Archive for the ‘About Me’ Category
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008 |
Here I was, going through one of my older computers (grabbing files and stuff I need to transfer to my new laptop) and I came across some old pictures of me that show me at different weights. I’ve decided to post them along with the weight that I was at the time.
And please, no “OMG you are soooo ugly and fat” comments. I’ve heard ‘em all already. 
Please note a lot of these are blurry because they were taken with one of my older cell phones, which took AWFUL pics. Also, these are in chronological order.
Me, around 130 pounds, 2001, no muscle (didn’t work out):
Me, 135ish, 2004 (no muscle or working out):
Me, Spring 2006, when I had gotten up to around 157 (Yikes!):
Me, August 2006, 135 (after riding my bike all summer):
Me, Fall 2006 right before gaining weight, prob around 140ish:
(I was taking picture of my new hair color, which explains the weird pose).
Me, 155ish pounds, Dec 2006 (A month or two after I first started gaining, a little buzzed after a couple drinks):
Too bad there are no pictures of me from 2005…. I had gotten in very good shape that summer. That’s also the year I started theskinnywebsite.com.
So how do I compare now to these older pictures? Well, I definitely look smaller now than I did in my 157-pound picture above… but not as small as my 135 and 140 pics.
I will eventually be taking more pics of my progress and will post them here.
Posted in Updates, About Me | 12 Comments »
Friday, December 7th, 2007 |
Hey everyone! I have decided that I will be going on a hiatus from doing this website until January. But I wanted to sum up my complete progress so far, as I have been way too hard on myself lately.
As my faithful readers know (all 300+ of them), I have been trying very hard for two months now to lose weight. To be honest, this is the longest and hardest effort I have ever, ever put into losing weight. Why? Well, I’ve never had this much to lose, for starters. Secondly, I usually lose all the weight I need/want to within a shorter time, then move onto other things. The weight usually comes off a lot easier and faster - within a month and a half. Or I would lose 10 pounds and forget about my diet.
I feel confident enough now about my current eating and exercise program, plus my slow but consistent weight loss, that I will be able to carry on with it without writing about it every day. By no means am I quitting my diet/exercise plan. It is no longer a “diet” for me now - I have successfully changed my eating and exercise habits. Sixty days is long enough to learn some lessons and create some new habits.
MY FITNESS SIX MONTHS AGO:
Just think… several months ago (June), I was so out of shape that going up one stairway made me a little breathless. Walking 1/4 of a mile down to the corner store made me out of breath! Exercising on a stationary bike for 15 minutes was enough for me to be tired. I was wearing cotton/stretch pants because none of my clothes fit. My stomach was HUGE. At one point, my waist was 36 inches. (I measured it probably back in late May or something). Getting up off the floor was painful. My diet consisted of anything I wanted to eat, plus LOTS of alcohol. I literally drank alcohol EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. EVERY SINGLE NIGHT.
As for my body, my stomach was quite large, I had love handles and a double chin.
MY FITNESS NOW:
Now… after several stops and starts over the summer but sixty solid days now under my belt, I have turned my physical fitness around! Now, I can walk up 12 flights of stairs without getting TOO out of breath! (I did it the other day - I now park on the 3rd floor in my building and live on the 9th. Each floor is two flights!) I can - and do - work out for 45-75 minutes per day, doing cardio and resistance, about 6 days per week. I sweat and get slightly out of breath during the workouts and keep going. I also use a pilates muscle stretching thing, plus free weights for my arms and toning stretches. I purposely park far from the mall and store entrances now and go out of my way to go up or down steps when I can. As for my diet, I eat five or six small meals per day. Mostly healthy protein, whole grains, veggies and fruits. Yes, I cheat occasionally. Yes, I skip meals sometimes when I just don’t have time to eat or aren’t hungry. Best of all, I rarely drink alcohol any more. I only had maybe four drinks during the entire month of November! (Thank God that I don’t appear to be an alcoholic after all!)
As for my body now, well, the scale may have only moved down roughly 9 or 10 pounds, but I no longer have a double chin. I have my waist/hips back. I have muscles in my thighs and legs and some starting in my arms. I am wearing jeans again! My love handles are gone.
