Ok, I know it has been a long time since I have written. I have just been so busy! It is great, because I have all sorts of energy. As of this morning, I have lost 45 pounds! It seems almost unreal to say that. This week has been a little bit of a challenge, because I have been sick, so I have not gone to the gym. Last week I went to California and ate some things that weren't the best, but did so much walking that it was ok. I spent 14 hours at Disneyland. Trust me, my legs and feet hurt, but I was able to do it. I find that I am starting to find courage to do things I have been afraid to do. For many years, I have thought of myself as a confident woman, but am finding more and more confidence as I continue on this journey. I love that I have so many people that can understand this journey and are willing to share it with me. Over the weekend, a woman that I know from work proudly told me she has now lost 50 pounds. She is doing it the same way as I am, lifestyle changes. It is so great to be encouraged by and to encourage others. I think about the changes I have seen in my energy level and confidence, and am excited to think of the additional positive impacts others are getting with their weight loss. Living a long and healthy life is what we all want, isn't it?

Until next time.........

Just thought I would write a quick note today. Not too much to say. Still working hard, but not too much change lately. It is a little frustrating, but I know that if I keep it up, I will see the pounds start to fall again. I wanted to just say to everyone who is on their own journey, keep it up, you can do it!

Until next time..........

Today was a great day! I spent the morning with 275 union stewards and leaders. My friends and I had a class during the meeting where we talked about becoming healthier. It was a little hard, but an amazing thing to be able to share a little about my journey in front of 80 plus of those people. We talked about nutrition, exercise, and stress. We had a lot of fun. We danced! I am glad I got the opportunity to share with others, and hopefully inspired some of them to start on the journey to improve their own health. We have a huge problem in this country with obesity. It is frightening to know how young children are being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and that this generation of children is the first to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents if we don't do something. That thought just breaks my heart. On top of that, the healthcare cost due to this epidemic is out of control. I am committed to doing what I can to solve this problem. Are you? In mid-May a four part HBO special will air on this very subject. I hope you will tune in. It will be a powerful four hours. More information to come on this, but you can find out more about the special by googling Weight of the Nation.

Well, I am tired after a long day, so I will sign off for now. Until next time............

I am so super excited! I have now passed the 30 pounds lost mark!!! I looked up yesterday how much I weighed when I last went to the doctor's. I am actually 45 pounds lighter than I was in 2010! I just cannot believe it. I won't say that it has been easy, as you all know, but I am happy to say that honestly I thought it would be much tougher. No, I thought it was impossible. It is possible and I am seeing the results. I am loving it! I can't wait to see how this journey continues. I know that I can do this. I have the drive, and an amazing group of people supporting me. I thank you all!

Until next time........

Life has been super busy lately. I spent 6 days in Hollywood last week. It was a great training and fun times as well. We did a flash mob in front of the Chinese Theater. It was to the song Move Your Body by Beyonce. It is not the easiest dance in the world. I was very happy I have been doing all this working out! I spent two hours one day practicing the dance. Boy were we sweating! The next night we had a dance. I danced for several hours. The following night, some of us went to a couple of Hollywood clubs. We danced for a few hours then too. I would not have been able to do that four months ago! It was great to have the stamina to do it. I didn't do too bad with my eating while I was there, but not as good as when I am at home. I am happy to say, that I did not gain any weight back while out of town!

After I got home, I tried to work out the next day, but I was too sore from all the dancing. I had to take a night off. The next night was much better at the gym.

All total as of this morning, I have lost 29.2 pounds! I am so excited! It is great to be able to walk into any store and buy a pair of pants. I am looking forward to the class that Moe and I are putting on for our stewards on April 13th. We have found lots of great information to share. I hope that we are able to inspire others to start to take better care of themselves.

Until next time.....

Today is a fabulous day! Currently down about 27 pounds. But that isn't the best thing by far! I am leaving to go to Hollywood on Tuesday and I have very few clothes that fit me right. I have been out shopping, trying to find some cheap clothes. I decided to go into Old Navy today. To my surprise, I can now buy jeans at Old Navy! Not their plus sized jeans either. They weren't on sale, so I didn't buy any. I mean really, why would I pay $40 for jeans I will not be able to wear all that long? It is great just knowing I can shop there if I want. I then wandered down to Sears. I did buy some jeans there. In the Misses department!! I don't even know how long it has been since I was able to do that! It is an amazing feeling knowing that I can walk into basically any store to buy pants!

