Start With It All


In 2007, I accomplished something most people never do.  I lost 115 pounds the old-fashioned way. No gimmicks, no fad diets.  I got in the "drivers seat" with my brain, I moved my body, fueled it as best I could.  Over time, I learned to appreciate my body at every size and shape, and to find gratitude the simplest of moments.  I learned the value of rest for both mind and body.  I truly found my "sweet spot" for optimal health, and I called it my Moxie.  I stayed in that "place" for almost 10 years and worked as a NASM Certified Personal Trainer for about 5 years as a way of not only paying it forward to help others but to keep my life active.  I promised myself I would never "go back. Looking back, it was because I was afraid.  Afraid  I wouldn't have the strength or the Moxie to do it again.
Turns out it was just a dress rehearsal.

Fast forward to 2019 and I am still digging through the ashes of a few disastrous years to find my Moxie again.  In 2013, I found and married my soul mate.  The next year we lost 2 babies.  Two.
One to miscarriage - the day before we were scheduled to see its little beating heart, and the second was our 8 day old daughter who was beautifully and wonderfully made with one extra 18th chromosome.  We never got to bring her home.  I buried my baby girl in a tiny white daisy-clad casket, and my life crashed as a piece of my heart died with her.  My health tanked, and I lost all motivation and ambition for things I was once so passionate about.  Grief is real.  It's heavy.  It's unexpected.  But it is mandatory. I struggled over the following years with more miscarriages, and the label of "Unexplained Secondary Infertility" that left me even more empty than when I started.  I knew weight gain was a possibility with all the medications and procedures I would undergo for our last chance at parenthood.  I told myself it would be a worthy sacrifice - but nothing came from it except empty arms and extra weight that my body so proficiently loves to store.

Here I am today - above a weight I feel healthy at.
Please understand me - I am happy in my skin.  I am so grateful for this body and honor what it has been put through the last few years.  I have healthy loving relationships whose love and care have no conditions or rules.  But, I am tired and I hurt.  Not the good "worked out hard so I ache now" hurt, but the weariness from carrying around this Kummerspeck. The "grief bacon" of repeated loss, broken dreams, shattered optimism, and faded confidence.  There has been continued heartbreak, and sometimes I wonder what lessons I am supposed to learn from the tears that hide behind the "I got this" smile and the aching to feel complete.

I admit...I have tried fads. I have tried shakes and supplements, and all the quick fixes I could google to restore me to a pre-grief mind and body.  None of it has worked.  None of it will because I can never be fully restored to what I once was.  I am changed to the core - and I must remember my experiences, and use what I KNOW works best for me.  Starting is hard - but it needs to be done.  I can't wait until conditions are perfect - I need to start IN imperfect conditions.

Having so much stripped from me, I have learned that getting my Moxie back isn't as simple as the fuel I put in my body or the amount of time I spend exercising.  It is about healing my mind and my body.  This blog is to chronicle a new kind of transformation...a place to remember that to eat, to move in a way that makes me happy, to rest my body and mind when needed and love in all the ways possible is the best way to not only honor my body and this life I get to live, but to also honor the memory of my sweet angel daughter.   2020 is about about being NOURISHED.

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