How it all started

One morning, I woke up, went to the bathroom to take a shower and was simply disgusted at what I saw.  For years I had always pretended I wasn’t “fat” and many would tell me I wasn’t, but the reality was that I was.  I know that people didn’t want to hurt my feelings, but the vibrations I felt in my heart, high blood pressure at the Doctors office, the constant knee problems and foot discomfort didn’t respect those feelings.  The deadly combination along with what I saw that morning told me I needed to make a change.

As usual, I took the 20 stairs up to the train platform on my way to work and was winded when I got to the top.  In my mind was the visual of what I saw that morning in the mirror and a determination to change it.  As soon as I got to my office, I thought of nothing else but to fix the problem right then and there and I would stop at nothing.  I searched on-line for anything and everything that could teach me how to lose weight but lose it fast.  My patience had run very thin and I had tried every pill, technique and scheme out there.  Yes, I was on the all bacon no bread diet like half of the world, I had drank the “body solution” before bed, popped the Xenadrine pills by the bunch, ab rolled, Hollywood dieted, ate the cookies, the juice, the shakes, the bakes.  Nothing helped.

So I typed in “Lose weight fast” and “healthy” on the Google search window and of course I saw all the pills and shakes again.  But as I kept scrolling, I ran into a link that said “How I lost 28lbs in 21 days”.  I thought to myself “surely this is a pill or something that will make me relapse within a week “.  So I clicked on the link and read the story of Chris Gibson. 

http://www.weightlossbythenumbers.com/

I read his story with a lot of skepticism especially since the website looked like a typical get rich scheme fake website like all of those “get ripped in 3 days” websites.  However, one thing that grabbed my attention was that this guy had been featured on lot of news stations and blogs.  So I did my research and found out that this person sold no pills, no shakes, no candy or weird potions.  He sold a book, a book that would educate me on the simple ways to eat better.  At $39, I didn’t have much to lose yet everything to gain.  I downloaded the e-book and began reading immediately and found how SIMPLE it was to eat healthier and lose weight.  In the beginning, I didn’t think it was that easy.  The basic formula of lowering my Glycemic Index, eating smaller portions more often and exercising seemed like it was too good to be true. 

What I loved about the plan was that it let me eat a lot of the foods I liked but taught me how to substitute certain foods for healthier ones.  I’ve never been the type to eat only vegetables or drink wheat grass smoothies or anything gross like that!  So this got me even more excited to try this plan out and see what happened. 

The first week was very hard on me.  I was used to eating everything and anything I wanted, and now all of a sudden I had to control my portions and eat breakfast! (Something I NEVER did)  However week two was exciting!  I had lost 8lbs the first week and was down 2 pant sizes (from a 42 to 40)!! WOW!!  So of course, that got me more excited to keep on trying.  I didn’t do any cardio or exercise during the 3 weeks because I wanted to make sure the diet was helping me lose weight and not the 2 hours of running on the treadmill.  By the end of week 2, I had lost 8 more pounds and was now wearing a size 38.  

Meanwhile, I was ALWAYS full, I had much more energy and was not winded at the top of the train stairs!  On my 21st day, I had lost a total of 24 pounds and was wearing a size 36.  I could not believe my eyes!  All of a sudden, I was wearing “new” clothing which was clothing I had stuck in my closet that I had not worn since College and was getting a lot of compliments.   Of course, there were the skeptics that thought I was starving myself or drinking illegal pills, etc.  However, nobody could deny that not only was I losing weight, but I looked healthy.

After those 21 days and 24lbs lost, I was hooked and did not look back.  They say it takes 21 days to form a habit, and those 21 days sure did help me form the healthiest habit of my life.  

The rest is history…