Hello! Welcome!

So as you can tell, this is actually a very old blog that I had used a long time ago, but never actually shut down. I had used it as an outlet at the time, to help me sort out my thoughts. While bored on the computer at work I would come here and blurt out whatever came to mind. I was getting out of a very bitterly unworkable relationship with my high school sweetheart/ first love and didn't have someone to talk to about it, so sometimes I would freewrite my thoughts and come back to read them later. Later, I decided I no longer needed this place, and deleted all of the posts. Lame, but that is the history of this page. Now, as of this week this is where I am going to be doing weight loss blogging!

I also have a youtube channel (which you can find here) using the alias Coquinat, which has chronicled my journey for the past year, but I find that having both a place to video and a place to write are dualistically beneficial for success.

My weight loss history is probably very similar to that of a lot of other people, but nonetheless I am going to share it.

I can remember becoming aware and conscious of my body when I was 11 years old. Synonymously, this is also when I began dietting and fussing over my body. My mom would make negative and positive comments about my thighs, which made me feel like a rotisserie chicken. I joined a basketball team, took ballet classes, and began skipping lunch. It worked, and people began referring to me as 'slim'. I liked it, but I never really believed that they were saying the truth.

After that, my family moved to Pennsylvania where THERE ARE NO SIDEWALKS and you need a car even to get groceries. Luckily, we lived next to a park. I had never had this type of place near me where I came from. I went around and around the park, loop after loop. It was so freeing to feel the wind playing with my hair, and to watch the sky change vivid hues as the day transitioned into twilight. I was just loving the exercise so much until one day my mom said "your legs are looking nice from all that biking". again comments on my body, and that same strange discomforting feeling of being naked. I'm positive she wanted to compliment and encourage me, but I didn't feel happy hearing that.

I began going to public school, and here is where they serve some mean, fatty lunches to students, because they try to serve what the students will eat. I also added a milkshake each afternoon, and the novelty of riding the bike in the park wore away. I began to gain weight.

In my freshman year of high school, I remember getting on the scale for gym class and being told I weighed 179 lbs. 179!! How on earth did that happen? I promptly joined a swim team and had my first encounter with Weight Watchers. I was 14 years old.

I lost 10 lbs on weight watchers and kept it off for about 4 months, and then began gaining weight again ..bummer..

I reached a new high at 16 years old of 230 lbs. Silly, naive, people pleaser that I was, began to drink only crystal light and work out like a fiend. I quickly shed 80 lbs. I got tons of compliments, and more people wanted to be friends with me. In private I was crying all of the time, I had stopped menstruating, and there was not a thing in my digestive track except vitamins. The boyfriend began getting scared and asked me to please please begin eating again, and slowly, one meal at a time I began to eat again.. and gained a lot of weight.

This time I gained the 80 plus 30, bringing me to my highest weight ever of 272 lbs. Among the pounds of fat that I had buried my body in, you would find a mess. Every pound is a physical representation of the issues that had brought me to where I was, and losing the weight means working through all of that.

I began in the summer of 2007 with a yoga class and a glass of water. I needed a PE credit for my major in college, so there wasn't an escape. It had been years since I stepped into any sort of physical activity class, and I was THE biggest girl in there. It was very hard to bring myself to class where I was surrounded by tiny flexible women, who could get into all the positions, and some of them I just couldn't get into because my fat was in the way! But I also realized that ohh had I gotten so, so big. As painful as the class was, the end I found very relaxing. Dead Man's pose: my favorite part of the day. The teacher would also read aloud some scripture and play her singing bowl, which I found particularly helpful for my spirit. She always spoke about self acceptance and Ahimsa (non violence). Next, I began walking in that same park where I rode my bike all those years ago. One loop was equal to 1 mile. In the beginning it took me a while, and I didn't rush myself. I went at a comfortable pace. Soon the time it took me to do one loop lessenned to 30 minutes. I cut out soda from my diet very slowly and the water intake increased. Slowly, effortlessly, I was making the change. I lost 15 lbs very gradually the first 10 months, at which point I began making youtube videos and joined the online community GUT2CUT. I am two years down the road now and have lost 66 lbs. I can go for miles. I eat very healthily, and I drink 3 liters f water a day.