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Hey Hey Sweet Shoppers! I’d like to talk today about something most of us struggle with…weight loss. Dum Dum DUUUUUUUUUUUUM! This is going to be a monthly post from me for a while, so I think you need some back story!

Let’s start at the beginning shall we?  I was always a “chubby” kid. Never fat per se, just never thin either.  I was always bigger than the other little girls (taller and bigger boned) and certainly never petite.  Here’s little old me circa 7 or 8?  Certainly not fat but not a waif either.

Once I was old enough to realize that I wasn’t “Hollywood” thin, it became a real self esteem issue for me, but I never really did anything about it. I really started to pack on the pounds in the summer between 8th and 9th grade after a bad break up with a silly boy and losing some of my friends in the process. I think by the time I graduated high school I was averaging a cool 180 lbs at 5’7″..about 20 lbs above the “max” for my height according to the  (faulty) BMI calculator.

After high school, I stayed steady but I got pregnant at 19 and then again at 20.  After I had my boys, my highest weight ever was about 215 lbs. I was miserable, felt worthless and hated myself.   In 2009, I’d had enough and a week before my 25th birthday, I started Weight Watchers. This is about what I looked like at the time.  I wasn’t 215 lbs anymore but I was hovering right around 200.

On Weight Watchers, I lost about 40 lbs and reached my lowest weight since I was in middle school..I felt AMAZING.

So amazing, in fact, that I promptly got pregnant. Great way to reward losing 40 lbs…by gaining 60!  Finn was completely worth it though, of course and I wouldn’t change a thing.

Directly after I had Finn, I joined Weight Watchers again, only to find that they’d changed the program.  Add that to the fact that I was 3 weeks post partum, nursing and extremely mentally not ready and I dropped out within 2 weeks. I hovered at about 183 for Finn’s entire first year, but at the beginning of this year, I started gaining weight again due to life stresses.  When I was asked to take part in a guest blog post where I had to take some new head shots of myself, I was petrified.  Nevertheless, I got all dolled up, put on some Spanx and had my hubby take some pictures.

When I saw the photos, I was DEVASTATED.  It took some extreme editing for me to come up with anything I liked, and this is what I showed the world…

I received a lot of compliments on the photos, but that’s only because I found the THREE photos in the bunch that didn’t make me look like a cow.  This is what the majority of the photos looked like:

That’s WITH Spanx people. (please excuse the weird pose and crappy editing, my husband caught me at a weird moment.)

When I saw these photos, I knew I was ready.  I signed up for Weight Watchers again, this time with new drive. That was on March 3rd so it’s been exactly 1 month and I’m happy to report that I’m down 11 .4 lbs!! I already feel so much better, I’m only about 15 lbs above my lowest and I finally busted past that 183 plateau and am on my way down the scale.

So ready for some tips? I think that no matter what you’re doing to try and lose weight, there are a few universal rules, I call it the Reward system. 🙂

• Remove Temptation – Put your food AWAY! Out of sight, out of mind right?  Nothing throws me off track like having food sitting on the counter.  Either put it all away or leave healthy snacks on the counter such as fruit or carrot sticks.
• Eat Clean – or at least as clean as possible.  That means no processed foods, no Lean Cuisines, no “diet” foods.  Not only are these things loaded with chemicals of all sorts, but they tend to not keep you full.  Instead, go for lean protein, complex carbohydrates and foods that are as close to the way they came out of the ground as possible.  I had a few concessions with this rule as I’m a huge sugar addict so I made sure to keep some “cheat” foods on hand.  My favorites are Special K bars and the Weight Watchers Dark Chocolate Raspberry ice cream popsicles.
• Write it Down – Even if you’re not following a structured plan, it’s essential to keep a food/exercise journal.  I’m a serial grazer and sometimes don’t even realize that I’m grabbing a handful of almonds on my way through the kitchen (PUT YOUR FOOD AWAY!).  There’s no way to know how much you’re eating if you don’t keep track.  I’ve even seen an idea that said, every time you’re going to eat something, commit to sitting at the table, with a plate and eating with a fork.  It won’t be worth the hassle to do all that when you graze, so it’ll keep you from over eating.
• Accountability – Mine happens to be the weekly weigh in at Weight Watchers.  I LOVE having the log book with the numbers going down every time I go in, it’s a huge accountability issue for me and I  actually look forward to it.  Find some sort of accountability for yourself that keeps you motivated each day.
• Relax – It’s ok to take a day of “rest”. Each week after I weigh in, I take a day off to reward myself for a good weigh in.  For me, this means I let myself eat some things that I normally wouldn’t. I also front load my weeks with foods that I know cause me to gain temporary weight, such as rice, that way I still give myself these things I like (sushi anyone!?) but it’s at a time when it won’t effect my weigh in.  This being said, I still try not to OVER eat, I just relax the rules a little. No one can go through a weight loss process by completely depriving themselves, it really will just make you fall off the wagon in the end.
• Do not weigh yourself every day – I know for some people, this goes against the laws of nature, but when you weigh more often than once a week, you’re not getting an accurate picture of your weight loss.  I know that if I eat rice, I will have gained 2 lbs the next day and it will be gone the next.  Seeing that you “gained” 2 lbs overnight can really throw you off your game, so focus on the big picture, not the small picture of a daily weigh in.

I hope this helps!! Is anyone else on their own weight loss journey? I’ll be back next month with another progress update and some more tips for those who struggle with weight loss…like me!!