(Senior Spring Break – 2014)
Welcome back, Happy Tuesday!
Here is the third and final part of the “My Fitness Journey Series”.
A little recap to start. If you remember last week, I told you guys how during my freshman year at Baylor I gained a lot of my weight back. I wasn’t eating the best but I was doing a lot of cardio. The summer before my sophomore year, I cleaned up my eating, kept doing cardio and lost some of the weight. Then during Christmas break, I started to do weights again, which in turn took my fitness journey to the next level. I did the same work out plan for 3 years. I left off by telling you guys how much I “loved my workout routine and my lifestyle”!
Which brings me to Part 3, which is the backside of that story and how my obsession with fitness ultimately became unhealthy.
Are we caught up? Okay, cool.
MY fitness Journey: Part 3
(BODY DYSMORPHIA, OBSESSION W/ WEIGHT LOSS & LEARNING TO LOVE YOURSELF)
By my senior year at Baylor, I had lost all of my weight again + more. During this time, I was in great shape. I was the thinnest I had been at 100 lbs. This is when I started documenting everything I put in my body, every single day, down to the ounces I drank in my wine. Only allowing myself 1000-1200 calories a day. I was addicted to the scale and I was obsessed with people telling me how thin I was. I wouldn’t go out with friends in fear of overeating, if I thought I overindulged on a date w/ Colton, I would cry myself to sleep and the thought of vacations (aka not being able to eat my set diet or follow my set workout plan) would give me such anxiety that I would make myself sick the entire way leading up to them.
Needless to say, the moment I graduated, started my first job and saw my weight rising a little, I had a true panic attack. I mean, I freaked out. Looking back though, this small weight gain was not a big deal but at the time, all that I could think was…..
“OMG, IT’S HAPPENING AGAIN!!”
So basically…. long story short….I became more of a psycho and started being harder on myself than I ever was before. I’m not sure if it was because my body wasn’t used to sitting at a desk all day or whether it was the fact that my body was way too use to my workout routine from school, but I was definitely gaining weight and I started being really hard on myself.
Poor Colton, I was not a fun person to be around.
I know I needed to do something different.
I learned very quickly that financially, a full-time trainer wasn’t an option. But, after meeting with a few, the number one thing they told me was that I needed to kick it up a notch. I started doing two-a-days waking up at 5 a.m. & working out after work. That kind of worked for a little while, but I was being so hard on my body, that I was exhausted. I was so stressed, and focusing so much on losing weight that I wasn’t able to lose anything. (Remember, I am self-taught) Right around this time, my friend, Tera told me she was starting the Kayla Itsine’s Bikini Body Guide. I told you all about Kayla in this post.
When browsing through Kayla’s website & Instagram it’s pretty easy to get stoked and pump yourself up. I mean, she has fantastic success stories. I thought to myself “This is it, I am going to get back on track and lose all of my weight with this plan”!
Well, that didn’t happen and I actually haven’t lost any weight since starting her plan….but that doesn’t mean it didn’t help me. Truth be told, her workouts pushed me to that next level, getting me out of my plateau. After spending so much time stressing over my body image, the number on my scale, not missing a single workout & having Colton take my “reminder” pictures…. I finally looked at myself in the mirror and liked what I saw! THIS was an incredible moment.
I was SO exhausted of obsessing over it all – finally I looked in the mirror and felt at peace. The bottom line is, I want to be fit, I want to be happy, & healthy, but I also want to LIVE. I want to get dessert on date nights and enjoy brunch with my friends. I want to go on vacation and drink daiquiris. Because that is living & the way I treated myself, wasn’t.
So that’s where I am now, focusing on learning to love my body. Learning to love myself. Maybe it is because of my past & because no matter what, I will always view myself as the “heavier girl”. But, I know I am no longer that person, that I have worked hard to get to where I am today and that I will continue to workout hard and to eat healthy, but I won’t kill myself over an indulgence.
It’s all about balance. It’s all about giving your body the nutrients it needs and moving to keep it healthy. It’s also about being happy with who you are. Today I am still doing Kayla’s guide for the second time, but I also mix it up with my old weight routine & a lot of spin classes, which I love love, love. I will always choose the healthier option, but I will let myself indulge.
Maybe this is a weird ending? Idk, I feel like I am aimlessly typing in my bed. All in all though, I just want everyone who is trying to lose weight, to realize that you’re incredible, beautiful & you can change your habits into being a healthier and happier person. Keywords: healthier and happier. I want you to change because of those reasons and not because you think you should be a certain number on a scale.
My fitness journey will never be a finished series, your body changes everyday & it’s a life long commitment to a healthier lifestyle. It’s just finding what works for you at that moment & what makes you happy. I hope you guys enjoyed reading this series as much as I have enjoyed sharing it. I do not know who all reads this, but if I can just help or inspire one person, then that’s fulfilling enough to me.
If you guys have any questions or comments, please email me! I truly love reading them.
xo,
Lauren