I can’t tell you in words how excited I was today when I
stepped onto the scales at the Doctors office and realized that I had lost a
significant amount of weight since my visit 6 months before. I knew I had lost some because I had been to
a different doctor in October and was pretty sure the scales were down. I didn’t know the exact amount but knew I had
lost. Today, when my doctor said
“congratulations” you have lost 24 pounds since I saw you last I was ecstatic
to say the least. Hopefully, when my lab
comes back I will have great diabetic number as well to report. It felt good to have a doctor say Good Job
instead of “if you would just lose some weight ……. High Five!
Back in early fall, after feeling like I was getting nowhere in
my quest to lose weight and get healthy, I decided to enter a Texas state
version of the Biggest Loser. The local
grocery chain, HEB had what was called the Slimdown Challenge where they select
15 people from around the state to participate in a 16 week weight loss
challenge. The 15 chosen get a boot
camp, a personal trainer, a dietician and appear each week on the media to tell
of their experience and garner votes from the public. At the end of the challenge, $10,000 is
awarded to the winner. It wasn’t even
the money that motivated me to want to be chosen. I just knew that if my weight and
measurements and exercise and eating habits were out there for the public to
see, it would motivate me through humility and shame. Sad, but true. I wasn't chosen and that was a huge disappointment. But I realized that I just have to push through and do it on my own!
When my son Chris came to shoot my video entry, I had
written a script that was going to be humorous.
Very self-deprecating just like my comedy routines. Fluffy not fat, etc. But when it came time to shoot the video I
realized that maybe by being honest, instead of hiding behind humor, I would
have a better chance at being selected and thereby a better chance of getting
all the help and tools and cheering section to move me forward.
Below is the link to the video I submitted. It is a different side of me than most of you
have seen. Watching it actually made me
cry. For probably the first time in a
long time, I let myself be vulnerable and honest about the distress and the
anguish that overwhelms me at times when I realize that no one but me has the
power to get healthy and that if I don’t get my health issues under
control that I have no one to
blame.
I long ago lost the vanity part of weight loss. It’s not that I don’t care how I look. Sure I’d like to be attractive and be able to
wear fashionable clothes...but that has not been a dominating factor for me for
a long time. I just want to lose the
weight so I can feel good. It’s about
being sick and tired of being sick and tired.
There are so many things I still want to accomplish in my lifetime. I am not ready to settle in to being
inactive, especially when I have the power to change that.
A few weeks ago, we filmed a segment on our hospice for a
show called “We Are Austin” that will air on a local channel soon. The segment consists of interviews with our
staff and I will post it to facebook for all to see once we are given the ok to
do so. The producer decided that he wanted
footage in the background while our interviews were playing to be of our nurse
and a Home Health Aide actually doing what they do. When the actor that the owner had hired to
play the part of the hospice patient backed out about an hour before the shoot,
my boss recruited my husband Joe to be the patient. He came to me and said “whats Joe doing
today?” I said, “not sure, why?” He said I need him to play the patient in our
video..think he can act like he’s sick?
LOL So I called Joe whose only
question was “do I have to get undressed?”
Once he knew that wasn’t a requirement, and that he’d make $100 for
about 15 minutes of “acting”, he was ready to go. He did a really great job too. Very convincing. Anyway, our nurse actually took his vital
signs as part of the video and the next day said to me “LeeAnn, I think you
should have Joe go see a doctor as his blood pressure is really high.” So I called Joe and told him. He said “yea, I
haven’t walked as much lately and I think I’ve gained about 10-15 pounds….my
clothes are tighter. When I came home
later, he had dug out and dusted off the dreaded scale and looked a little
shell shocked. Honey, he said…I have
gained 42 pounds since I met you. How
can that be?
Well, if you take into account that I’ve known Joe since
August of 2011 which is about 28 months and if he gained 1 and ½ pounds every
month then bingo…42 pounds. It doesn’t
happen overnight and it surely doesn’t happen overnight when you are trying to
get it off again.
Once Joe got on the scale and took a good honest look at
where he was at, he was motivated immediately to do something about it. He is in excellent health…and wants to keep
it that way. So he told me to not make
any more desserts, to limit his portions and walk with him more
consistently. Of course that helps me
too! And so in the last few weeks, he has
made remarkable progress in getting back on track.
I have to say I admire him for getting on that scale. Unless I am forced to at the doctor’s office
(I once had a meltdown at the scale at a doctor’s office and ended up on Prozac
for a period of time. LOL) I don’t
weigh. It’s much easier when my pants
feel tight to blame the hot clothes dryer.
Or the quality of the fabric. Or
the conspiracy of clothing manufacturers to not put the correct sizes in their
clothing. After all, I’ve never worn a
2x before…I think it’s a 1 x that’s mislabeled.
You get my point. My son Andy’s
beautiful girlfriend Liz actually put pictures and weight and measurements on
her blog for all to see and I so admire her for that. That took courage and guts. And I suspect her honesty helped a lot of
people to take a look at themselves.
I know that my victory today and it was a victory to make
that scale move down those 24 pounds will not be short lived. I figure if I can keep doing exactly what I’m
doing (which isn’t nearly as much as I should) for 6 more months I’ll be down
another 24. And by this time next year
I’ll be down 72 pounds which will put me where I want and need to be.
Oh, I know that I will still face daily challenges. And every one I meet and defeat I will celebrate. Even the small ones, like going to the
Bluebonnet Café, known for their mile high meringue pies, and just admiring
them in the case. And the failures, well
those are a given. I know me well enough to know that I will overeat at
times. And that there will be days when
I say “I’m not walking any farther than my car and from my car to my desk.
I realize from working in the field that I do, just as I
said on the video that having your health is everything. I look forward to being down on the floor
playing with my grandkids someday. I
look forward to traveling the US when I retire and being able to walk to see
the sights. I look forward to being in a
family picture that I’m not trying to hide behind someone, or camouflage my
body behind a pillow or behind a tree.
LOL
I look forward to the day when taking a nap doesn’t mean
having an apparatus on my face to help me breathe. I look forward to the day when I can say
goodbye to all the drugs I take to keep my body going.
If you want to make a change, you have to admit the need to
do so.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/w4pv35n8c7je6j6/HEB%20Slimdown%20Challenge.m4v
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