Welcome to the first featured post in August’s Healthy Living Tuesdays series,“Healthy Living Freed Me From…”
Here’s how you can play along: Write a post on your own blog under this theme before the last day of the month, and when the last Tuesday of August rolls around, we’ll host a link up. Just another great way we want to help promote your greatest content!
Between now & then, we’ll be showing off some of our members own posts on the subject manner – so, be sure to come back and visit each week to get a taste of how others are tackling the topic themselves. It’s a great way to find new bloggers to read and get to know your fellow HLB Members. [If you’re interested in writing for future Healthy Living Tuesday featured posts, drop us an email at healthylivingblogs@gmail.com.
Healthy Living Freed Me From Death – Skinny Emmie
Wow, that blog post title sounds melodramatic! In reality though, it is a true statement that isn’t magnified in any way.
As a 455 pound twenty-something, the life you live is really not much of a life at all. Imagine trying to haul hundreds of excess weight up from a seated position. Or up the stairs. Or into a restaurant and trying to find a place to sit that is large enough for you. The amount of weight that I was hovering at is not something that a body should have to manage. Instead of living my life, I opted out of it, choosing to spend all my time alone with food and television in the comfort of my home. The thought of trying to make a change to start living my life before I died from my obesity just made me want to crawl in a hole and wait for the grim reaper. Thankfully, my mind performed a shift and decided to choose life. Thus began the fitness journey.
From sitting to standing.
From standing to walking.
From walking to walking a little longer, or a little faster.
From walking to a gym with workout equipment.
From workout equipment to some jogging.
To the first 5K.
To the second 5K.
To the first half-marathon at 350 pounds.
With each positive change in my body, a positive change in my mind followed. The more I filled up on fitness, self-worth was discovered. I’d been freed from these feelings of inadequacy that lingered over me since I was a child. Somehow the progress I made through years of slow nutritional changes and the addition of exercise into my routine gave me enough confidence to feel healthy enough and worthy enough to do a half-marathon, even if I was at 350 pounds.
Now, still hovering at that 350 pound mark, I’m living. I can run up the stairs without being winded. I can go to the doctors offices without fear of the blood pressure cuff, and can laugh when they have a look of shock when they tell me my blood pressure is perfect. I don’t hesitate to go do fun things with friends, or to put myself in new situations. I still may look large to others, but I know the progress that I’ve made, the strength that I have, and the ability to live now like never before.
No matter how pretty new, smaller clothes are, or how many compliments I get, the biggest reward is the life that I’m living, as opposed to the death I was facing.
Love this new segment! As always, Emmie writes from a place that really inspires me. She’so right – what is the opposite of truly living? DEATH. A lot of us shy away from the hard, cold facts. Truth is, had it not been for her incredible change of attitude and determination, death would (probably) have come a lot sooner.
Cheering you on, Emmie! You’re a great example of HLB community!
Thank you so much, Emily!
I totally related to this post! I am also very overweight and I need motivation to get moving! I feel like many things I read about weight loss are about people who need to lose like 20-30 pounds, not hundreds. You are so inpirational!!
Thank you, Akra!
Hi Emmie! Wow I was looking for a inspiring weight loss blog to follow and came across yours and I must say CONGRAT! You’ve done exactly that. I do have a question for you tough I love to work out and I want to start running but I get so insecure because I know I don’t last long at all I may now but I don’t know how do you do it?
Hi Heather – thanks so much!
As far as getting started running, you have to remember that you must walk before you can run! I don’t know how much walking you do now, but that’s where I’d say to start. Walk 1 mile, then 2, then 3. I “wog” (walk/jog” much more than “run” because frankly I’m just not a good runner! But to start, I would jog short intervals until I got tired, and then would walk until I was recovered. Then I would jog again, then walk. Many people like the Couch to 5K plan which combines walking and running intervals, and it’s great if you like structure behind your training program. Wishing you the best!
You’re inspiration Emmie. There are days that I don’t want to or feel like I can’t and I read your blog or think of you…if Emmie can, so can I! You encourage me to keep going and keep moving.
Thank you so much Amy, that makes me feel great! We’re all in it together.