This morning, I felt like I was walking to my sentencing.

Part 1
Part 2
The first 30 days doing the "Shake it Off Challenge" with Kelsie were easy.  I lost 13.4 lbs. taking the Orchard and Garden Blend capsules and drinking 2 shakes a day.

I had a veggie filled lunch everyday as well as healthy snacks in-between meals.  I was averaging 10-13 fruits and vegetables a day not counting the Juice Plus capsules.  I was CRAVING fruits and veggies and drinking things like KALE in GREEN SMOOTHIES!  I'd go to the Farmers' Market and be assaulted by all the amazing smells of all the produce.  It was like my palate had been cleansed of all the refined and processed foods and I could appreciate God's bounty more fully.

I avoided gluten and dairy.  I also avoided any processed foods and salt and sugar.

I drank half my weight in ounces of water a day.  I was flushing out all the toxins.

I slept 7-8 hours every night.  I felt so rested and amazing.

2 1/2 weeks into the challenge I started going to the gym.  It gave me MORE energy.  I had always told myself I didn't have time to workout.  I have 8 kids who I homeschool.  Where would I possibly find the time?  I found the time early in the morning before they wake up.  I was wide awake.  Getting enough fruits and veggies and enough sleep switched me over to being a morning person.

My body wakes up every morning at 5:15 unless I set the alarm for 5 am.

The "Shake it Off Challenge" was a good thing for me.  I didn't have to commit to it for 3 or 4 months.
Just one month.
That was bite-size enough for me to handle.
I didn't have any illusions of dropping an absurd amount of weight in that time.
I hoped it would help me set some good healthy habits.  It definitely did that.

I jumped straight into another month of the same healthy habits.  About a week into it, I started to get discouraged when the scale wasn't budging.

I second guessed my ability to turn my fat-storing diabetes-bound body into a healthy fat-burning body.

I let these doubts poison my thinking.

I felt like failure was creeping up on me because the scale wasn't going down.

I was desperate.

And then one morning, my skirt fell off.  I was losing inches.  I WAS MAJORLY LOSING INCHES!  Of course!  I wasn't losing weight because I was building muscle.  And muscle is heavy.  And I WANT that muscle to help me burn more fat.  Yes, yes, YES!

I was doing everything right.  What could I possibly do more?  I was making reasonable and healthy choices for my health.

Positive affirmations.  Positive self-talk.  That's what I could do.  So I started to journal my feelings on my progress.

The scale wasn't the only thing to show progress.  I was a size 22 skirt in November.  My size 20 jeans were too tight to button.  I could only button them if I laid down on my bed and held my breath.  Now I am a size 16.  I have a whole bunch of clothing that fit me that had been banished to the shelf in the closet for many moons.

I can ride a bike.
I can swim.
I can take my kids on a hike and not gasp for air.
I'm not using any allergy medication anymore.
The only time I used my inhaler in over two months was Sunday, and that was because there were lilies in the primary room.  And I have a life-threatening allergy to lilies.
I had one migraine since mid-January.  This is unheard of for me.
I'm not drained and exhausted every afternoon.

Yesterday I went to the doctor and she discussed with me my test results from mid-November.  She was ecstatic that I took her advice to exercise and eat right and had lost over 30 lbs.

My test results from November showed I was a little low in Vitamin D.  Another test, that checked my A1C, was high indicating an increased risk of becoming diabetic.  It should've been followed up with another test.  But it wasn't because somehow the note to follow up wasn't there.

Now, 4 months after that November testing, and 33 1/2 pounds lighter, she's retesting again.  I fasted after dinner last night until my labs this morning.

This morning, I felt like I was walking to my sentencing.  Would it come back elevated?  Would my birthday present be a verdict of prediabetic?

Would it make a difference?  Would I still continue my path to health?  What would change?

to be continued...

"There's no magic pill." part 2: Praying for inspiration and taking that leap of faith

I wanted there to be a magic pill.  How could I POSSIBLY lose 110 lbs?  Wasn't there some kind of surgery that was approved for people 100 lbs. overweight or more?  Didn't I qualify for that?

But thinking back on my recovery from my hysterectomy 4 months earlier, a surgery was the last thing I wanted to go through.  As far as I understood, that surgery made your stomach smaller so you couldn't overeat.  There was no guarantee I would get all the nutrients I needed with my limited stomach capacity.  I didn't want to be that woman with the hanging skin because I had surgery to ensure rapid weight-loss.  But I also didn't want to be 110 lbs. overweight anymore.  I wasn't just overweight.  I was obese.

"You know how to do this," her words echoed in my mind.  Did I?

If I knew how to do this, why couldn't I just do it?  A close friend encouraged me to try the Atkins Diet.  I wasn't going to pay to join something, not even sure you have to for that, so I looked up what I could online.  Sure, I lost some weight following it.  But I was always constipated.  There were so many fruits and veggies on the list of things I should hardly ever eat, that my system was just not happy.

