My Story

Here is the story of my 8 year struggle... 

I've pretty much consistently gained weight since my first pregnancy (2002), during which, I gained about 50lbs. Not seeing it fall off quickly, I went on the Atkins diet, pretty hard core for a couple months in 2003 and lost about 20 pounds. I was able to keep it off for a while, but when I got pregnant in 2005, I gained about 10lbs during and then all the rest that I had lost, plus a little extra. I pretty much ignored it for a while, what with 2 kids and a lot of stress at home. After my divorce in 2007, I got settled in on my own, my life settled down as I got into a routine and I finally felt ready to commit.

At the beginning of 2008, I started again with the Atkins diet for about 6 weeks, managing to lose about 20 pounds again. At this point, I saw the scale and my pants size going in the right direction and knew I couldn't maintain the hard core lifestyle of the Atkins plan so I transitioned to Weight Watchers in March 2008, joined a gym, and hired a trainer. I lost another 10 pounds over the next month, and then I hit a plateau. My trainer, not impressed with the Weight Watchers plan, thought I was exercising too much and not eating enough calories. So I started adding more calories to my diet on the days I was working out ("Activity Points"

or allowable points earned by doing physical activities). This still kept it within the weight watchers plan, and I was still making healthy choices, but didn’t affect my weight. It got to be too expensive, so I stopped going to the Weight Watchers meetings. It had been another month with no weight loss, yet again, anyway. I did one more month with the trainer, and then stopped seeing him as well. Still no weight loss, and no lost inches, but I was feeling great, so I stopped thinking too much about it. I really did enjoy working out, with the trainer and without. I continued to work out 3-5 days a week at the gym through August, when Jerry and I got married, and then life got a little busier. I still went to the gym several times a month, but eventually gave up on that as well. This time, due to the time constraints of adjusting to married life and an instant Brady Bunch family.

By October I started noticing my clothes fitting different, again (and not in a good way). The weight was creeping back on, and by December, I had nearly gained back everything I had lost. I kind of gave up at that point. I was angry, frustrated, depressed, call it whatever, but I really just stopped caring again.

Just before our first anniversary, we joined a new gym in town (my previous membership was for a gym in a neighboring town) hoping that having something close to home would be more encouraging. My attendance has been sporadic at best over the last year and a half, though, and I still wasn't feeling like it was worth it, even though I loved the way I felt after each workout. I didn't see any physical improvements no matter what I ate, and number on the scale kept going up. Finally, we were convinced that there had to be something else going on, because my diet wasn't terrible. I just shouldn't have been gaining weight - to me, there was no reason for it.

My husband convinced me to give a local natural medicine doctor a shot, so we started seeing one in October 2010. We did consults, physical tests, blood tests, more consults. Finally, after 6 months of testing, we had some answers. Sleep Apnea, Hypothyroidism, Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS), Insulin Resistance, and high levels of Testosterone. Basically, lots of issues causing weight gain (among other things), of course.

Over the last 6 months of testing and meeting with the Doctor, I've started taking multiple vitamins and supplements, and I am relieved to say that the scale has finally stopped climbing, after 2+ years of frustration. Initially, I lost about 9 pounds when I started taking a supplement for the PCOS, but that was all. I wasn't discouraged by the stop, though. It's been about two months since the last of that weight drop, and even though I haven't lost any more, I haven't gained anything either. That's without changing eating, sleeping, or exercise habits.

Because we finally got the weight to stabilize, I feel much more encouraged to try other things again, like adjusting my diet, and exercising again. It’s just such a huge relief to get on the scale each week and see that it didn’t go up any more. I talk a lot about the number on the scale, but I do want to clarify that that number is not my concern. True, I don’t like that number – it’s high, but I know that I need that number to come down, at this point. As I begin to get back on track, that number is going to matter less. I do not have a weight goal. Maybe I will make one, but probably not, since I don’t really care what it is if I am healthy and feel better and have energy again.