We all have them… Women, that is… Numbers in our head of how much we weighed when… They often are our own internal barometer on how we feel about our bodies.
My milestones are probably the same as most women my age:
- High School Weight (the pipe dream that I’ll never see again)
- College Weight
- Driver’s License Weight
- Wedding Weight
- Pre-pregnancy Weight
- 10 months Pregnancy Weight (a number in my head that I always marvel at how I used to weigh that much)
- Post-pregnancy Weight (I look at a picture of me holding my 3 week old baby, and that number pops in my head. But you know what, I still think I look beautiful because I’m radiating in happiness).
I started off this New Year with a personal, silent goal. I was still carrying around 10 pounds of what I thought of as “pregnancy weight”, and by golly, my baby was 2.5 years old. I had met with my doctor in December, voicing my concerns about not being able to lose weight. I eat very healthy, exercise daily, but still, for my health and my self esteem, I needed to shed at a minimum those 10 pounds.
So I got on a medically supervised weight loss plan. It has been strict. But it has worked. As of today, I’ve lost 20 pounds, and I’m one pound over WEDDING WEIGHT. Not to say I was stick skinny at my wedding, but I was at a weight that made me happy, was healthy, and it is a weight I literally haven’t seen since my wedding day (I gained 4 pounds on my honeymoon in Italy, but it was totally WORTH it).
I always thought that exercise was the key to maintaining or losing weight for me. And since I was 19, I pretty much worked out 5+ times a week. Religiously. Vigorously. What I’ve learned on this plan, which actually restricts my exercise to light walking, is that for me, it’s really about the food and the calorie count.
I think my problem before was that I was working out so hard that I would become ravenous. Even though I was eating healthy foods, I was simply eating too much to offset how much exercise I was doing.
Anyway, it’s interesting how the people that see you every day and live with you really don’t notice much of a change, but I’m starting to get comments from people at work on how I look GOOD.
Which always makes me pause and think, did I look that BAD before?! I really don’t feel like I look THAT different, but I do notice how my clothes are fitting differently and I have bought some smaller sizes recently.
Throughout this journey, I have also been very concious to not talk to my kids about what I was doing… I believe I’ve managed to slide this under the radar. I don’t want my daughter to even know what a diet is at this age. I simply eat my healthy food, which is often what the family is eating minus the carbs. I’ve taken to snacking on cucumbers and baby bell peppers daily, and you know what has happened? My kids now think that is a lovely snack. That makes me happy to see. They’re also really fond of shrimp now.
Anyway, I sure hope I can maintain this weight. I want to lose that one more pound go get me down to Wedding Weight. I think I may do a little dance when that happens.
There have been so many changes in my life since I hit my 30s. I think learning to regulate your weight in the face of marriage, bearing children, and raising children is a whole learning curve. I’m hoping that I have truly figured it out, and can stop the battle and just enjoy the living.
