I just gained 162 lbs!!!

While not related to my weight loss, today is still a very exciting day for me. My boyfriend Jay proposed last night!!! I can honestly say that I have never been happier in my life. Many of my friends will tell you that recently I had been having suspicions due to Jay's "sneaky" behavior. When his grandpa (retired jeweler) would call, Jay would sprint into another room or even into his car in the garage to talk to him. I would say that I saw a proposal on the horizon, but not last night and definitely not in the manner in which it happened! :)

You must keep in mind that many of my friends had fairy tale proposals in far off destinations or were taken on a treasure hunt in NYC, so my expectations were probably higher than most. Well....haha! This is what went down. I had been napping for the past couple of hours because ConAgra had 1:00 dismissal from work on Fridays in December, so needless to say my makeup left something to be desired. I was making my famous microwaved potato chips when Jay got a call from his grandpa. As before, he makes b-line for our bedroom and I just roll my eyes thinking that he really isn't very sneaky. There is a ring and the doorbell and Jay comes flying down the stairs again. We had decided not to buy each other Christmas gifts this year, so when a package arrived and he said it might be for me I told him he better tell me if it was because then I needed to get him something. He went upstairs (again) as I anxiously awaited my snack in true fatty fashion. Once again, Jay comes down the stairs and goes into the dining room where we have our Christmas tree. He tells me that there is something for me under the tree. I walk into the room that is dark, other than the lights from the tree and see a ring box. Jay gets down on one knee and holds the ring up and asks me if I will marry him. I of course say yes, and he hands me the ring and I put it on my finger myself (sorry I thought that was kind of funny). He is SHAKING uncontrollably and says this, "Sorry it's not that romantic, but I was so nervous and didn't want to lose the ring!" Priceless!

We decide to go downtown to celebrate by walking through all of the Christmas lights at the Gene Lehey Mall.



I honestly thought that my proposal story needed to be perfect, and you know what I realized...it is! Nothing over the top, just very honest and real. Now begins the insanity that will be the next 10 months of my life!!!!

With the good, there always comes some bad

I am entering my 6th week of the HMR program with a heavy heart. If you reference my previous post and how I "rocked it," I will tell you that the scale did not agree! If fact, it stared me right in the face and said, "F*ck You Teri!" Well not literally, but when I weighed in at my meeting I had only lost .5 lbs....yes there is a (.) in front of that 5!!! WTF right?!? I have had shits that weight more than that! Long story short, I had a mini-mental breakdown and cried like a baby for about an hour. Now I'm fine, but have come to the realization that losing weight isn't easy and it definitely doesn't equate to immediately being able to run out and by the tightest pair of spandex shorts available. There are steps we must go through, and also steps that our bodies must go through that aren't always pretty. Below are some of the anomalies that I have discovered so far.

While I have always had the "excess baggage" around my mid-section, thighs, arms, neck...pretty much every single part of my body, and the cellulite was present, I had always prided myself in knowing that I had seen skinny girls who had it a lot worse than me. It was always a complete mystery to me how a 120 lb chick could have an ass that looked like it had been through a torrential hail storm. I'm not going to lie, it was a mystery that I loved! Well it is now apparent that karma has come to bite me in the dimply ass for secretly laughing at all those skinny bitches! All this time I had never understood the fat vs. cellulite hierarchy. I thought that because I was fat with less cellulite, I didn't have a cellulite problem. Little did I know that the fat is higher on the "visibility chain" than the cellulite, meaning the cellulite has always been there but because fat trumps cellulite, I just couldn't see all of it. It was hiding, like Osama Bin Laden in my own personal fat cave!!! As the fat has begun to come off, I now have my own cottage cheese farm right on my thighs....too fucking bad I can't eat cheese! And my next question....if fat trumps cellulite, is there something that cellulite trumps? Is there some sort of mystery fat below my layers of dented tissue? Let's hope not.

