I was always what one would call heavy- or at least people said I was. I learned to believe those messages others said. I look back at pictures of myself as a baby & child and see I was not at all heavy or pudgy or fat - I was normal, average and healthy. How sad that I learned to believe them and became what they said.
I would say I actually began putting on weight when I hit puberty. A combination of my body changing and my philosophy in life. My philosophy was if it made you sweat or made you feel hot it was to be avoided. I hated exercise. I hated pain. I loved to eat and I loved to watch TV. I don't ever remember being taught about how to care for one's self.
I was young when I learned about dieting from watching commercials or watching the women in my life eat everything low fat or fat free and I wanted nothing to do with that. Dieting required discipline and diet food doesn't taste good. I was pretty good at all or nothing. So either I ate whatever I liked & wanted or I ate almost nothing at all. I remember once in 8th grade I decided I was going to lose weight. I allowed myself water, one glass of orange juice per day and one half peanut butter and jelly sandwich per day. I would do a lot of situps and that was the only exercise I was willing to do. I got to a size 5 in jeans. I was ecstatic. Then one day my mom made a family dinner and after about 5 bites I just could.not.eat.anymore. I was stuffed. I had been starving myself for so long that my stomach had shrunk and could barely hold any food anymore. She was very upfront with me that either I needed to start eating right or I would have to get hospitalized so I could learn how to eat again. That really scared me- so I started eating more and more- and the buffer of knowing how or when to stop was never learned.
Over the years I would try to keep my weight in check. I would be sort of careful about what I ate. When I was 19 I met my future husband, Dan. When I would talk about not eating something because it was fattening or something he would scoff at that idea- he said- "eh- eat what you want- just earn it with exercise". I wish at that point I would have said- I hate to exercise I would rather eat less. But I didn't- so I ate what I wanted ... and never exercised. I think when we met I was about a size 12, when we got married a couple years later I was a size 16. Dan has a natural affinity for exercise and a high metabolism as a result- his method works for him.
When I went to nursing school the girls in the dorm would encourage me to take the stairs (we only lived on the 3rd floor!), but I would almost always take the elevator. The girls would use a room in the dorm and do cardio videos together- I only went maybe twice. I hated to exercise. Even in high school I found ways to get out of gym class- I took gymnastics and weight training instead of physical fitness classes. I always struggled with exercise partly because I hated pain & sweat, but also because I have had asthma since I was a young child and it would hurt to run- I tasted blood. I know it sounds odd, but that's the only way to describe it.
We were married in April 1995, I was 179 pounds the day we married. I had lost a few pounds before the wedding. I had always had reproductive issues so we did not want to wait to have children. We conceived almost immediately, but that baby was lost due to an ectopic pregnancy.(May 1995) As a response to sadness, I medicated myself with food. When I got pregnant with my first daughter, Anne I was 190 pounds. I am only 5'1"- so that is about 60 pounds overweight at that point.
During Anne's pregnancy I barely gained any weight. I didn't know then that as a heavy girl I didn't need to gain much weight. I think at my top weight pregnant with her I hit 215. After Anne was born I decided to breastfeed. I had heard a lot about how breastfeeding was great and how it helped you lose weight. Um, not me. I was able to nurse my baby, I am grateful for that, but I do not lose weight while breastfeeding.
I wanted a large family, so when Anne was a year, we conceived, Beth. I was again about 190. Again, I did not gain very much weight while pregnant with her. How that is possible- I have no idea how that happened. I developed a very bad habit- a coke habit. Every night, after everyone would go to bed, I would stay up late and eat ice cream and drink soda. Beth was born and weighed 9lbs.3 oz. No surprise! She was a colicky baby and I never considered that possibly what I was eating/drinking(namely soda) could be contributing to her excessive fussiness. I continued to medicate my sorrows & frustrations with food. Dan had always been kind of nudging me to exercise. I fought back so hard for so long. However, in 1998 we bought me a recumbant bike. I would ride the bike and watch TV. I would say I did it on average maybe 2-3 times per week. Never very vigorous- I don't ever remember being drenched in sweat or desperately needing a shower after exercise on the bike.
A year later we conceived again. Beth had not been an easy baby, and I really didn't want another baby at this point. I was scared to relive that baby year over again. I finally embraced the idea by the time I was about 10 weeks pregnant. At 12 weeks I suffered a horrible, brutal miscarriage. We named that baby Mary. Our thought on her name was that we accepted God's will even though we didn't want to, didn't know what all would be involved with that. We decided to wait to conceive again. However we hadn't really paid good attention in our NFP classes on how to avoid pregnancy, so we conceived Gus :)
Gus' pregnancy went much like the older girls. I didn't gain much weight, and again I would start out at about 190/195 pounds. I would continue to very rarely use the bike and I ate pretty much whatever I wanted. When I was pregnant with him I did try to focus more on nutrition. I ate a lot of home made wheat bread and Smucker's natural peanut butter. Oh how I loved peanut butter. That year Reese also released a fabulous new candy- Reese sticks- ahhhhh!! It was like a Kit Kat- except they had peanut butter in the middle. Gus was a dream baby. He was born at 37 weeks and he was 7 lbs. 15oz. a nice, healthy size- not huge, like Beth.
When Gus was almost a year old I conceived Margaret. I again started my pregnancy at about 195 pounds and continued to focus on trying to make more healthy foods for my family. At about this time I switched from regular soda to diet soda. I used to laugh at the people who would order a Value Meal and then order a diet coke at the end- what was the point of that? Well, I saw the point- those hundreds of calories sure added up- in pounds!
All of my children had been C-sections. My recovery with Meg's was complicated because my incision had a clot and opened while I was still in the hospital. It was a blessing in disguise though, because Meg was in the NICU with some breathing issues. She was born at 36 weeks, 5 days, but her lungs just weren't ready. She was just a little peanut baby- 6lbs. 13 oz. She was born October 2001. I decided this IS IT. I have to get healthy. I have all of these children and this awesome husband to live for and this is NO WAY TO LIVE.
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