There are a couple of things that are frustrating me. It is hard to have my lower body shrinking faster than my upper. It is just kind of odd. I tried on some dresses, and they just didn't work out very well, lol. I know that in time it will all work out. The other thing is that as I am getting thinner and getting toned, I have some areas where I have extra skin. I am hoping that over time that will tighten up too. I just have to wait and see.

To all my friends that are on this journey with me, keep doing what you need to be doing. We are in this together! Until next time........

I know it has been a little while since I have written. Things are going very well for me. I am now down 24.8 pounds since I started my journey less than three months ago. I am heading to Hollywood, CA in 11 days. I will have to do some shopping before then. I bought jeans two weeks ago, and it is almost time to buy some new ones. Although I have only lost a few pounds the last couple of weeks, I have been losing inches pretty rapidly. That is a great feeling too! I found a top in my closet today that actually showed off my new shape. So many of my tops are starting to feel like a tent. It was great to put on this one and see how great it looked! It was such a great feeling. Several people commented on how good I looked, but more about how happy I look.  I am happy. I never thought I could lose nearly 25 pounds!

I am also excited about an upcoming work event. A co-worker and I are putting together a class for staff with tips and tools to improve their health, their families health, and that of the community. We are planning a fun and interactive class. The part that I find the most exciting is that it is another way to share what I am learning along the way, and hopefully show people who feel like I did, (that I couldn't do it) that it is possible. I hope that others can find the joy that I have with getting healthy and losing all this extra weight.

I have always felt like I am a skinny woman stuck in a fat woman's body. I can't wait until I fully escape from this body. I know that there will be days ahead that will be rough, but I know that I can get through it. Until next time.........

Things are still going pretty well. I am now down 21.4 pounds which I find so amazing. The new jeans I bough over the weekend, well I have to wear a belt with them. That isn't a terrible thing! On Monday, I did a whopping 73 minutes of cardio, and yesterday I did 60 minutes. Today, for some reason, I am feeling rather weak. I only did 45 minutes of cardio today. I think I may be fighting getting a cold. I sure hope I don't get sick.
Funny story today. I went to Subway to get a turkey sandwich. I got the footlong, so I could have 6 inches for lunch and the other for dinner. Not only was it the last day for $5 footlongs, but they were giving away a cookie with every purchase. I did decline, but it is crazy how much temptation is out there. I have to constantly be on guard for temptation. Knowing that is very helpful.
Keep up the good work to all of you who are taking this journey also. Until next time.......

Heather

What a difference a few days make! I was so frustrated earlier this week, and now I am so happy! I have lost a  total of 17.6 pounds. A friend mentioned to me the other day that I needed new jeans because the ones I was wearing were too big. I went to the store last night and to my surprise, bought a pair of jeans 2 sizes smaller than the ones I was wearing! I almost cried right there in the dressing room. That was such a great reward. On top of that the scale is continuing to creep downward. This great feeling so much overshadows the frustration I was feeling over the last few weeks. Until next time...

Things are going better since my last post. Thank you to everyone who is supporting me! I would list you all, but I'd be afraid I would accidentally miss someone. You are all being such a big help to me! So, I say the personal trainer on Wednesday. That has made a huge difference. She game me a plan to follow for the next couple of months. I have used her plan twice now, and am now down 0.6 pounds since Wednesday. I am so excited to see the scale moving again! Yesterday, my friend Maureen said to me, "Heather, it is time to go buy a new pair of jeans. Those are now too big." Talk about making me feel awesome! I explained to her that I am going to wait a couple more weeks. We will be going to Hollywood in a little over 3 weeks. My goal is to lose at least 8 more pounds before we go. I plan on doing a little shopping right before we go. It sure is painful to know that soon I will be having to start getting rid of a lot of my clothes. Andrew is "complaining" about all the money that I will be getting rid of when I do that. I guess it is one of the prices that have to be paid. As my friends told me yesterday, (straight from Dr Phill) the only reason to keep those clothes are if I am planning to get fat and need them again. How true! I have no plans of needing them again!

I guess my purpose for today's post is just to tell everyone that is on the same journey as I am, that when you hit those plateaus to stick with it. Keep doing the right things, switch things up and the weight will start to drop off again. Don't be discouraged. Thanks again to everyone who told me those same words when I was feeling down. Until next time......

