10 Ways I lost my 100

So, I never thought that writing a single blog about my weight loss would have such a chain reaction to so many people, in so many places. When I posted my blog I had to do it as a promise to myself, The reaction from others was immediate and was not all what I expected. I was expecting to be criticized and judged for what had happened. That was part of my fear of posting, I was scared that people who had recently met me or who hadn't seen me in a while would look and be disgusted and judge, make fun of, or just be hurtful in other ways.
I was wrong, very wrong. Soon after I posted I got messages of the exact opposite of things I was expecting. I had people telling me how proud they were, asking how I did, complimenting me in so many ways. I was overwhelmed by the responses I got, I never thought first that so many people would care to click that link that I posted, second care to comment, and third be so kind and supportive to me. As I mentioned in my first post It was and is the support of all the people around me that I am able to have these successes in my life.

[On that note, Can I just say that I have the most amazing people in my life. I don't know how I am so blessed  to be surrounded by such supporting family and friends that love and like me. You all know me, I hope you understand this. But bluntly put I always have anxiety that I am not good enough for people, or meeting their level. But getting all the responses and being approached after posting this blog it was a whole different view of what amazing non-judgmental people I have been blessed to have in my life. Seriously I cannot thank you enough.]

The Baugh Family July 2010.

Among the many comments and emails I got, there was something said that I just can't ignore or let pass. A few people have asked how I did it, what I ate, what exercise I did, every nitty gritty detail. I panicked as the emails kept coming because because I never expected that. I kept rationalizing that I may not have to respond because I did that post for me, and I wasn't running a diet blog. 
I realized though that the people emailing me were asking for help. They needed it just as badly as I do. So I have thought about how to put together this post to  give my support and tips to those who want to loose weight. I think I can narrow it down to a list of Top Tenish, I am typing this before I lay it out there so we'll see how it goes. . .

1- Do it for you-
Like I said in my first post, I truly believe the only reason I have succeeded is that I have done this for me. Anytime that I have "fallen of the bandwagon" as my dad calls it, or stayed the same weight after working extra hard I think about where I am and where I need to be. I will never forget the time I spent watching my awesome little nephew and wondering If I would make it to his first birthday or to see his brother be born. It makes me sick to think that that is what it took for me to realize I needed to get healthy so that I wouldn't miss out on their lives, and the healthier I get I realize how much of my own life I was missing out on. There is so much I have missed out on already that it motivates me to get healthier because I don't want to look back anymore and regret loosing chances because of something I could have taken care of.  
 2- Diet
I hate the word diet, I think it needs to be called a life change because in order to keep the weight off you have to do it for your life or, like I did you will gain back what you lost. My sister has a diet blog A daily dose of Dieting, click here  What I Try To Follow. This link outlines the diet that me and the members of my family who have been successful at loosing weight have pretty much followed. My whole family has had weight problems, and every member has tried different diets and this one by far has given the best, long lasting results. No its not a 7 day diet like the blog says, its a lifetime change but don't freak out, I know you can't do only this for the rest of your life.
3- Excercise
The more physically active you are the better you are going to feel. When I first started loosing weight I didn't want to heavily work out in public because I didn't like people to see me. Also it was hard for me to work out because, due to my obesity my body hurt. By 21 I have a horrible back, a replaced ACL and arthritis in my knees, my neck kills me and so on. So I decided my best option was to work out in the house. I started doing workouts from the comcast "on-demand" excercise tab. I loved it because they were 20 minutes, had tons of variety and they made you feel totally burnt. I would do the workout(s) and be dripping in sweat. A lot of them are lead by the biggest looser trainers, and I am confident in them :) I also just stuck in it my mind to move every chance I got. I was working at my old job where I would either sit at the desk or be stocking or running supplies. I started trading all my shifts to try to make sure I wasn't at the desk all night. I also started going on 30-120 minute walks with a friend at least 5 days a week. I realize this is not easy for people with kids or school, I was very blessed to be able to do this, sometimes we wouldn't leave until 11:00 pm but I knew it was important. 
4- Support
When I used to go on diets I hated people knowing I was dieting. I felt people judged me and it was like me saying, "I can't eat normal food because I am ginormous." I have realized that this is completely wrong, The more people know your on a diet the less likely you are to cheat. I didn't shove it down people's throats but if they asked I would tell them. Or if people were going out to eat I would decline and tell them why. You need people around you to know your on a diet and to not be tempting you, for me I was in a very serious situation and needed to be healthy. So my family, friends, co-workers, and anyone around me knew that I was on a diet. They asked questions, when I was a vegetarian they usually taught me more then I told them but it was awesome to have that help.  
5- Confidence
The word says it all. You cannot start expecting to fail. You need to believe in yourself, you need to see big awesome ending from the beginning or the bad days will engulf you and you won't be able to brush it off and keep going. Trust me I have been there I have fallen and not gotten back up, I have fallen and kept fallen, and then I fell and finally stood and decided I wasn't going to let it keep happening. To succeed you need to believe yourself when you say you can do it. 
6- Weigh Every Day
For me this is what works period. I know experts say don't do this, All I can say is when I don't weigh every day I usually gain weight. I don't think it is right to obsess over your weight and starve yourself if your not loosing weight. But I would not have been able to figure out that my genes don't handle white flour if I didn't weigh everyday because that's the only thing that was changed. Or that my diet soda really does make me hold onto weight. If you can go without the scale, then do it. But for my safety I keep it. 
7- Listen to your Body
  Your body tells you if you need water, sugar, salt, protein, fruit, vegetable, exercise, or sleep. You have to listen or you won't be able to succeed. When you ignore and starve your body of the things it is telling you it needs I think that's when you get caught in the funks and you feel sick and warn out. Those are times when I would give up, if I felt like what I was doing was hurting not helping and I hated it why would I continue. So this time I worked hard but there were certainly days where I ate ice cream, or chocolate, or cookies, or cheese and when I finally quit the vegetarian diet, I ate meat and it tasted good! And I didn't feel guilt or that I had failed. I just kept my lifestyle in order and knew that eating the small portion of whatever was just that. It wasn't going off a diet because I wasn't on a diet. It was simply having a treat, or trying something new. You just have to make sure that its not a daily thing, that you don't do it more often then eating healthy, It has to be special occasions, and in small proportions.