Seriously? I have a lot to be happy about right now. A lot to be proud of, and a lot to work towards. And I will continue. Unfortunately, I was diagnosed with a respiratory infection at the doctor’s yesterday and it is causing me a lot of pain right now, which is why I’m not yet asleep at 4am. Yes, I’m concerned that I have been sick with colds and infections for weeks now, but the doctor told me today that a LOT of people around here are having the same problem. It’s gonna be (and already is) a bad cold/flu season.
MY PERSONAL FITNESS GOALS:
I definitely have areas that I need to work on. Firstly, I need to learn how to regulate my blood sugar and meals. I need to stop eating so much cheese. I need to take more vitamins in order to help ramp up my immune system. As for weight, I don’t have an exact set goal weight, but the range is 115-124. My goal size is a two or a very loose four. I have a small frame, so these goals are not too extreme. My ultimate goal is to become one of those super-fit, slim people that everyone hates. My ultimate workout goal is to go back to jogging…
WEBSITE STUFF:
Changes will be coming to this site in January. I will be doing a snazzy new layout and start doing reviews on diet products… books, food, etc. I’ve been wanting to do this for a while, but have been too busy focusing on and writing about my weight loss efforts. From now on, I will only do personal updates maybe once a week (starting up again in January), and do reviews and other informational posts the rest of the time. I no longer need to write about my dieting efforts every day…
I wish everyone a wonderful holiday season and New Year… and I’ll see everyone the first or second week of January 2008!
Posted in Goals, Updates, About Me | Comments Off
Sunday, November 11th, 2007 |
Reason #1725 that I like low-carbing: I can eat a steak four hours before going to bed, then get up the next morning and STILL be a pound lighter.
Today is a good day so far. I am getting tons of free publicity courtesy of the people who are completely obsessed with finding out who I am and what I look like. To them, I say “thanks!” 
Hint to all my new curious readers: read this blog from beginning to end if you are curious about how I got to this weight. No, I wasn’t always overweight. It only happened in the last year due to excessive partying, drinking and beer munchies. Oh, and a touch of laziness.
Anyway, onto more exciting stuff… I went out and bought my first HDTV ever last night. My sister and I were wandering around Wal-mart and discovered that they have drastically reduced the prices on HDTV’s! I was so excited to see a 32″ flat panel HD TV for only $599 or so. (There were even cheaper ones than that!) I think I will get one for my bedroom as well, just a bit smaller.
Today will be spent in part taking a four-mile power walk (no weights this time, they killed me yesterday), hanging out with my sister and niece again, and hunting down two lamps for my living room and framed art for my walls. As my long-time readers know, I just moved into a new apartment here in a new city and state, and it’s a huge one-bedroom with tons of space. I have spent the past two weeks decorating obsessively and buying furniture. Once my decorating is done, I will take some pics and post them here. I am almost done, but awaiting one last furniture delivery, plus a few odds and ends. (Who knew decorating was so damn FUN!?)
The walls and carpet of this apartment are all a light tan/ beige, which goes with absolutely EVERYTHING. I have a deep red/ gold/ brown/ creme colored theme going on in the living room, and a burgundy/ gold/ creme theme in the bedroom, and pink/tan in the bathroom. The kitchen is white with black appliances and a colorful green/ red/ brown/ tan/ black theme going.
I am thinking about buying a bicycle, but since it’s November, maybe I should wait until the Spring? Hmm…
Posted in Updates, About Me | No Comments »
Saturday, November 10th, 2007 |
I just discovered that there is a website making fun of a photo of me from back when I was 5′5 and 125 pounds. They are calling me fat, ugly and pro-anorexic.
Very interesting… My goodness if they think I was fat at 125, I wonder what they would think of me now? Plus it was only a face picture. I unfortunately inherited one of “those” chins that make my face appear chubby unless I am nearly underweight.
Oh well.
Anyway, I am flattered that people think I am important enough to track down photos of. I must be hitting the big time! 
