My Success Story

The weekly Weight Watcher meeting topic this week is “Your Success Story.”

My success story has taken on many twists and turns. Despite the highs and lows, success is what you chose to make of it.

My success story began in December of 2006. After a trip to Las Vegas, where I almost could not getting the seatbelt to buckle on the plane and I was completely exhausted from all the walking/sight seeing, I decided to join Weight Watchers. I walked into my first meeting in January of 2007 weighing in at 304 pounds.

This photo was taken taken at my birthday in October of 2006, a few months before my first WW meeting.

For two years I counted points, weighed and measured my food, exercised, and attended my WW meetings. I developed many friends and met many wonderful people along my weight loss journey. I struggled, celebrated each five pounds lost, cried many tears, and smiled a lot. After 110 weeks I met the goal weight I set with my doctor of 175 pounds. 

Six weeks after that I officially became a Lifetime Member and earned my first LT key in May of 2009.

My new journey of maintenance began and so did a lifetime journey of learning how to keep my weight off. Once again I struggled, celebrated other WW members five pound losses, cried many tears, and smiled a lot. I continued to attend my WW meetings and found I had to change meetings to find a different type of support than the support I received during my weight loss journey. Since I didn't magically lose 130 pounds, getting to my goal weight didn't mean I would magically stay there. I still had to count my points and weigh and measure my food. I had to reach out for help when I was struggling and in doing so I built a great network of online WW friends. My weight dropped below 175 pounds, it came back up to 175 pounds, and it went above 175 pounds. For five years I was able to maintain my weight loss pretty close to my goal weight and it all felt pretty carefree.

In August of 2013, life changes brought on new challenges and my weight started to steadily increase. I really struggled (and still do) to bring it back down. I won't make excuses for why I have gained back 30 pounds. I tend to focus too much on my re-gain and I let it over shadow the close-to-100-pounds I have continued to keep off. 

Weight loss experts consider successful weight loss as losing 10% of your weight and keeping that weight off for at least one year. I've been keeping more than 10% of my weight loss off for over seven years.

This is me today.

Success can come in many forms. Sometimes we can struggle to see something as successful because we chose to focus on the negatives instead of the positives. Sometimes we can struggle to see something as successful because we let another person make us feel as though we have somehow failed.

Don't let that happen. Celebrate your successes and cheer on those that are struggling. Don't lose sight of what success really is. Know that there will be setbacks and hard times. But there will also be so many wonderful times. Life is what you make of it. If you wake up everyday thinking “today is going to be a horrible day” then you have already set yourself up to fail. If you wake up everyday thinking “today is going to be a great day and if it isn't, that is okay” then you have already succeeded. Sometimes we just need an attitude adjustment. Keep fighting the good fight and never give up. Success might look differently from time to time but it is still success.

Thank you to everybody who has always given me support. I appreciate it so much.