About Jen
A little over 18 months ago, I was a normal, active, healthy 31-year old Female. I first started noticing a change in my size and appearance in October 2012. While trying on dresses in my closet for a friend's wedding, I noticed they all seemed tight. After choosing a dress with stretchy material, I chalked it up to needing to work out more from one-too-many happy hours. Being busy, I put it out of mind, and life went on, until April 2013, that's when the changes really took hold. I was preparing a trip to NYC and NONE of my clothes fit proper. After a shopping trip, I was sporting clothing 1 to 2 sizes larger, and my confidence was shot. I started noticing other differences too. My short-term memory began failing, which was particularly frustrating as I relied on it at my job and it was one of my strengths. I had massive headaches, I felt lethargic completely drained of energy, I wasn't sleeping well, and my waist kept expanding despite no large change in my day-to-day. I again chalked it up to outside factors, my father has just unexpectantly passed, and my stress and emotional levels were extremely high. By June of 2013, I couldn't take it any longer and made an appointment. Turns out, I wasn't just stressed, I had Hashimoto's thyroiditis. Now you can google it for all the nitty-gritty, but long story short: My immune system had turned on my thyroid and I was no longer metabolizing properly. I had gained 54lbs in 3 months, without a diet or exercise change, it was almost too hard to hear. And so the year and half of weight gain purgatory began.
Our first plan of attack: a food based system to control every single calorie entering my body. First up, Jenny Craig. I followed the diet to a T, making sure to give it my all, I gained 10lbs in 2.5 months on a 1500 (then reduced to 1200) calorie a day diet. I added excessive working out, an hour or more at the gym a day PLUS, I coach collegiate cheerleading and would work out right after practice 2x weekly. FAILURE.
Then came the medications: Orlistat and Synthroid. I despised both. Orlistat is the prescription sister to Alli, you know, the fun drug that doesn't let fat absorb properly causing you to experience and "oily discharge" (aka, poop your pants) if you ingested more than 10g of fat in a sitting. Yay. Then the synthroid... since my thyroiditis was only intermittent, sometimes the synthroid helped, most times I felt faint, tingley, nauseated, and would have major headaches. I gained 5 more pounds in a month and a half. FAILURE.
Then came the Fad diet phase. I did the Master Cleanse, lost 10lbs, gained it right back. FAILURE. I did the Advocare 24-day challenge, lots of pills and a nasty fiber-drink, no change in weight. FAILURE. Weight Watchers. FAILURE. Cabbage soup diet. FAILURE. Starving myself (for one week I ate nothing but chicken broth and croutons). FAILURE.
Then came the Give Up phase. Nothing was working, so why not throw caution to the wind. I ate what I wanted, I stopped all workouts (save walking my dogs), I drank what I wanted, I completely gave up. I felt helpless. I felt it was impossible. I felt defeated. Around this time, I only had about 9 outfits that fit me. I refused to buy new, plus size clothing (I went from a 9/10 to an 18/20). I stopped attending functions out of embarrassment, stopped going out with friends, I even shopped at night to avoid running into people at the grocery store. My social life completely died, as did my romantic life with my fiance. And my joints were a mess, did I forget to mention, I have severe arthritis.
Sidebar: the arthritis has been a factor since I was 16. I had a sports injury that resulted in an aggressive onset of arthritis. At 19 I had my meniscus removed from my left knee and by 21 I had no cartilage in my left knee and minimal cartilage in my hips and ankles (primarily the right).
1 week before I moved from New York to Seattle (July 2014), I had an appointment because of the joint pain. While wearing heals, my ankle gave out and I fell (it was breathtaking) face down in a busy Starbucks parking lot. The verdict: I was suffering from a "consistent sprain of my ankles due to weight gain and wearing heels." I had gained over 67lbs. Now to get an idea of what that is, go to a grocery store and pick up 2 giant bags of dog food (30lbs each), then, grab a 10 bad of flour. That's what I now had taped to my body. I was ordered to stop wearing any shoes with a heel, 95% of my shoe collection was now negated.
I would love to tell you that's the turning point, but it wasn't. I moved across country and kept on the indulgence wagon. from July until October I would "work-out", half assing it at best, and quit. I'm not sure how much more I gained, but I would guess between 10-20lbs. None of my "big size" clothes were fitting anymore. I kept saying I wanted a change... then did nothing to move that forward... until October of 2014.
I don't know exactly what sparked the change. Maybe it was the fact I couldn't effectively coach anymore. Or that I just put away an entire closet full of clothes and shoes I could no longer wear. Maybe it was the fact I now had to borrow my fiance's winter coats and sweatshirts because that's all that fit. I'm not sure, but if I had to gather a guess, it was all of these combined with the fact I finally found some real inspiration. I discovered an article on a friend's Facebook page that made me realize my "healthy eating", wasn't. I found a Beach Body coach named Nicolette, whose entire page elimated excuses and gave inspiration. I decided I had enough. I decided to change.
I'm a toe in type of gal. I don't jump in head first, I need to test the waters. So in mid October, I started doing that. I began with eliminating fatty, processed food and drink, saying good-bye to each one. Soda became sparkling water. Processed baked goods became only home-made baked goods. Take-out and pizza became home cooked, low cal options. I began working out, 2-3 times a week. I started on level 1 of the 30-day shred...I cannot express enough how great this program is for beginners. 30-min workouts, modifiers, and motivation, I love it! When I started, I couldn't do a jumping jack, an F-ing jumping jack. I coach Division I athletes and I couldn't do a jumping jack. I had to run in place and flail my arms, it was a disgrace. That's when I stopped focusing on weight loss, and began focusing on my health. I'd look at the pictures and videos from my online inspiration, and I would push myself to get better. I wanted to complete the workout without feeling like I was going to die, and, at first, it seemed impossible. After a month of toe-in, I took the plunge. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas I decided to follow a strict workout plan (30-day shred, 5 days a week), a health plan (21-day fix), and give up all alcohol. And guess what... I did it, and.... It worked!
After seeing Nicolette's Facebook page, I bought the 21-day fix. I am in LOVE with this program, and I think it saved my life, but more on that later. I pushed myself and after 3 weeks, I completed level 1 of the shred doing all the advanced moves. I ran out of the room screaming and yelling, I scared the crap out of the whole house, but I couldn't believe it. It stopped hurting my knees to sit down and climb stairs. My energy went up, my sleep improved, and then I went for my check up. My doctor doesn't tell me my weight (because after I gained and I was told, I had a mini nervous breakdown at the number), only if I've gone up, down, or maintained. He was shocked. For the first time in 18 months, I lost, a lot. 20lbs in 25 days... without pills, gimmicks, or fads. I did it. My clothes started fitting, my nails and hair stopped breaking, my mood improved. My life was... my life is changing. And it's only the beginning.
