Jumping off

Wow, I can't believe I am doing this.

I have struggled with my weight ALL of my adult life. I was never tiny to begin with, I don't think. I remember wearing a size 14 in High School (15 years ago). I believe that a lot of overweight people can pinpoint when their downward spiral began. I know I can.

My senior year of HS, I met and fell in love with a guy. Not too shocking for a HS girl. We dated and things got serious, or so I thought. He eventually cheated and left. I went into a deep depression...hey, he made me believe that he wanted to marry me. I can't say that I immediately turned to food. I think it was a more gradual thing than that. But that is where it started. I progressively got bigger from there. It didn't help that I started working at a fast-food restaurant about 6 months after the break up. Talk about easy access. I continued to work there for 10 years. I went from the sad eater, to the mad eater, to the defiant eater, to the I-don't-give-a-crap eater. My weight quickly went up and I found myself in a size 22, then ultimately a 24.

(This is how I still look, but my husband is much thinner than this picture. All he had to do was stop drinking diet soda and he lost weight. Go figure!)

I have been at a size 24 and 294 lbs (+/- 2 lbs) for the better part of a decade. I have gone through many different exercise spurts, weight loss plans (though, never that cost any money, cause I didn't have it to spend) and have had no success. I start, I feel really good, I don't lose very quickly and then I quit. The bright side is that I have maintained my atrocious weight, with the exception of during pregnancy, for many years. I have changed some of my eating habits. I don't turn to food for comfort. I am not much of a snacker anymore. My biggest problem is portions and not eating enough of the right food. Still, this has got me nowhere.

A few months ago, I heard of the HCG weight loss plan. My first reaction was "CRAZY FAD DIET". My husband's cousin wanted to lose some weight so she would be smaller at her wedding. She told me she was getting injections everyday and that she would only be eating 500 calories a day, for 40 days. I thought, and probably told her, that she was crazy. 500 CALORIES??? No one can survive on that, right? Not without looking and feeling so sick that you want to die. Well, I was curious to see how she did. She gave up way before the 40 days and didn't have anything to show for it. She was an absolutely BEAUTIFUL bride, regardless of a little extra padding and her hubby loves her either way!

So, I put it out of my mind. Then one of my BFF's let me know that she was going to do it and that her sis-in-law (one of my friends also) was currently doing it and was having great success. I thought" Good luck" and left it at that. Over the next few weeks, I started to notice some pretty drastic changes in my friend. I could see the weight melting off of her. She was losing 1lb+ a day, as talked about with this plan, and she looked fantastic. Not sick, or tired. No sunken or hollow eyes, no droopy skin. I commended her on her loss. Her husband was doing it too and it was a few weeks before I saw him. His loss was AMAZING. He looked so young and energized and skinnier than I had ever seen him (he is a football player and had been "trained" to eat good). I also saw their SIL, who was on the plan and had finished her treatment. She had lost 35 lbs and had gone from a size 16 to a size 8. She looked amazing and healthy. All of them still do. Each needed round of the HCG lasts 6 weeks. Then you have to do a 6 week maintenance afterwards, to slowly add everything back in your diet. After the last phase, you work with the knowledge you have learned through the loss plan and work to make a better life for yourself, keeping the weight off. More rounds can be done if additional weight loss is needed.

I was soooooo jealous. I knew my husband would never spring for it. He hates "fad diets" even more than I do. Days after he saw the success of our friends, he came to me and said he had been thinking about it. If I wanted to and could commit to it 1000000%, he was ok with me doing it. I did the research, the reading and all that I could do to be prepared. I finally felt good about doing it. I have had 6 friends overall, who have done it and have seen great success and have kept it off and changed the way they think and react towards food.

So I am doing it. I am jumping in with both feet. My husband decided to do it with me. He only has about 20 lbs to lose to make it to his weight, but I felt that I needed the support. Instead of being on a 500 calorie diet and having to cook meals for the husband and kids, now I only have to worry about the kids and they are easy.

We are starting on Friday 8/28/09. We are doing the sublingual (under the tongue) drops, instead of injections...I HATE NEEDLES.

I had my husband take my before photos this morning because he is leaving out of town until Friday. I will post the photos and my starting measurements and weight on Friday. After that, I will post my results weekly.

I am writing this all down as a sort-of weight loss journal and also to feel some accountability to someone. I haven't let my family and friends know that I am doing this yet, and want to keep it that way until I am done. When I have seen success, THEN I will show this to them.

Fatty Natty Out!