The Journey to the Starting Line

So it begins....
I have never written a blog before, so this will probably not be anything awe-inspiring or award-winning. I realized that my life and weight-gain involved all Five Stages of Grief before I was able to make a positive change. Everyone tells me I talk too much, and I need something to help keep me accountable on my new journey to a healthy lifestyle; so a blog it is.  "Don't go where there is a path, instead go where there is no path and leave a trail."

Introduction
I am a 26 year-old young woman who has struggled with being very overweight to borderline obese my entire life. My ancestry is French, English, German, and American Indian...so "big-boned" is a bit of an understatement. I have always been the "big girl" who didn't look like everyone else. I was a self-proclaimed nerd, book-worm, and always had only a few very close friends.

BARGAINING -- My first memories of being very self-conscious about my weight started around middle school (sixth grade). I still have a quiet-time journal from a church youth-group retreat where I had prayed that God would miraculously make me lose 75 pounds (roughly half of my body weight at the time). I wore huge over sized sweatshirts, boys Husky-sized jeans, and anything else that would hide my frame. I yearned to look like my classmates; as if wearing those cute, tight-fitting clothes would somehow grant me the Golden Ticket to popularity. In seventh grade, I joined my school's Pep Squad (aka the cheer-leading rejects who cheered for everything but the Varsity teams) hoping to make friends amongst the popular girls. I quickly realized that the student body constantly ridiculed and teased us... So, I quit the pep squad and slunk back down to the band hall, dragging my clarinet case in defeat.

This was around the time, that I also started getting really involved in horseback riding. I was given the most amazing gift of an OTTB (off-track Thoroughbred) ex-racehorse. Keeper was incredibly important to me. We were partners and he taught me more about life, love, and trust than any friend, family member, or book ever could. We competed in hunter-jumper shows all through middle school, high school, and the beginning of college. No matter how much I loved being a "barn rat" and sending every waking hour around horses, I was still acutely aware of my weight. Every time I needed a new piece of equipment or clothing, I could never purchase it off the rack. I had to buy tall dress boots three sizes too big for my feet just so they would accommodate my huge calves, and plus-size breeches, belts, shirts, and jackets were the norm for me. Basically, horseback riding is not good sport for self-conscious fat kids. Since I was also an insatiable book-worm and Honors student, I made the decision to go to a different high school within my district to get involved in their International Baccalaureate (IB is like "super Honors") program.

High School
I was ecstatically happy with my horse, getting a fresh start in my new high-school, and making brand-new friends. About half way through my freshman year, I met my very first boyfriend and got involved in the school color-guard and marching-band. Over the next four years, I flourished (in my own way) and it didn't seem to matter that I was heavier than my classmates. I was smart, making great grades, winning at my horse shows, involved in a sport that involved team-work, creativity, dance/music skills, and fitness, and I was clearly head-over-heels in love with my boyfriend. Did I mention that the boyfriend's father was a classically trained French chef and the owner of one of Austin's premiere bakeries? Long story short, I was constantly eating insanely unhealthy, yet magically delicious food. I went on the South Beach Diet with my mom for a few months during my senior year with nice results. I was sitting at a slightly overweight (yet very fit and muscular) 180 pounds on my graduation day. I had big dreams of heading to Texas A&M University to pursue my undergrad degree and eventually veterinary school.

College
DENIAL -- I loved college! I loved the fresh start, I loved learning, I loved riding my horse after class, and I loved living on my own. About half way through my freshman year, my high-school boyfriend and I split (thank goodness that he was mature enough to realize that we were finished). I got pretty depressed, turned to food for comfort, and gained the dreaded "Freshman Fifteen" (and then some) in a matter of weeks. I wasn't working out daily anymore, because I was too busy focusing on school and keeping my grades up so that I could get into vet school. I met my next boyfriend (who I would eventually marry) a few months later. We were so happy... just studying, working, spending time together, and eating too much food. We both had raging hormones and college metabolisms - eating anything and everything in sight without ever working out or gaining much weight. And, he loved me regardless of how I looked. Fast forward three years, I applied to and got accepted into the prestigious Texas A&M University College of Veterinary Medicine Class of 2011! My fiance accepted his first job offer out of college...then moved five hours away.