I fasted and prayed about how to get healthier.  I felt like if it was up to self-control, it wasn't going to happen.  But perhaps if my Heavenly Father wanted me to lose the weight, I could.  But I needed some divine intervention.  Or a nudge.  I'd take a nudge in the right direction.  Anything would be better than eating too much cheese and very little fruit.

Mid-December, a little over a week after fasting and praying about help to get healthier and lose weight and a month after my doctor's appointment, I got a Facebook message from Kelsie, an old friend from the Frozen North who's totally fit and a personal trainer and has more energy than my 5 year old twin boys.  Plus she was Pookie's primary teacher when he was 4.  He used to stroke her skirt because he loved the way the fabric felt.  Hey, it kept him quiet.  But I digress...

Kelsie was inviting me to join a "Shake it Off" Challenge.  It was a biggest loser type game with motivation, cash prizes, recipe ideas and workout tips.  

I could use healthy recipe ideas and workout tips.  The very idea of working out scared the daylights out of me-- I could injure myself!  But who could give me better tips than a personal trainer, right??

But this was just before Christmas.  And well, you know me, I'm a baker.  I was busy making cheeseballs for youth parties, and cheesecake with my number 1 girl, and cookies for the neighbors, and rolls for the ward Christmas dinner, and on and on and on.

Maybe I'll look at that invite again after Christmas.  I would make sure I had some goals for the New Year.

But the new year came.  All I knew was I wanted to lose weight and develop some healthier habits.

I was pretty depressed about my state of health.  I was snoring like a beast.  According to Danny, it would shake the bed.  Even when he rolled me onto my side, I still snored-- though not bed-shaking snoring.

January 5th, I took the kids for a walk.  It was the first Monday of the new year and I was going to start my new healthy habit.  I decided I would walk 3 days a week for at least 15 minutes.  We walked for 25 minutes.  It felt REALLY good to be doing what the doctor said to do.

I did it again on Wednesday, January 7th.  25 minutes was really good for me.  Go me!  The kids were loving the outdoors time.

I decided not to let the week get away from me and did it Thursday instead of waiting for the weekend to make me lose momentum.  But it was 20 minutes.  Not bad.  I was a day ahead of my goal and 5 minutes longer anyway.

For whatever reason, that evening I remembered that message from Kelsie from 3 weeks earlier.  So I contacted her about "my friend" to ask some questions.  I was excited about everything she was saying:

Whole foods
Non-GMO
organic
phytonutrients
vegan shakes

I thought Danny would never go for it.  It was going to be about $5 a day for the program she was telling me about.  I was thinking I'd need it for like 3 or 4 months to get a good jump-start on my weight-loss and solidify some healthy new habits.  That was going to add up to like $600 if I did 4 months straight.  Maybe I could just get the capsules and the occasional shake.

But Danny said, "Yes."  We were very worried about my health.  I didn't want to die before I was 40.  What did I have to lose?  They had a 30-day money back guarantee.  And after that, I could always send back what was unopened for a refund.  I figured I would know for sure by the 30 day mark if it was going to be worth doing 3 or 4 months.

So I signed up with Kelsie and joined her "Shake it Off" challenge too.  I was going to utilize this opportunity to learn everything I could about bettering my health and get recipes and workout tips.

To be continued...  

"There's no magic pill."

Since my doctor's appointment mid-November, I have been on a path to lose weight and get healthier.

This path started with me tracking everything I ate in My Fitness Pal app.  (I'm "Nikkiairforcewife" if you want to add me.)  I needed to know first of all my starting place.  Then I could improve.

Everyday that I didn't walk, I could hear my doctor's words in my head.

"You need to walk 3-5 times a week for 30 minutes.  You could walk out to a park 15 minutes away with your kids, let them play, and then walk back 15 minutes.  It doesn't have to be all at once.  You just need to get moving."

"There's no magic pill.  You know how to do this.  You need to eat less and exercise more."

"You're going to have diabetes and heart disease in no time if you don't work hard to get this weight off."

"It will be harder since your hysterectomy.  Those changes in hormones makes it more difficult to lose the weight.  But you can do this."

But still I couldn't find time in my week to walk more than one day.  In the first month I walked twice.  I was too busy homeschooling 8 kids, buying food for and feeding my family of 10, and sometimes keeping up with the laundry.

In the afternoons, when I wasn't as busy, I didn't have the energy.  I wanted a nap, not a walk.

I did drop a little weight just from keeping track and trying to avoid obvious bad choices like chips and ice cream.

May 4, 2014 I had to cut off my ring because none of the tricks worked to remove it and it was cutting off my circulation.  It was red and extra swollen here because of the techniques we were trying (like the dental floss trick).

To be continued...