Skin, ahhh skin. It is the largest organ in the human body and we treat it like absolute crap! All of my close friends can attest to the fact that I am psycho when it comes to creams. I have done it all, and still do. Eye cream, face cream, neck cream, leg cream etc., etc., etc. I even got the nickname "Ass Cream" from my previous Avon lady because she made a fortune on all the money I spent on cream that was supposed to lift and smooth the skin on my ass. Please reference the previous paragraph....it didn't work! After years and years of weight fluctuation I am pretty sure that my skin has thrown up the white flag. I have always carried a lot of weight in the middle and now that some of it is coming off I guess I just expected to have a mid section like Jillian Michaels from the Biggest Loser. Well, ladies and gentleman, it appears that I will never be rockin' the sports bra and spandex pants in public. I know, I'm sorry! If you have never seen the movie "Click" please go and rent it and wait for the part where Adam Sandler starts playing with the excess skin on his stomach. For those of you who have seen this movie...you know what I am talking about, but please still be friends with me! Mine isn't that bad, but it doesn't look like it will be snapping back into pre-fatass shape.

My last beef with losing weight.....WHERE THE HELL DID MY TITS GO?!?! Is that not the one thing that fat chicks can hold over most skinny chicks' heads? Not literally, because that would just be weird, but figuratively. That's probably the only reason I got any action in college was because of my vivacious rack. During my monthly self exam (don't make fun of me, you all should do it), I had always considered myself to have an overflowing handful. The last time I checked, this time it was just for fun, my cup did not runith over! I don't want to be picky here, but I guess when I told myself I needed to lose weight, I didn't mean in my bra!!! Everyone viewing this page KNOWS I cannot afford to replace my shrine to Victoria's Secret...it would bankrupt me!

I will end this post on a positive note by saying that I am thankful for every ounce I have dropped, but I wanted to share the little quirks that I have found puzzling as I am going through this.

4 Weeks Down!

I am officially 1/3 of my way though my first 12 week HMR program and I am down 22 lbs!!! I honestly can't believe it! I don't think I have EVER lost 22 lbs on ANY program in my life....actually I am sure of it. Last week's weigh-in was followed by a trip home for Thanksgiving....pause for dramatic effect. This is the most dreaded of all holidays for anyone who is on a diet, let alone a diet where you pretty much can't look at anything on the typical Thanksgiving day dinner table. I developed a case of the hiccups on the way home that didn't go away until Saturday. I have no doubt that these were driven by the anxiety I was feeling towards the 4 day weekend that normally would have included mass amounts of food, alcohol, and "fat pants" that told me that it was okay to eat my weight in Stove Top stuffing.

So how did I do? I ROCKED IT!!! With the exception of not getting a workout in every day, I stayed "in the box" and hope to lose more weight this week. I had an HMR entree with a side of potatoes and corn (both are allowed). My dessert was a shake, made into a pudding, with pistacio pudding mix and crushed pineapple (also allowed). Try not to be jealous!!! JK

Suprisingly, the hardest part was not the formal dinner. My sister came home with chicken wings on Saturday night....I almost punched her. For some reason this has been the one food item that I have been craving since I started. Luckily they were BBQ flavored or I told her I would have probably licked the sauce off her fingers for her. Sorry, that was a little graphic! I still believe this was her way of distracting me so that she would beat me at Trivial Pursuit....damn you Tina!!! Then, on the 8 hour drive home, Jay decides to get a personal pizza from the gas station we stopped at. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? Not only am I having to watch Jay eat my favorite food, I AM STUCK IN A CAR WITH IT!!! I cannot walk away. I cannot ignore it. The scent is wafting around the car and there is absolutely no way for me to avoid it. I told him I would never sleep with him again and ate my $4 gas station pineapple chunks...GO ME!

P.S. I am still acclimating myself to blogging, so I haven't added any pictures yet. I will try to update my previous blogs with some pics soon!

Where I've Been....

How does the old saying go.....You didn't put the weight on overnight, so you can't expect it to come off overnight? F*ck that! I have found that the truth hurts sometimes.

Like many others out there, I have struggled with my weight my entire life. I was a chunky kid until about 6th grade when I discovered that not eating was an effective, albeit unhealthy, way to get skinny so that boys would notice me. So middle school was full of sports, boys, and size 6 jeans....then came high school. I had a car, which meant no more walking. I had a boyfriend who could eat everything and not gain an ounce. This equated to meals at McDonalds, Dairy Queen, and Pizza Hut. I discovered alcohol, thus the rapid, yet insanely entertaining, demise of my waistline!!!

