Tasha's Journey To Fit Chick

I was slim as a teen but heavy throughout my 20’s and early 30’s due to very poor eating habits since childhood. I never.ever.exercised in my entire life with the exception of the moderate outdoor play that was forced upon me when I was a kid. I recall spending almost all of my time as a tween and teenager in the house watching television and basically avoiding the great outdoors. I didn’t like to walk anywhere and I definitely didn’t enjoy any sort of physical activity. As a teen and adult I ate very little fruit and vegetables and my daily diet consisted of pre-packaged foods, take-out, Pepsi and endless coffees with cream and sugar – there were always numerous day stretches where I didn’t even drink a single glass of water. I never ate breakfast and always ate very late into the evening, sometimes even waking in the middle of the night to snack. I ate chocolate, bread, pasta, rice and potatoes with no moderation whatsoever and very rarely thought about what I ate as a consequence. I overate when I was bored, stressed, sad and ESPECIALLY when I was tired which was obviously all the time given the lifestyle I was leading.

My weight went up and down over the years but pretty well always ended up higher than the year before. It’s funny but throughout all that I never hated my body or my looks. I knew I was overweight but I didn’t truly appreciate HOW overweight I had become. I made one or two attempts in my 20’s and 30’s to exercise or diet but always felt like a very deprived fish out of water and therefore always quit after a few months in order to revert to my comfortable old habits.

Fast-forward to 2011 - I’m a 35 year old wife of 13 years and mother to two young children ages 6 and 9, with a full-time career running operations for a national program, a four bedroom house and a live-in elderly parent. I was fully cognisant of how unhealthy I was but really felt powerless to do anything about it. The year itself was very challenging. My elderly mother-in-law, who suffers from cognitive impairment, moved in to our home and at the same time my husband and I were tearfully forced to say goodbye to his brother who diet a year after being diagnosed with Stage 3 stomach cancer. It was a very stressful and sad summer for our family.

Throughout the same year, my best friend had begun an important journey of her own and had been steadily losing weight for numerous months. Inspired by her undeniably awesome results and the fact that I had lost two friends and family member to cancer in the past two years, on October 15, 2011, I made an important decision to join a medically supervised (and incredibly expensive) weight-loss program here in Canada - a ketogenic diet. At that time I weighed 223 pounds, the highest I had weighed since having my two children, the first in 2002 and the second in 2006. I wore size 16 – 18.
After five months (March 2012) I had lost 60 pounds on this plan. Although I felt so proud to go from a size 16 to a size 10, at the same time I realized that I also felt incredibly unhealthy. The diet was a very NON sustainable 950 calories a day with no fat, sugar or carbohydrates. I was pale and gaunt – I felt jittery, exhausted and absolutely gross. After speaking to my husband, I decided that it was time for me to stop the medically supervised program several months earlier than planned.

I explained my husband that I felt highly confident that I could maintain my newly lost weight because I had just finished reading two amazing books that empowered me to begin making healthy lifestyle choices – “The Eat-Clean Diet” and “The Eat-Clean Diet for Family and Kids” by Tosca Reno. My husband immediately agreed that, despite the money we had paid, I should discontinue the program if I felt even the least bit unhealthy.
In terms of how I first heard about the Eat-Clean Diet, I had seen Tosca’s name mentioned several times in my favourite Facebook fitness group, Fit Chicks. Many people had mentioned the terminology “Eat-Clean” and recommended Tosca’s books and the magazine, “Oxygen”. Intrigued by what I had read, I bought the books and let me tell you, I have never once looked back.

Immediately I began clearing my pantry of white flour and rice as well as all forms of sugar. I bought succanat, stevia, coconut oil, almond flour, quinoa, steel cut oatmeal, chia seeds, flax and many many other items that have become staples in my happy Eat-Clean life. I bought a cooler and began diligently packing my day’s meals and eating every 2-3 hours. My husband also began eating six small meals a day and focusing on his own nutrition. He has been a rock for me throughout my journey – a supportive, loving and caring man who loves me unconditionally. I am very blessed.

At the same time, I took Tosca’s advice and began seriously reconsidering trading my long cardio sessions for free weights. I hired a trainer and he designed a program for me that focused on upper body one day and lower body the next. It surely didn’t take long for me to overcome my shyness at the gym after I discovered how much I love to lift weights, it feels so powerful and invigorating. I feel like I am a master of my own body when I lift – it is border line impossible to adequately describe the high of taking a weights workout and absolutely killing it! I embrace my DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) like a gift from God. (laugh!!!)

Diligently following the program I immediately lost another 10 pounds by April, 2012. Since then, I have slowly lost a little more weight, month for month trading my fat for muscle and my body has been changing before my very eyes. My arms, shoulders, back and legs are starting to show real definition, my stomach fat is starting to recede, revealing small indentations on the sides of my abs. I am absolutely stoked to see how they will look a year from now! My husband (we are high school sweethearts!) has also begun lifting and we are both constantly discussing our fitness goals and our work-outs. We developed an excellent post-workout shake that we love and lots of Eat-Clean meals that have become our favourites (We have been loving all things pumpkin lately!) The lifestyle makes us so happy and energized and now instead of connecting over unhealthy food we choose to connect through fitness and a Clean Eating lifestyle. Our children now accompany me to our local YMCA four times a week to play sports like soccer, hockey and basketball as well as take swim classes while I sweat it out in the gym. As added motivation, we have also chosen to base their allowance around their physical activity.

Today I weigh a healthy 147 pounds (77 pounds lost), wear a size 6 and my goal is to continue eating clean, focusing my energy on strength training and losing more body fat over the coming year. I have started running and completed my first 5K in late September and already have my sights set on a 10K in April, 2013. Stay tuned, my friends, because this Mama still has lots of goals, including an intention to be featured in Oxygen one day!