Defining "Choose Your Hard"

My friend Casey and I have been dieting together since 9/15/09. That was our D-Day. Casey was one of my best friends in high school and we lost touch during college, then came together again in 2003 after we had both graduated. Back then we were still fit, tho not the slender versions of ourselves that we had been when we graduated high school 4 years earlier, we were still pretty darn fit. You could find us on the bar dancing and drinking away until all hours of the night every weekend! It was great to be young and alive with the excitement of being with our friends!

Well, when I moved to Tennessee a few years later, we had a falling out and lost touch again. It was not until Circuit City went down and I was spending some of my unemployment time with Kyle at my family's beach house, that we became reconnected again. Ironically enough, Casey had worked at Circuit as well, but since she was in the financial division she saw the writing on the wall long before the company tanked. Not me tho!!! I remember saying, "I am going to stick with this ship until it hits the bottom of the ocean like the Titanic!" In retrospect, this was probably not the best decision I have ever made. That aside, everything happens for a reason and this brought Casey back into my life because she was offering to help find me a job. Well, though she did not get me a job we spent alot of time discussing how things have changed and how we both got fat!!! (FYI- if you are uncomfortable with the use of the word fat, I suggest you either get over it or delete this blog from your mind all together! I use the word fat because that is exactly what I was! God love those of you that want to say I wasn't, but for me... self acceptance, awareness, and acknowledgment is part of this process.) Admittedly, Casey had better reasons for her body changes than I did, she had twins in the years that we were not talking! HOLY COW!!! But both of us candidly admitted that the spare tire we were carrying around was more a result of Big Macs and beer than anything else. So we decided to take a stand and make a change and in September we both started dieting and reporting our results to each other. Those of you that are friends with my on Facebook know that I have also been "keeping myself honest" there as well, but this is all part of my process. Casey and I had both tried to lose weight on our own, and now we were each others diet buddies. We were going to be brutally honest with each other, call each other out, support each other, and knock some sense into each other when necessary.

I cannot take credit for the blog title as it is something that Casey heard along the way, but it is so completely true that I have adopted it as my life mantra. "Choose Your Hard!!!" In this scenario, consider this- Being fat is hard, losing weight is hard, and maintaining weight loss is hard. Choose your hard. It really is that easy!

If you have ever been fat, you know how hard it is. Many people feel trapped, embarrassed, and uncomfortable in their own skin. I have been here! It is sad to go clothes shopping. It is sad to go to theme parks because it is uncomfortable to fit into the seat. You hate flying because you hate knowing that as you walk down the aisle there are people thinking "please don't sit next to me, I don't want to be squished for this whole flight!" You wonder if this is the time that you will need a belt extender to make the belt fit you. You cannot wear the shoes you want because the weight has started to hurt your joints from the sheer pressure of it all.

As hard as it is to be fat, it is even harder to make the choice to lose the weight. You have to acknowledge the problem and confront it head on. There are lots of people who diet without ever addressing why they have gotten to the point they are at and without being honest with themselves about how big of an issue it really is for them. For me, the hard part was setting a weight loss goal that was almost 100lbs from my current weight. As big as I was, it seems that everyone underestimated what the scale was actually saying about me. It is a blessing and a curse because even tho no one knew how bad it had gotten, I did. I still had to face that scale and deal with all of the emotions that entails.

Maintaining weight loss- This one I am projecting my ideas on, since I have not reached that stage yet. But I know that when you get to the goal there is an instinct to want to celebrate. I mean.... you just reached your GOAL WEIGHT!!! (I have one main goal but I have set several smaller goals along the way) It is so hard to settle down into the rhythm of keeping the weight off. The goal is different, the rewards are less obvious. This what they mean when they say it needs to be a "lifestyle change" (but we will get into that more later on).

CHOOSE YOUR HARD