College...oh college! I can't lie, my college days were some of the BEST times of my life! I have always been slightly competitive by nature, so when I heard about the freshman 15, I took that challenge on full force! Coupled with mass amounts of Bacardi and all-you-can-eat pre-paid meals at the Garvey Cafeteria (The Garv), I put on weight like a bear fattening up for hibernation. Don't get me wrong, I have always been a savy dieter (HILARIOUS), so my senior year was filled with Atkins-friendly meals such as "beef concoction." In plain English, ground beef with ranch dressing, salsa, and cheese....seriously? And there was nothing better than the McDonalds breakfast the morning after a good night of debauchery!!! The cholesterol-filled examples go on and on.

Upon graduation I moved to the corn-fed state of Nebraska to await the arrival of my deployed then-boyfriend Curt. Money was tight living alone for 4 months, so I did lose some weight. Not by choice but for sheer lack of resources. The year following Curt's return from Krgystan was filled with endless parties, mid-week keggers, 3-day benders and a few nights that even Penthouse may find amusing. And while we always had fun at all of the parties, there was nothing substantial in our relationship and it eventually ended.

I was now a broke, fat, lonely borderline alcoholic! Surprisingly, this is where things started to look up. I had been offered a new position at ConAgra Foods as a Sales Analyst and I discovered a weight loss product called Alli. I put my increased funds towards these little blue capsules that, according to the back of the bottle, would "eliminate" 1/4 of the fat that that I ate. MAGIC!! I soon found out that there was nothing magic about taking an Alli and eating enough Taco Bell to feed a small family. I had experienced my first "treatment effect." The website describes this as "spotting, loose stools and more frequent stools that may be hard to control." I won't be graphic, but this is the Disney version of my treatment effect. Needless to say I quit yet another program and gained every pound I had lost back and more. (no picture necessary!)

Side note: During the few months I was on Alli I rekindled a friendship with a former middle school boyfriend/enemy/boyfriend of a friend, Jay Rislov. He and a few other friends made the excursion to Omaha for Labor Day in 2007. Something had changed for me since our awkward make-out sessions in 8th grade. I was hooked! The dilemma; Jay now lived in Phoenix. I needed to take action. I had an upcoming business trip in California that I conveniently routed my return layover in AZ. In typical Teri-fashion I got drunk and told Mr. Rislov that I wanted to be more than friends to which he responded, "I like you, but I can't do the whole long distance thing." While the visit was a blast, I went home crushed. I had never felt so bad about a rejection in my entire life. I got a call from Jay a few days later. In a very nervous shaky voice he told me that I was right, (LOVE THAT!) and that we needed to try to make things work....what???? I seriously made him repeat himself because I was in a total euphoric shock. Three months later he was packing his bags and moving to Omaha!!! We are insanely happy and I believe that I was given a second chance at true love.

Okay, enough mush! Jay is in Omaha, but I am still fat. I am a serial dieter and have tried EVERYTHING!!! After a recent trip to Las Vegas, I came to the realization that while my life is good and I am happy, I needed to take care of the baggage that was holding my body hostage. I stumbled upon a weight loss program though Alegent Health call HRM and decided to attend an informational session on Monday October 26th, and began the program on the 29th. Twenty-seven years of struggling with my own body lead me to this day, and it's a good day!

Welcome!

Welcome! Those of you viewing this page have had the red velvet rope lifted and given an all-access pass to my insane weight loss ride. I understand that all of you are not dillusional to the fact that I am fat. In fact, I probably joke about it every day of my life! The simple fact is, that it isn't funny anymore. Okay, that was a bit too dramatic! I recently joined the HMR weight loss program through Alegent Health in Omaha, and I am starting this blog as a self-motivator and a way to hold myself accountable. So, if you don't see any updates in 6 months you can pretty much assume that I have given up, and I am burried in a diminishing pile of buffalo wings and Doritos! Wish me luck!!!!