What an insane realization, that moment I realized that I
didn’t feel as good as I thought I did.
I’ve heard from all angles—doctors, blogs, health gurus—that
being heavy is hard on a person’s body. Weight effects energy levels, it bears
down on joints, causes all sorts of health problems.
You know what? Even at 245 pounds, I felt fantastic. I had
energy in spades, had never had a problem with moving around (though getting
off the couch has always been a problem), my joints felt fine.
If I was so content, what changed?
I’d like to say I had a huge epiphany, that I realized that
being content with my weight was going to send me to an early grave. Maybe so
that I could feel more confident about the way I looked, get a boyfriend.
Nope.
The very simple, honest truth—the goals of the people around
me changed. In some ways, I am very much a follower, and when, during my
sophomore year of college, all of my friends joined a gym, I did too. I won’t
tell you that it stuck and that I lost all my weight and have maintained it.
Nope. As soon as their attention waned, so did mine.
But I’d learned that I loved the look of a calf muscle as it
slid along with an elliptical, strained against the pressure of a 200-pound
weight.
A year later, I started a new job. At a bakery. The only
thing in my life that helped me maintain my weight was that I have no car, and
I lived a mile away from the job. Around me, though, it seemed that all of my
co-workers were getting healthy—running, dieting. As a store, we decided to all
participate in a 5k sponsored by our franchise.
I finished my first 5k in a black t-shirt, rain goading me
through the last quarter mile, in 43 minutes and some change. I did one more 5k
after that, then I stopped.
But I’d learned that I didn’t hate running. That my body
could actually move an entire 3.1 miles.
Last October, my boss opened her own restaurant, and I
followed.
Here, I met our CrossFit Guru. Honestly, I didn’t
particularly like her until I got to know her better. Hell, I didn’t like her
until I saw pictures of her from a year previous, where she weighed only a
little less than I did at the time. Something clicked.
My resolution in January was to focus on myself and to focus
on small, acheivable goals. I’d never kept a resolution before; I don’t know
why I thought this would work. But it did.
30 pounds, one pair of Kinvaras, over a hundred miles, a
membership at Balance Fitness, and
minimal high fructose corn syrup later, I’ve started this blog to share my
adventure.
