over a bowl of blackberries in a minute.    My natural wants are polar opposite to what is good for my health.   I can go days without craving water, but will break out in a sweat before noon if I don’t have an ice cold diet coke or a sweet tea. 

I am mesmerized by the candy rack at the check-out counter, the frozen dessert section and the pastry counter, but can walk by the produce section without skipping a beat.   

How I have allowed my appetite and eating habits to become so toxic?  At what point does the madness stop?

Thankfully, tomorrow is a new day and for the next 24 hours, I am committing my eating to Him.   

By His grace may I only desire healthy foods.

Food Unawareness - Mindless Eating and Obesity

In  2009 I started seeing a therapist who treats sugar addictions. And as we progressed through therapy one of my assignments was to keep a food log, however, this request was meet with much resistance on my part.

Mentally I was like...me start a food log?? No way! That would be way too structured and very "type A" which is polar opposite to my carefree "type Z" personality! Besides...didn't the food I eat on the "down low" -- when no one was looking not count...

Well....my therapist does not give up easily and after the second food log request I decided to give it a whirl...and boy did I hate it!!!

I tried it for one day (well actually 3/4's a day) and I crashed burned! No more food logs for me!!  It totally interfered with my continuous grazing patterns. Plus, it was much too shameful to actually be truthful and list all the junk food I ate.

Besides...I am already fat...so what is one more pint of ice cream...chocolate bar or one more day of chowing down on my unlimited supply of favorite junk food?  And if I actually wrote down what all I was eating...then the calories would count and I would gain weight!

But somehow the actual act of keeping an honest food log for even 3/4s of a day had made a dent in my armor and after two weeks and a couple days of all out sugar gorging, I begin to realize my thinking was flawed...

It was kind of like me saying that if a rattlesnake bites me in the closet...it does not count. But we all know that if rattlesnake bites me in a closet or on a crowded street.....it does count! And after the bite - whether rattlesnake or a bite from a 1,000 Twinkies - I still have a strong chance of dying, if I do not reach out and get help.

The food I "eat in the closet" today will eventually come to light down the road on my body as serious health issues. And no amount of magical thinking on my part can prevent the health consequences that comes from my sugar/junk food addiction and the resulting morbid obesity....whether I choose to be aware of them or not!