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      So today I wanted to talk specifically about how I lost my weight. I needed to get the pounds off fairly quickly so that I could look good during the holidays.  On impulse, I bought some homeopathic HCG drops.  Then I went home and downloaded the free ebook, Pounds and Inches by Dr. Simeons. The first 2 days of “loading” sounded like heaven.  Who wouldn’t like eating whatever they wanted in mass quantities? It was the next three weeks that sounded scary. 500 calories a day. That’s it. I could eat that much before brushing my teeth in the morning! But the drops promised 1-2 lbs a day average loss.  For that, I could survive 3 weeks of hell.
     I’m not going to get into the specifics of the HCG protocol at this time. Maybe at a later post I will go into depth about HCG diet and various other methods available. From the end of October to mid November I religiously followed the rules and never cheated once.  I lost somewhere in the neighborhood of 21 lbs.  But now it was time for maintenance.  I could either be happy with the 21 lbs and start the stabilty diet, where you slowly up your calorie intake and no carbs for 3 more weeks. But with Thanksgiving coming up I knew I would blow that.  Or I could go back and do round 2 of the HCG drops.  So I planned very carefully so that my 2 loading days fell on Thanksgiving. Stuffing my face with food didn’t taste as good as I remembered it. Then came another 3 weeks of starving and no exercise.  The first time wasn’t too bad, the second time was hell.  I wasn’t really dropping the weight like the first time.  I had no energy and I was super crabby.
    It was almost the end of the second round and Christmas was in two weeks.   11 more pounds had come off for a grand total of 32 lbs. in less than two months.  I remember thinking, not bad, but I still want to lose at least another 30 lbs.  I had to change my plan. There’s no way I could do the HCG diet again. It was getting less effective and harder to stay on it.  I hadn’t cheated yet, but it was only a matter of time when only eating 2 apples, zucchini and lean turkey everyday ad naseum. But I wasn’t ready to call it quits yet either. So I started researching other weight loss method to try.  One friend had had great success with cleanses, another heartily endorsed Slim Quick.
   All at once the cold hard truth smacked me in the face.  If I resorted to methods so outside my normal routine to lose the weight, didn’t that mean when the diet was finished and I went back to my regular life that the weight would either creep or jump back on? Isn’t that exactly what had happened umpteen times before? Did I really want to be riding this rolling coaster and putting my body and my family through hell again in another year or two? The answer was a resounding NO! There had to be a way to keep the weight off without dieting several times a year, or putting more harmful drugs and chemicals in my body.  The solution was painfully obvious, but that didn’t mean I was excited to hear it.

  Stop dieting.


      I didn’t need to find a way to lose weight, I had proven over the years that I knew lots of ways to get the fat off. It’s always the gaining it back that’s the problem.  If I wanted the weight to stay off for good I had to change my routine into something that wouldn’t keep making me fat. But it couldn’t be for just a week, or month, or however long it took to get the other 40 pounds off. I had to find a new way to live.

     So hopefully now you have the What I’m going to do.  Now you need to figure out the How I’m going to do it..  Do some research, make a plan, and write it out.  Take a look at your natural resources and see what you have in abundance.  Do you have lots of time available to you, or maybe some excess cash. Do you have a support system in place, (you have me at least!), or do you need to create or find one? Here’s a good rule of thumb to decide how best to approach your goal. There’s fast,  there’s cheap,  and there’s lasting. You can combine 2 out of the three, but very rarely can you have all three at once.  You can do it  fast  and cheap, but it won’t last. (crash diets, cleanses, etc)  You can do it fast and lasting, but it won’t be cheap. (Surgery, professional trainer, etc) Or you can do it cheap and lasting, but it won’t be fast. (eat less, move more, healthy life changes) 
 
    Last year when I decided that I needed to lose weight, I hadn’t yet discovered my  Philosphy of Finishing. We will get in to that in a later post.  I wasn’t thinking long term, I was thinking “I can’t be fat for one more day!”.  I didn’t care how the weight came off, just that it came off. I was so blinded by desperation that I couldn’t see the big picture and didn’t make a plan. I went for cheap and fast.  I wanted to be skinny and wanted it now.  I hadn’t put a lot of thought into maintaining and so I had set myself up for success that could’t last. I have repeated this cycle dozens of times over the years
. Get fired up—–> Lose Weight ——-> Stop diet and go back to life——-> Gain Weight back——> Get depressed——> Get fired up——-> and around and around for 15 years. 

   I want you to break the circle and make a plan that’s a straight line more like this
 Get Fired up——>Lose Weight—–> Change outlook on life —–> Develop Healthy Lifestyle ——-> Tone up and find your ideal weight——-> Maintain and continue your new healthier lifestyle.

   Think about which two you want to choose: cheap and fast, fast and lasting, or cheap and lasting.

Next time I’ll go into my orginal plan, my revised plan, and  my suggested apporach to weight loss

So this weekend I went to the local Writer’s Conference.  Figured it wouldn’t be a bad place to start. The main topic was EBooks.

Way over my head. Amazing advice but my head is still spinning.  Everything in today’s publishing market revolves around the internet. Long gone are the days when writing a book was the hardest part.  Now you have to be author/marketing genius/publisher/tax man.  It’s a wee bit daunting.