8- Give a little-
I think donating time, money, clothes, food, anything will keep you going. If your ever having a bad day helping someone else will make you feel better. If your not loosing weight, loose some old clothes, or loose some time helping someone else. I will honestly tell you that the times I went and gave away my time, money, or material things made me feel so much better then stepping on the scale and getting that number down just a little bit. It will make you continue and believe in yourself to keep going because you will feel like your worth it. For me When I felt little self confidence and like I was worth nothing I was more likely to quit. When your out helping others and being selfless you usually do not feel that way...

9- Meditate
I have never sat cross legged with my hand out and hummed. But I have sat in bed at night and thought a lot about my future and what I am going to do. During this time I always see myself as a healthier me. I do this because that is what I am working towards, it goes along with the confidence. There is a book called Think and Grow rich. The idea of the book is if you go to bed every night saying to yourself  something like " I am Bob Thomas, I am smart, I will be a doctor in 5 years, and I will be rich in 7 years." By doing this you make yourself believe it and give yourself the willpower to do it... I never sat there and said " I am Kenzie I am fat, I will be skinny in 6 weeks by only drinking water" But I would give myself some time at night to reflect on what I had done for myself that day. I don't care how stupid or cheesy it sounds but I needed this time to sit and analyze my diet and excercise for the current day and decide what I would keep or throw out for the next. These times helped me realize that I ate a lot when I was nervous, stressed, bored, or angry. I was then able to catch myself the next time I was about to eat at these times and do something different. Or I would sit and think, was that 500 calorie candy bar really worth it, no it wasn't so the next time I wouldn't eat it. The more I thought, the more I realized that when I was eating I wasn't thinking at all and that was a huge problem.  
10- See it
Do whatever you need to see yourself thin. For me it was finding out how much my sisters weighed, does that make sense at all . . No because they are all a good difference in height from me. I also loved looking at pictures from junior high, yup don't worry thats the last time I was in the weight range. I could see where I was headed and it gave me hope. I still am working on loosing more weight and I still look at my sister and hope to look like her. It drives me crazy to have so much behind me, and so much in front of me at the same time, but I can see that there is an end eventually in sight. You have to be able to see that, or your going to give up.

So thats what I have done, or at least what I have recognized what skills have helped me. I honestly feel so inadequate writing anything down and telling anyone steps to how to loose weight because while doing it I had so many set backs. But looking at it that was the only way I could have succeeded. Everybody does things different and I think it is vital to your success to do what feels right to you.

Thank you again for your reading and support, love you all.
-A Lot Less of Kenzie :)