Let me count the ways......

Crossfit this week will be Tues, Wed, and Friday.  I'll be running today (Monday), Thurs, and Saturday.  I have it written on the calendar.  Yesterday I also made a dinner menu for the week and went to the store to purchase all the needed ingredients.  I will not need to go to the grocery store for the remainder of the week.  This saves me time and also the headache of trying to come up with a plan for dinner at 5:30pm.  I've been so bad at being organized for dinner that my poor family has been eating lots of meals that are a little unconventional.  Anyway, I've been feeling a little guilty and decided that I needed to get my rear in gear and plan it out.  It sounds so easy, why is it so hard to do sometimes?

I've been thinking a lot recently about my past weight loss endeavors.  There have been quite a few!

*STARVATION

I've done this one many times.  I think I started it in middle school.  I got quite good at it when I was about 19 & 20yrs of age and I lost about 70 lbs in 5 months. 

*EXCESSIVE EXERCISE

This one never seemed to do anything.  I figured that if I was going to exercise like a fiend then I would allow myself to eat whatever I wanted.  Of course I'd eat fast food and junk instead of healthy choices that would've filled me up and kept me satisfied.  This weight loss endeavor never ever worked.  I never lost anything more than 5 lbs. 

*BINGING AND PURGING

Looking back now I'm super thankful I was terrible at making myself throw up.  I just could never get the hang of it.  I tried it probably a hundred times throughout the years.  I have been quite a rock star at binging though. 

*LAXATIVES

Ugh, this was the worst!  I used a laxative that caused extreme cramping.  I hated how it made me feel so I soon realized that if I didn't eat at all I wouldn't have to go through the pain.  I tried this method for about a year and lost 25 lbs or so.  Once I stopped taking them and started eating again, the weight came right back.

*CABBAGE SOUP DIET

*CALORIE RESTRICTION

*HCG DIET

*WEIGHT WATCHERS

*LOW CARB DIET

*THE BIGGEST LOSER DIET

*CHRIS POWELL'S CHOOSE TO LOSE DIET

*THE BELLY FAT CURE

*JUICING

*NO SUGAR, FLOUR, OR FAT DIET

Most of these diets, I tried multiple times.  The sad part is, I lost the most weight by just starving myself.  Although I lost a lot of weight, I was still quite flabby.  I'm guessing because I lost a lot of muscle and not a lot of fat.  I was tired all the time, couldn't think straight, had zero zeal for life at all. 

I feel like since I was in 3rd grade, my life has revolved around my weight and what food I put in my mouth.  It's been a battle for 25 years.  I've hated myself for 25 freaking years.  LITERALLY!  I was a failure!  I couldn't lose weight, I couldn't seem to make smart food choices, I was stuck in a rut and felt miserable.  I remember my mother telling me when I was in middle school that boys do not like fat girls and would never ever marry one.  She said I was pretty but had the potential to be beautiful if I could ever lose the weight. 

I hated school because I felt so awkward and different from all the other girls.  No guys paid any attention to me.  No one asked me to prom.  Most of my friends were also chubby and we'd spend the weekends going to movies and eating.  Us fatties had to stick together.

I became a mom who didn't do anything with the kids.  I didn't want to go outside with them, I didn't want to play with them, I just wanted to be left alone.

I fly to Boise once a year to visit my sister.  When I went last summer I couldnt' buckle the seat belt on the plane.  It didn't fit.  I was too humiliated to ask for an extension.  I put the unbuckled belt across my lap and folded my arms over it so you couldn't tell it wasn't latched. 

It literally wasn't  until I was sitting on the couch this past March and started thinking that if I had another chance at starting my life over that I'd be an athlete.  I'd eat like an athlete, work out like an athlete and be around others who were like me. As I was feeling sorry for myself that I couldn't push rewind on my life, it hit me.........
WHO SAYS I CAN'T START BEING WHO I WANT TO BE?

It was like someone slapped me across the face.  It was that day that I emailed Jonathan from CrossFitCDA and asked for help.  My life has never been the same.  I feel different.  I feel......alive.  I feel like there is hope.  I feel proud of who I'm becoming as a person, as a wife and as a mother.  I am so very far from perfect, but I'm starting to like who I am becoming. 

I still have bad days where I'm lazy or I eat junk.  But my good choices are starting to add up and my bad choices are becoming less and less.  Every person who is important in my life have made comments on how they see a different Erica, one they've never seen before.  I can't even tell you how happy that makes me. 

All of this to say that you can do this.  You can pull yourself out of the ruts.  You can change your life for the positive starting today.  Find that one thing you want more than anything and go for it.  Pour yourself into what you want.  You can never regret trying your best, but you will regret never trying.  You are not in this alone.  Find others to help encourage you and go out there and claim your life back!