I Can Do Anything for 17 Days

You might say I was getting pretty doggone desperate. I wanted to do something about my weight, but everything I had tried in the past had not worked. When I was young, I just quit eating whenever I needed to lose weight. But I just can't do that anymore. I get too hungry. Then comes the headache. And the faint feeling. I don't know how I skipped meals back then, but now, that's just not an option.

Last year I enrolled in a boot camp exercise class. I figured I'd lose weight. The instructor was brutal. Let me tell you, that girl nearly killed me. I was so sore I could hardly get out of bed in the morning. But I did not lose weight, because I just ate more. You probably already figured out I quit that class. I've never cared much for exercise. 

I have always been a sucker for articles about weightloss. I'm always looking for an easy way out. Losing weight is hard. I can't believe some smart scientist hasn't figured out an easy weight loss plan for people like me. Lucky for me, one day I was standing in line at the grocery store. This caption on the cover of Woman's World caught my eye: "20 Pounds Slimmer in 17 Days." Wow! I can do anything for 17 days. So naturally, I bought the magazine. 

After reading the article and studying the menus, I knew I could do this diet. The meal plan is full of good tasting food. And I like good tasting food. I can do this. The success stories were amazing. I could not wait to start this diet.

So I rushed out and bought the book: The 17 Day Diet.

The Beginning

I have been overweight for a while now. It all started when I had babies. At least that's what I told myself for years. But that's not true. I found a picture of myself when my baby was about 2 years old, and I was normal sized. 

Several years of eating as much as I want of what I want whenever I want is what made me into what I became. I knew I had really put on weight, but it was not until I went to see the doctor that I learned the extent of the damage. There it was, right there on the scale. Something has to be wrong with the scale, I thought. The nurse didn't think the scale was wrong. She proceeded to write that horrible number right on my chart. For the rest of the visit, I was stunned...in shock really. I could not believe I had let it go so far. How can I ever get back to where I should be?

By the time I returned home from the doctor's office, I had made up my mind. I will lose weight. My life depends on it. 

No wonder I feel bad all the time. No wonder I'm short of breath. I am fat.

I knew what I had to do. The doctor wanted to see me back in one week to give me my test results. So I would work hard and try to lose a couple of pounds during those seven days. 

I would eat salads and walk every day. Well, I did walk every day. And I did eat salads. But I must have eaten more than salads, because I gained 4 more pounds. 

I was crushed. My test results came back all normal. Nothing was wrong with me. I was just going through "The Change." (No, the doctor did not call it that, but that's what it is.) The doctor never mentioned my weight. She didn't have to. I KNEW I had to lose weight. For me, it wasn't just about the weight. I knew my health was at stake. There was nothing medically wrong with me except that I was overweight. And that excess weight was tearing down my health. 

I knew all this, but what I did not know was how to fix it. How can I lose weight?

I Just Want to Be Normal Sized

I just want to be normal sized again. I've worn all black for several years now. I add color to my wardrobe only with my accessories. Black jeans, black skirts, black tops, black sweaters...black, black, black--that's all I buy. And I am sick of it. Besides, I still look big! I might as well wear red. Or white.

I'm tired of wearing black all the time. Yes, black looks sophisticated and classy. And black is slimming. But when you get as big as I am, you still look big, no matter what color you're wearing. I AM tired of wearing black all the time.

But more importantly, I'm tired of being big.

Last summer all I wore was black capris. And I did NOT look good in them. I looked like a big woman wearing black capris.

I want to wear shorts. No, not short shorts. I'm a mother, a cub scout den leader, and I'm involved in a number of volunteer organizations. I don't want to sport around town wearing hot pants. But I'd love to wear some nice looking walking shorts. Khaki, perhaps. 

And I'd like to wear pink.

Why am I overweight?

In the past few years, I have become increasingly overweight. This excess weight has caused me to develop several physical problems that have made life uncomfortable for me. My knees hurt most of the time. I know it's from carrying around all this extra weight. One knee hurts when walking, when standing, and after sitting for a long time. In other words, it always hurts. Stiffness every morning gets worse all the time. 

I don't know when it was that I noticed I was short of breath most of the time. Just walking to the mailbox felt like a jog to me. I knew this was bad, so I started walking every day. I figured surely I'd lose weight by walking. It was such a chore to me, but I made myself walk for an hour every day.  After my walk, I was so exhausted that I had to rest for the remainder of the day. The knee pain was unbearable. I took Alleve twice a day and still needed to apply a pain relieving cream to the back of my knees.

I was surprised to find that I did not lose any weight walking for a whole hour every day. "What am I doing wrong?"  I wondered. I promised myself I would get to the bottom of this.