Vet School
DEPRESSION -- Finally, I was going to live out my dreams of becoming a veterinarian! Classes began and the unimaginable stress and rigors of vet school hit me like a ton of bricks. I spent every waking moment at a desk: in class, researching, or studying. Every second of sleep was a cherished gem. My support system was reachable only by phone or instant messenger. My daily schedule left me approximately 20 minutes of free-time between the hours of 3-4am for shopping, meal-planning, daily exercise, and wedding planning before I was right back in class. Needless to say, these four years are when my weight got completely out-of-control. My metabolism, sleep schedule, stress level, and eating were completely haywire. It was about 18 months before my wedding day, and I had reached an utterly depressing weight of 240 pounds before I was able to make a move. I joined a women's fitness boot-camp and started getting up at 4:30am to work out for an hour every day before class. This went on for about a year and I was able to fit into my size 16 wedding dress. I was eating moderately healthy meals and exercising regularly, but I still wasn't happy with my body.

ACCEPTANCE -- Our wedding was beautiful, we had an unforgettable honeymoon in Fiji...and then I headed directly back to the reality of my fourth-year rotations in the teaching hospital. Rotations were two-weeks long, but all had drastically different schedules. Some were night-time, some were day-time, some were 12-18 hour shifts and some were only 6.5 hours. Some had loads of free-time, some required travel, some you were on-call 24/7, some required constant studying and research, and some had you at school checking up on your cases around the clock. You never knew whether you would have any a five minute break to eat lunch, stop for fast-food, or even take the time to go to the restroom more than once all day. I ate whatever I could, whenever I could. I never went shopping, completely neglected exercise, and would eat nothing but junk - averaging 1.5 large fast-food meals every day. The stress level was indescribable, and I didn't see any other valid option to change the way I was living. On May 12 of 2011, I added three magical letters (DVM) to my name, started calling myself Doctor, and just accepted the fact that I weighed 250 pounds.

Post-Doctorate
ANGER -- After vet school, I moved to San Antonio to pursue an internship in Equine and Small Animal medicine. I worked with extremely fit men and women for the next 12 months. I'm talking about Paleo-eating, XXS clothes-wearing, exercising three times a day, marathon runners. No exaggeration. This frustrated me to no end. It didn't matter how healthy I ate or how much I exercised, I would never look like any of my co-workers. Also, they were always publicly chastising themselves for being too big, not eating a healthy meal, or not being "toned enough". They had to work so hard to maintain their perfect "Veterinary Barbie" hard-bodies, I just couldn't see the point. So, I just fretted about it and continued to eat crap all the time. All while working to succeed in an extraordinarily stressful job and having little to no time to myself, and an extremely variable daily schedule. Any exercise I got consisted of wrestling 150 pound foals while trying not to get killed by their crazy mommas. About half way through my internship, my husband got a great new job and moved down to San Antonio!! Joy of joys! We were finally together after living apart for 4.5 years. He moved into my extra-tiny apartment, and we began our newly-wed life. This apartment was SO small, we literally did not have a pantry to store food in. Our kitchen had a tiny stove, tiny dishwasher, tiny sink, and four tiny cupboards. The microwave took up an entire half of the available counter space. Because we didn't have the time or space to cook food, we ate out...ALL THE TIME. We didn't cook more than once every few months. We both gained a lot of weight as the end of my internship loomed, I started looking for my next job, and we both searched diligently to purchase a home in San Antonio.

THE CHANGE
We bought and moved into a beautiful new home. I started an amazing new job as an associate veterinarian for Banfield Pet Hospital. My husband was flourishing in his new job. I had a bit of a reputation around the hospital as the "pet food Nazi" - constantly begging owners to feed their pets healthier food and helping them to achieve weight loss. I always joked about how my dogs ate better than I did, and how if someone would just feed me one cup of "healthy weight people chow" twice daily, I would look like a supermodel. I knew that I was being hypocritical, and I desperately wished that I could show the same great results as many of my patients. I hated being twice the size of my co-workers and even my most obese patients but didn't see any way to get out of my rut.

One day in early January of 2013, I hopped on the scale and read with horror the following numbers: TWO SIXTY-FIVE. It wasn't all that much more than I had weighed a few months before, but something about 265 and weighing as much or more than many NFL linebackers kicked my fat ass into gear. I was tired of squeezing into my XXL scrubs, that showed off every fat roll. I vowed to start taking my own advice. I looked to my closest friends and family for inspiration. My beautiful little sister is an elite college volleyball player and is always eating healthy and working out. She has the perfect body to prove it. My older brother was also an athlete, excelling at basketball. He is now married with three kids and has also managed to maintain his healthy physique. I have a very close college friend, who had always been a little bigger than I, who had recently celebrated 100 pounds lost after having weight loss surgery. Several of my co-workers were also very petite and fit women, several of whom were older than me. Finally, I had had enough. I was a young, successful, happy, married, Doctor ...why didn't I deserve to be healthy and fit as well? I realized that I wasn't going to ever see a difference if I didn't make some major changes.

Defeat is not a true failure, not trying is the true failure.