How I Lost 90 lbs!

My name is Gabrielle. By the time I was 30 years old, I had 2 kids, weighed around 240 pounds, and couldn't fit into my size 22 jeans. I was so tired of being obese that I lost 90 pounds and have kept it off for almost two years so far. I was never the fattest girl in high school, but nowhere near the skinny, cheerleader, show-off-your-belly type either. At a size 12/14, I was still pretty but with all that "babyfat" it was sometimes hard to tell.

I got married at age 22 at a size 12. I remember eating so much on my honeymoon, that my jogging suit (the one that I never actually jogged in) didn't fit me on the way home.

My mother has always been a thin career woman, so she never had junk food in the house when I was growing up. Actually, she never had much of any food in the house. I would stop by my friends' houses for dinner or a snack, then come home and ask my mom what she was making me for dinner. The answer, by the way, was always "you are on your own". I started to learn to cook and finally started to have my own money and could do my own grocery shopping. When I had the freedom make the comfort food I always craved as a child, I went nuts. Sunday mornings I was frying bacon and eggs, baking bread, serving whole chicken and saving the crispy brown skin for me. Every bite was a message to my mom that although she was never home long enough to cook me an all American meal, I could take care of it myself.

With my first child, at age 24 I only gained 22 pounds, but in the weeks and months that followed his birth, I ballooned up. I would have breakfast at home, then get to work and have another one. I would get a meatball hero for lunch, claiming that I wasn't going to have dinner, then I'd go home and eat a huge dinner, claiming I never had lunch. I started to not recognize myself in pictures and in my reflection. I'd pass a window and think, "oh, look at that poor fat slob" and then I realized it was me. I started dieting and walking. I'd walk an hour a day around my neighborhood. I didn't care if neighbors saw me and thought I looked ridiculous. I was determined to show them all that when I say I'm going to do something, I do. For my 32nd birthday, my husband bought me a membership to a local gym. I was 165 pounds when I joined. I started lifting weights- not caring that I was still an out of shape, slightly chubby girl in the middle of weightlifters and bodybuilders. Surprisingly, I got a lot of support and tips and have met a lot of women struggling with the same problems.

Currently, I'm around 150 pounds and fairly muscular. I can't bench press my weight yet, but I CAN wear size 8 jeans and I CAN'T shop in a large size clothing store anymore. I'll always have a problem with food, but if I work hard at it, I don't have to show my problems to everyone who sees me.

~Gabrielle

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