How My Life Turned Upside Down

My Story
I have struggled with my weight for as long as I can remember. At the age of 46, I weighed 220 pounds on my average 5'7" frame. I looked and felt awful and my self-esteem was at an all-time low because of this and other family issues.

There was a lot of stress in my life. My father-in-law, who lives with us, was struggling with the effects of early Alzheimer's disease, and our younger son was struggling with addiction. Just when I figured things could not get any worse, our older son was killed in an accident in November 2007.

I spent that winter on the couch, wrapped in a blanket with my friends—yes! Both Ben and Jerry. By February 2008 I had topped the scales at 235. I could barely walk up a flight of stairs and my knees and ankles hurt all the time.

One morning in March I looked at myself in the mirror and decided enough was enough. There were obviously many things in life that I could not control, but things I could control were me, my body, my mouth and what I put in it.

So I made some changes. I started with forcing myself to give up Pop-Tarts and eat a healthy breakfast instead. That was a lot harder than it might seem to most people. Pop-Tarts were my comfort food. I literally ached through the first week of healthy breakfasts!

After two weeks, I then gave up regular soda and switched to diet, didn't like it, and finally switched to water and tea. I switched to light soy milk. I noticed at work that most people who ate Lean Cuisine, Weight Watchers and Healthy Choice were all overweight. I stopped buying those and switched to a natural lunch of a rice cake, almond butter, fruit and yogurt.

The pounds then really started coming off. My motivation increased as my clothes got looser, and people started to notice! I started preparing more fish, and learned to like things like edamame and raw vegetables for snacks. I felt better and started yoga and took a horseback-riding class.

I started eating five small meals per day to keep my metabolism up, and so that I did not arrive home at the end of the day starving and ready to eat anything. I didn't eat after 8:00 p.m. By October 2008, I had lost 42 pounds and had plateaued, so I joined a gym and started a fitness program in earnest. I did weight training twice a week and the elliptical machine four times a week.

Last week, I reached 62 pounds of weight loss, and have about 15 more to go. I never starved myself or felt deprived. If, on a given day, I felt like eating, I ate. My company has free ice cream every Friday at 2:00 p.m., and there was not a Friday that I missed my fudgcicle or ice cream sandwich. If we went out for breakfast, I had French toast; if I felt like it, yes—I still huddled up with Ben and Jerry once in awhile, through "planned cheats."

I still work out five days a week, but I truly love the energy I have and the fact that my knees and ankles never hurt. I can run, not just walk, up the flights of stairs at Union Station in Chicago, and I feel more like myself than I have in years. I truly feel like I reclaimed myself in some way.

Editor's note: Do you have a weight-loss success story of your own? If you've lost weight or are in the process of losing weight, email editor.neversaydiet@nbcuni.com with "Weight-Loss Success Story" in the subject line and tell us your story. You may be featured on NeverSayDiet.com!