A little over a year now, I've been really trying to focus on some personal development. Been trying to figure out who I want to be. Not only as a wife, a mother, a friend, a daughter...but just who I want Maddi to be. Who God wants Maddi to be. I heard someone say this morning, "If things are good, than you need to be giving. If things are bad, then you need to be growing." I really hope that through this past year, I have been growing into the woman that God wants me to be. Here is just a small portion of my personal developement over the last year. Focusing on my health. Mental and physical.
I'm saying this here and now, the pictures that I'm about to show you has absolutely nothing about being immodest. I took these photos to track my visual results.
But what I do want to do, is inspire someone. Maybe someone who has been in my situation before. Here's my weightloss story:
After pregnancy with both Barrett and Brinklee, I weighed in at a whopping 220 pounds! Even after I had them, I was still about 205. I slowly dropped more weight after settling in to mommyhood.
After having both babies, I battled with post-pardom depression. With Brink, I was able to get medicated, felt better, then stopped taking meds. When she was only 4 months old is when I became pregnant with Barrett. After I had him, I COULD NOT get off meds without falling back into that depression. I stayed depressed for about 8 full months before I decided to take a more natural apporoach. I was so tired of feeling so awful, but I knew that when I made fitness a part of my life (for a very short time) that it made me feel so much better having all those endorphins goin! So I signed myself up for a gym membership, and took a natural supplement from the health food store to help my body start producing it own ceratonin. I didnt even have to finish the bottle! The combo of exercising even just 3 days a week, plus the HTP-5 did it for me. This is what I looked like before any lifestyle changes. sorry, the best one I have.
After a month of being consistent with working out, I felt so discouraged. I hadnt lost a pound. Not 1. My goal wasnt to do it to lose weight, I really just wanted to feel better. But after I started to feel better, I expected some weight loss too dangit! I remember driving on my way home from the gym and crying my eyes out because I was so dissapointed. I cried out to God, that he was gonna have to help me! Obviously it HAD to be my nutrition. Exercising a minimum of 3 days a week, you are supposed to get results. I knew that had to be it. And I knew that I couldnt do it on my own. That God was going to have to help me with my nutrition.
Just a few days prior, I had started reading the book "Skinny Bi*ch". Little did I know that after I was crying out to God that night, that I would go home to read the very chapter of that book that would change my life forever. I had no idea that God would answer my prayer for help, by me becoming a vegetarian! But hey, and answer is an answer I guess. (BTW, I know several people who have read the book and still eat meat, this is just how I mentally responded to it.)
Within about 3 months, me and John both lost about 20 pounds. (John still eating meat, I just quit cooking it for him. Amazing how mens bodys respond so much faster than ours.geez.)
I was held back for a few months after getting injured in a car accident late august, but was able to get back into working out again at the beginning of the year. I had worked hard, working my way up to working out up to 5 days a week, but had plateued in my weight loss journey. I had a number in my head that I wanted to be, but couldnt budge anymore weight. I was working out like crazy, really trying to count my calories, but nothing. And I knew I still had weight to lose. In fact...This was the day I decided to start a 6 week challenge with Fayetteville nutrition.
I also knew, that at this point I was going to have to start using some sort of nutritional suppliments to help me reach my goal.
I had some money saved up to get my tattoo worked on that I stared 4 years ago, and never got to finish, when my friend asked me to sign up for the 6 week weight loss challenge. You can win $500! I felt like my health was more important, and I could always save up again for my tattoo. It helped that my best friend also signed up for the challenge with me.
It was uncomfortable. Kinda like budgeting money. You can splurge now, and skimp later. Or save up for something big. It was hard. Mostly mentally hard.
In 6 weeks of using Herbalife's weight loss plan, I dropped 8 pounds. Doesnt sound like alot, but I couldnt lose a pound more doing what I was doing! Which was requiring much effort! It did so much more for me than just that. It made me realize so much about myself. So much about how I have viewed food my whole life. How much of a source of comfort and happieness its been for me. How much I had relied on it for that. How I didnt even realize that this whole time, that's what it was for me! I was addicted to it!
Nobody really talks about food being an addiction. We talk about drugs, drinking, gambling, smoking cigaretts....but food is something that you HAVE to have to survive. So I think it really gets overlooked alot in the addiction category.
Having to force myself to not eat something when I reeeeeeally wanted to, was so much more difficult than I thought it would be. That's why most give in. Doing the challenge really helped me develop myself as a person. It made me realize who I am, who I want to me. Has helped me even reach goals I never would have thought I would have attempted! I just ran two 5k's in the past month! I cant even believe it!! I hate running!!! But being able to overcome the mental challenge of it made it so worth it!
I never thought that I would have signed up for a 6 week challenge, and I did. Never thought I would have continued to do it after the 6 weeks, and I did. I did it for a full 16 weeks, and wound up losing 16 pounds!!! Here are my pictures that I took each month with my results. This included working out 3 days a week.
Wanna know something else I never would have thought I was going to do? Help other people reach their goals like I did! And now I am! This isnt just a weight loss product. It can be just for pure nutrition. It can be for weight gain. It can be for energy increase. It can be for anybody!!! Not just for weight loss! And now, I'm helping coach other people with whatever their reason is for using it. And I'm truely enjoying it. BTW....my best friend wound up losing 30 pounds in 8 weeks. Pretty incredible.....
I'm also very excited that my mom has recently signed up for a 6 week challenge. she's lost 6 pounds so far, and I'm so excited for her to reach her short term/long term goals, and that I get to help her on this journey.
I feel like God puts certain people in your life for a reason. So thankful for the ones that were put in mine, that led me to where I am now. God has provided for me, a way that I can also help provide for my family's needs part time. To be able to have the flexibility of creating my own schedule, around an already hectic one!
If this is something that you might be interested in for yourself, or someone else, I would love to help you reach your goals too! This isnt just a sell you some product, and there ya go....your on your own. I'm a coach. I am there every step of the way. To answer questions, give tips, encouragment..whatever you need. I'm very excited that God has put this company in my life. It really has helped me start to become the person I feel like God created me to be. Inside and out.
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