Baby steps first things first.  Write the darned book. The workshop leader’s name was Caleb Warnock. He was slightly insane but in that whole brilliant artist kinda way. He was really encouraging of my book idea and said I have a good narrative voice.  He hosts a weekly Wednesday workshop, so let’s get ‘er done.

     One size fits all isn’t a good idea for clothing and it’s an even worse idea for goals. If you pick your goal based on someone else’s achievements or ideals, the end result will probably not be what you had hoped for.  Let me give you an example.  When I started to lose weight I was thinking, “Hmmm. My sister in law and I are about the same height, so if she can be that little and skinny so can I.”.  BZZZZ  Wrong answer.  As I started to lose the weight I realized how completely ridiculous this was.   She has a very slight and petite frame, while I, on the otherhand, have very wide shoulders and at least a medium frame.  If I were to starve myself and become skin and bones, even my bones would be bigger than she is.  I had fallen into the precarious trap of trying to be like someone else instead of trying to become a better me.
 
      Each of you is amazing, fabulous, and completely unique.  No one else has a body exactly like you, so why should you try to force it to behave like someone else’s? Your individual composition of body type, metabolism, and genetic predispositions means you will lose weight differently than any other person on the planet. You and I could eat the same exact foods, do the exact same exercises, and we will still always have different results.  So once you let go of any lingering desire to look exactly like that guy/girl at the gym that’s amazingly toned and fit, then you can start to find and work towards your body’s version of healthy and fit.

     Now you’re ready to find your goal. To do this you, need to seriously evaluate what you really want and who you are doing the work for.  The answer to the first part will vary, but the second part should always be yourself. Try asking yourself this list of questions.

• What do I want to do?
• Why do I want to do it?
• Is there anything that could prevent me from achieving my goal?
• Is this a long term goal or a short term goal?
• How am I going to achieve this goal?
• If something gets in my way, am I willing to keep going until I finish?

    You should ask yourself these questions anytime you want to accomplish something. Whether it be a broad goal like becoming a healthier person, or a short specific goal like getting the house clean today. You might not know all the answers yet, and that’s ok. The How is always tricky. But it is absolutely essential that you can answer the first and last questions. Because if you can, you’ll now know 2 things. First, where you are headed. And second, that you will without a doubt figure out a way to get there.

    Hello. My name is Betsy Schow and I’m an FFP, a former fat person. Yes you’ve read correctly, former. One year ago today I decided I was finished with being fat.
 
     On October 17 2010, I begrudgingly stepped on the bathroom torture device, otherwise known as a scale. After the dust had settled and the little 0.00 had stopped blinking, it betrayed me by saying 216.8. The lies, the horror! I checked behind me to make sure my daughter hadn’t inadvertently stepped on the scale. Nope just me. Must be one of those freak miscalculations. I would step off and try again. You see, over the last four months I had been exercising at the gym, and mostly avoiding sweets. Last month when I weighed myself the scale read 205.  All that work couldn’t have disappeared in just one month right? If you believed the gremlin  that lives inside my scale, it did. A second, third, and fourth weigh in all revealed the same exact results, I had gained 10 lbs. in one month!

    Such a drastic change demanded an equally drastic plan of action.  My doctor had been warning me for years that I was obese and at very real risk of becoming diabetic. I’d never really believed him until that moment.  My parents are type 2 diabetics, my husband is type 1 1/2. If I could gain 10 lbs. in one month, it could happen again, and again, until I became too big to get out of bed. Looking back now, I realize that I was probably overreacting a little bit, but I’m grateful I did. That was not going to be me. My life was not going to be filled with needles, insulin and mumus. I was going to change my life and my unhealthy attitude towards food.

    And I did. Not in a week. Not in a month. But in a year. Like I said earlier, today marks the one year anniversary of going from fat to fit.  This year I lost 72 lbs. Went from 44% body fat to19%.  From being winded running to catch the mailman, to finishing a marathon.  But more important than numbers or percentages, I learned to like myself. I learned what amazing capabilities each and every person has hidden inside.  And all it takes to unearth this untapped well of potential was a little hope, faith, and finally listening to my mother’s advice “Finish what you start.”

     This blog is intended to help others like me who have tried and failed one too many times. Who are ready to say I’m finished with being fat. Everyone say it with me now, “I am finished quitting on myself.”  I hope by sharing my story and some of the mistakes I’ve made and tricks I’ve learned, that I can help you finish your own goals.

    Fair warning: I’m not perfect, as anyone who knows me will gladly attest. I’m not a doctor, trainer, model, athlete, or superskinny.  I’m not advocating any particular lifestyle or diet plan.  As always, check with your doctor before beginning any exercise or diet plan. I’m just a sometimes frustrated mother of two that wants to share my thoughts and listen to yours.

Ok. I’m going to do it. I’m going to be a writer. I’m putting pen to paper and off I go.

Now what? What do I write? I am bubbling with ideas but don’t know where to start. The book I want to write first would the story of how I lost the 75 lbs and ran my first marathon. I was thinking for a title “Run Walk Crawl”.  Kind of in the vein of  Eat Pray Love.

But I am serious about getting a book finished.  I have so many starts of novels then that little voice would talk me out of trying anymore. But this year has taught me that if I can run a marathon… I can do anything.