How did I get here? Sitting on the couch eating bon-bons?

I used to be a healthy person. I spent my younger days as a slim, healthy, athletic & active girl. I was vibrant. I lifted weights & at one time considered entering body building competitions because I was so muscular. I ran several miles almost everyday. I am half ways embarrassed to say I was a cheerleader. I was a volleyball player (my specialty was my ACE serving arm).

In my teens I started to show signs of what I know now to be PCOS. Didn't get my period when my friends did... got it like once a year... had to practically wear diapers when I did get it. Had other strange things. Had my thyroid tested more times than I can count. You know, I was actually told that I was lucky that I didn't get my period by a couple doctors? That it was something I just didn't need to worry about like other girls? TODAY I KNOW that my risk for uterine cancer was HIGHLY increased because I didn't get a period at least 4-6 times per year.

Another big one was "You're active, athletic... It's normal for girls like you to not get your period." Again... should athletes be at higher risk for cancer because they're athletes?? NO!

By the time I was 17 I began to gain a little weight. Not much... but, I was concerned as any girl that age would be, because I wasn't doing anything to cause it. By the time I was 18 I was starting to puke up my food in an attempt to manage my weight. It didn't work. By this time I was beginning to get cellulite on my thighs... I had never experienced that before. I ran a lot. I lifted weights a lot. I focused on my thighs with weight training. Nothing worked...

Somewhere in there my own mother started to harp on me about how I was gaining weight. I wasn't her beautiful slim beauty queen anymore. Did I tell you I was even a pageant girl once? HA! So funny now. My mother, like everyone else, didn't understand that I couldn't stop what was happening to me. I wasn't overeating. I WAS active. I was beyond active!

I was really into music, a musician, a singer, in bands, I got really self conscious, stage shy, didn't want to be a fat person making a fool of myself ya know. So my performing slowed down. I had won lots of awards, contests, money... scholarships for college, a pageant, John Phillip Sousa Award for outstanding musicians, Talent awards.... But, my private hell (with what was PCOS) was killing me and I slowed down in doing everything I loved.

In college I felt awful when Juries rolled around every semester and I had to perform for all the Music professors and staff. Not because I didn't have the talent but because I felt so.... Messed up. Like I was locked inside this body that wasn't even me. It was gaining weight and things were happening... Like moods, and depression, and hair on my chin... My self esteem was just getting shot down to nothing. Being a performer was really not terribly fun.

When I got married at age 21 I had stopped most of my physical activities & had to wear a size 12 wedding dress. I remember standing in the bridal shop, in horror that the size 10 didn't fit. Size 12 was double the size I had been a few years before. I was marrying the love of my life... the man of my dreams... but somehow a tiny bit of the joy was stolen that day because I felt like he wasn't getting all he bargained for in me. And, I felt like on your wedding day you're supposed to feel like a princess and I didn't. I guess there is a real lesson to be learned from Fionna Shrek, huh? If only they had made that movie sooner...

By age 22 when I finally was diagnosed correctly with PCOS I was a size 16. And today, at age 31, I won't even tell you... I can't even say it. All I can say is it isn't even about size now. (Even though my mom still harps on me... Reminding me about how she sees this person or that person from my college days or high school days and they "don't even recognize me now" because I have gained so much weight. Gotta love her. She doesn't know she is ripping me apart inside). Though weight has so much to do with feeling "womanly" and "feminine" and beautiful.... What I want more than anything else is to become healthy and know that I am going to be around when my kids are growing up and that I am not going to Kiel over from a heart attack and leave my husband alone to raise 5 little ones on his own.

Getting Healthy.... THAT is my goal.