Yesterday was a rough day for me. I have been stuck at having lost 15 pounds now for a couple of weeks. I was very frustrated. Thankfully I have so much support. Thanks to Andrew, Stacey, and others for reminding me to hang in there. I went to the gym, still feeling kinda down, but had a wonderful workout. I love the fact that I leave feeling so energized after my workout. I am tired and wired at the same time. It is so odd, but awesome! Anyway, having the support of the people around me is so key. There are days like yesterday that I feel hopeless and stuck. I know there will be more, but having others by my side keeps me going.

Today, I donated blood. That lead to me eating a little differently than I would have. I also was unable to go to the gym, but I think the rest will do my body good. I have worked very hard all week.

I hope the next time I write to be able to report some more weight loss. Until then....

Heather

I am a little low on motivation to go to the gym today. I am going to go anyway, but I am going to make it a "light" workout tonight. I am still pretty sore from last night's workout. Maybe just some cardio tonight......

I have been feeling some frustration lately. It seems I have hit a plateau. I have been stuck at 15 pounds for a while now. I know I need to just stick with it, and I will start to lose again. Watching the scale is my biggest motivation. The loss of inches is a good motivator as well. :-) I will keep plugging away. Until next time......

Heather

I had the most interesting epiphany today. Weight loss is the perfect example of process improvement and the tools that I work with teams to improve their performance. People sometimes do not get the connection to do true improvement work with one major aspect. They don't want to or find it important to study the results of the thing they are testing. One would never do that with weight loss. If you change your eating habits, the measurement is your weight, and you "study" to see if that change made a difference. (For my Improvement Advisor friends out there, you might look at blood pressure, blood sugar, or cholesterol levels as balancing measures.) No one who was seriously wanting to decrease their weight would not use these same principles that we use in performance/process improvement. It seems so logical. Having come to this realization will give me another tool when working with teams. :-) Many of the apps that you can find out there for weight loss even have the ability to chart your progress over time. It is amazing how much it lines up!

On a more personal note, I am still holding at 15 pounds lost. I am looking forward to a great workout at the gym tonight.

Until next time.......Heather

I have recently embarked on a journey. A friend suggested that I blog about this journey in order to help others who are on, or will take this same journey. I hope that I am able to encourage you along the way of your journey.

Were to begin......I guess it goes back many many years. I have been overweight for more years than I care to admit. Mostly because I only claim to be 29 years old, and telling how long I have been overweight might dispute my age of 29. Anyway....I would say that by 5th grade for sure I was becoming overweight. I guess it would depend on your definition of overweight, but I was certainly not skinny. By the time I was 18, I was what doctors would consider overweight, but not morbidly obese by any means. At that time I got pregnant with my first child. After giving birth, my thyroid stopped working and made losing the weight I gained during pregnancy extremely difficult. Time went by, gain a few pounds a year and by age 21 got pregnant with my second child. Again, taking the weight after did not happen. Over the years I took medications that added to the weight gain, as did diet and inactivity. I do take responsibility for the choices I made that lead me to be so overweight now.

OK, so more recently, I decided to make some changes. I decided I was going to work on eating better and exercising. My goal is to make myself healthier. I needed to start practicing what I preach. In my job at Kaiser Permenente, I have been encouraging staff to take care of their own health and hadn't been doing it myself. So I started slowly with the choices in food I was going to eat. Lucky for me, my husband was having the same thoughts, so we started working on this together. In the first 3 weeks, I had lost about 7 pounds. We then decided to get a gym membership at Planet Fitness. I have been working out now 4 or 5 days a week for at least 60 minutes a day for the last two weeks. All total in 6 weeks, I have lost 15 pounds. It hasn't been easy by any means, but I am taking it one day at a time. I hit a point where it seemed I had hit a plateau, but I kept at it and have now gotten past that. One of the biggest pieces of advice I could give right now to someone getting ready to take this journey is to drink tons and tons of water. It really does make a difference.

I guess that now you have been brought up to date with where I am at. My hope is to share with you along my journey. I thought for years I wouldn't be able to lose even 15 pounds and I have shown myself I can do that, so I know I can get down to where I need to be. I want to encourage you to make the changes in your life to help you become healthier too.

Until next time.........Heather