Have you ever looked in the mirror and been unhappy with what you saw? I have.

In the not so distant past, I avoided mirrors, pictures, and anything else that made me remember that I had gained weight. When I was in high school I weighed all of 115 pounds and maintaining that weight was effortless. I never thought about what my weight was. I was active, I ate what I wanted when I wanted, and it was high school. Now, I know there are many of you out there that did not have this same experience.  And before you start hating me too much, I must tell you one reason I think I did not focus on my weight was that I was (and still am) very focused on my skin, I have the oiliest skin imaginable, but that is for another day.

After gaining 50 pounds with my first child, I lost most of the weight and again did not focus on it too much. Yeah, I did the fad diets. I tried the Mayo clinic diet but, couldn’t finish it due to an aversion to cottage cheese. Then Atkins began, and I almost put myself in a diabetic coma, drastic carb cutting is not for everyone. But overall, I was not overweight at this point in my life.

Then came nursing school, during those 2 years and the beginning of my career I let myself pack on the pounds. Intermittently over the last 12 years, I tried and failed to maintain a healthy weight. I married my husband in 2010. I hated the way I looked, and our engagement and wedding happened rather quickly. I remember dieting and purchasing an elliptical machine as well as exercise DVDs thinking I would get my act together. But, it never happened.

Before long I was pregnant with my second son and had a rough pregnancy filled with bed rest and eating difficulties. After he was born, I started working towards that goal weight again. It was only 6 months after his birth when we became pregnant with our little girl. It too was a difficult pregnancy, and we lost her at 21 weeks.

That was the most challenging time in my life. In the year after her loss, I found yoga as a way of coping with the grief. It was so beneficial to me, and I thought I could use it as a tool for weight loss too.  I became stronger, but I never made any real gains. By the time I was ready to re-enter the workforce I was at my heaviest weight ever, 245 pounds.

During the first year at my new job, I lost 30 pounds just from work itself which was very encouraging to me. I then began having terrible trouble with acid reflux and lost another 20 pounds rather quickly due to not being able to eat. I had awful nausea, and nothing helped. After many tests, we discovered I had an allergy to red meat and pork. After making changes to my diet, I began feeling better, and the weight started coming back.

During this ordeal, I found myself depressed again. Not wanting to be on depression medication I joined the gym. This lifted my mood, and I also began losing weight. This was so exciting to me! I felt better, and I saw changes in my body I never dreamed possible. It was then that a coworker shared with me her eating plan. Clean eating with portion control. It was super easy and made so much sense. Later I began doing at home workouts and saw even more results.

Now I would love to tell you that is the end of it and I’m at my goal weight and never looked back. But that is just not how life goes. What I will tell you is that the coworker is now my best friend and accountability partner. We motivate and inspire each other, share struggles and recipes, and help each other DAILY on this journey. Health, fitness, and weight loss go hand in hand, and they are a journey. There is no magic number on the scale or one thing that makes you a success in this area. It’s about balance. You can’t expect to eat perfectly every day or always want to do your workout. Success is putting in the effort every day to be better for yourself and your family.

I challenge each of you to do something good for your body this week. Cut back on cokes or sweet tea, skip your daily fancy coffee, opt for grilled instead of fried, go for a walk, anything! Challenge yourself to do one this every day for the next week and see how you feel. Your wallet may thank you too!