Better than Jagger

I never intended for this to become a weight loss blog (especially since I'm sitting here eating potato chips as I write this), but there was some interest expressed in my previous post The F Word in the comments about how I lost the weight.  I never joined Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig or anything like that.

My weight loss began in the fall around my 40th birthday when about that time my company demanded we work mandatory overtime.  It was pretty easy not to eat after working 14 hour days, day after day, quite often I would come home and fall into bed.  Pretty soon I noticed my clothes were much looser and I tentatively approached the bathroom scale.  I had lost 8lbs expending little or no effort.  Of course I realized this wasn't the healthiest way of losing weight and resolved to go about this differently.

I changed my eating habits, not necessarily what I was eating, but the amount.  I did eliminate certain foods...bubye french fries, nacho cheese Doritos, Snickers.  I tried to increase my exercise but we were still working a pretty heavy schedule.  However, by Christmas that year I had lost 22lbs. and had dropped a pants size.

Then for Christmas my Mom bought me an MP3 player to replace my broken one.  Nothing special...not an Ipod...just a generic brand but how that little bitty machine would change my life!  I immediately began downloading music from my pretty impressive (I think) catalog stored on my computer.  I had missed not having music as the background of my day and I again began listening to music every night.  As sometimes happens when the mood strikes this will lead to the occasional Tom Cruise in Risky Business fit of dancing.  Now i've never been particularly gifted athletically, however,  one thing I can do since the age of 4  (thank you Ms. T!) is dance.

As we were enjoying a particularly mild winter, every night I would dance on my back porch much to the chagrin of the nocturnal woodland creatures living behind my house.  I was shaking my booty to old school 80's, Motown, modern dance,  even country.  And yes my moves were better than Jagger's, the proof being the nearly 40lb loss.  By then people at work were noticing and commenting.  That just encouraged me more.

Of course with any type of weight loss, you reach plateaus.  With the advent of Spring, I was was on one and fighting my way off.  I was determined to break the 200 lb barrier.  I began walking every night, of course listening to my music.  I eventually would do 3 miles almost every night.  I slammed through that barrier watching my legs and ass getting firmer and more toned.  I lost some more sizes and miracle of miracles could now shop in the "normal" women's clothes department.

Hitting another plateau, I changed tactics and began going to the free water aerobics classes offered in our county.  Ordinarily water aerobics is considered pretty geriatric, unless taught by a former Marine Corps drill instructor-HOORAH!  (And on one very memorable occasion by a 26 yr old blond hair, blue eyed hottie with washboard abs!)   In the meantime I was still walking and dancing too.

All this meant that I had lost 80 lbs by August.  I really wanted the century mark but was pretty happy with where I was.  I imagine not very many 40 year olds could say they were smaller now than they were in high school.  I had went from a size 22-women's to a size 10 in less than a year!  I'd never felt so confident, happy! and "ready-to-take-on-the-world!"

I HAVE NEVER BEEN MORE PROUD OF MYSELF!

And, oh yes, people were noticing.  :-)