Sharing our stories--Autumn Weber

Autumn Weber is part of our Get Up and Move challenge. She's lost 34 on the black team--woo hoo! :)

I asked the black team to tell us their top 5 food, physical and mental changes. In the course of her responding to this request, I found out that she has been chronicling her health and weight loss journey on her own blog.

Below are the answers to my questions and links to her blog posts after that, so keep reading!

Top food changes: For my food, I eat healthy 99% of the time. If I don't eat this way I don't lose weight. I eat veggies, fruits, nuts, eggs, meat, and water for drink. I let myself have one "free meal" every week. I look forward to it, enjoy it, and get back to eating healthy the rest of the week. If I 'cheat", I shrug it off, get over it, and refocus. Eating healthy is the biggest key in my weight loss. I've lost 31 pounds since January 3rd. (I lost weight even before this challenge)

Top physical changes: My physical changes would be focusing more on using weights and strength training verses cardio. It burns more fat.

Top mental changes: Mentally. Hard! I would say the better part of last year I had a fight with myself. I refused to change how I was eating, but just exercised like a mad woman. I lost minimal weight. I had to really, really, really talk myself in letting the foods I was eating go, and focus on eating healthy most of the time. I mourned the loss of fattening foods. Sad. I would say the mental work to get to where I am now is way harder then the exercise and eating healthy today! Not that it's easy for me now, because some days I want to give up. But I feel more committed because I want to be thin more then I want the food. For me, this weight loss challenge is a nice motivator, but it's not even close to the reason I'm losing weight. It's been a year long journey to prepare to lose my weight, and I'm finally ready, and in the right mental place. It feels great! I never, ever, thought I could get to his place. It makes me cry, sometimes. Good cry. :)

I LOVED this, so inspiring!

Here's a link to one post: http://queenofchaosandjoy.blogspot.com/2012/02/fat-pictures.html
Here's another link: http://queenofchaosandjoy.blogspot.com/2012/03/month-3-weigh-in-and-pictures.html

Keep on keeping on, because all of us are on our own journey and although we're in different places along the way, maybe something someone else does/says will spark something in you. Remember, YOU have things to share too and those thoughts/actions may spark someone else. Here's to mid-week energy vs. the mid-week slump.