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Saturday, October 13th, 2007 |
Here continues the story of my life and weight…
So, to sum things up, I was underweight all throughout my teen years. I ate whatever I wanted - my parents fed us quite healthy with three round meals a day and watched our sugar intake. I was very active as a kid - always walking and biking everywhere.
My breast size was 32A throughout my teens years. I occasionally wished that they would grow bigger and that I would get a more womanly figure. I was blessed with an hourglass type body, but being so slim made me long to have more curves. I spent most of those years weighing about 100-110.
Then my parents died in my late teen years (long story I won’t get into). My younger sister and I ended up going through several foster homes and group homes. I was living in a foster home at the age of 17 1/2 one day, and got on the scale. I was SO EXCITED to see my weight was: 121! I hadn’t even noticed the gain until then. I took off my clothes and looked in the mirror, excited to see that yes, I did look curvier.
I hadn’t changed my diet at all - still ate three meals or so per day and snacks. Still walked to school and walked most places.
About 2 months before my 18th birthday, I got on the scale. It read… 130. I noticed that most of my clothes stopped fitting around that time. I got naked again and looked in the bathroom mirror, and noticed that for once, my stomach wouldn’t suck in like it used to.
And then I realized… 130 isn’t good for my body. I had gained too much weight. I needed a diet! What really pushed this thought was that I had seen myself in a recent photo, and couldn’t believe how much… bigger I looked. I didn’t like it.
I had no idea how to diet. I thought dieting meant skipping meals. It was a bit hard to do where I lived. Then I went to live in a group home place until a week after I turned 18. Around that time, I learned how to “hate” my body and weight for the first (or is it second) time. Dieting did not work.
A month after my 18th birthday, I ran away from the group home and went to live with my best friend Jeannie. I had inherited a little bit of money at that time (a few thousand). My friend had messed up eating habits, and soon we were both skipping meals and walking miles and miles each day - mostly to go visit guys and run around flirting with guys at malls. It only took me 2 months or so to lose most of my gained weight.
I got back down to 117 - got on one of those mall electronic scales at GNC (have you checked YOUR weight today?) and was thrilled. I figured that 117 was perfect for my height, which was 5′4 at that time. And it was, although some people thought I was too thin. But I actually had a smokin’ body around that time (and have pictures to prove it, which I’ll possibly post later).
So, through the rest of my 18th and 19th year, my weight remained around that. It possibly fluctuated between 115-120 or so. I figured my weight problems were in my past.
WRONG.
I finally got my driver’s license and car at age 21.
And within a couple months, I had gained 10 pounds. I got a second job at a movie theater to pay for the car, and often had no time to eat anything other than fast food. I quickly gained another 10 or so pounds.
One day, I saw a photo of myself that had just been taken the week before. In it, I probably weighed 140 or so. I looked HORRIBLE and bloated. Even my older sister mentioned something about it.
Not again!? (To this day, I can’t always tell how much weight I’ve truly gained until seeing an actual photo of myself. The mirror lies!)
Thus began the yoyo dieting that continued throughout most of my 20’s. When I was about 22, I lost 10 quick pounds doing Atkins diet. I got extremely sick and had some heart problems throughout the time, not knowing that my body can’t handle huge amounts of water and that it flushed out my electrolytes when I was losing weight rapidly. I had to wear a halter monitor (which records your heartbeats for 24 hours). They couldn’t figure out what was causing my heart to beat so rapidly and erratically. The damn doctors didn’t think to take my blood test… and if they had, (I found out years later), they would have seen very low potassium or sodium reading. To make a long story short, after 7 days on the Atkins diet and with me drinking huge, HUGE amounts of water, I woke up in the middle of the night so weak I couldn’t get out of bed right away. My heart was racing too fast to even keep track. I was living in the same apt. complex as my sister at the time - in Anaheim, CA, but had my own apartment. Anyway, I would have called one of them to take me to the hospital, but I was too weak to pick up the phone! It was a horrible, horrible night which resulted in me going to ER the next morning.
When I was 24, I embarked on an actual jogging and exercise AND dieting plan that helped me to lose about 15 pounds. By the time I got to NH (when I was nearly 25), I was in great shape and probably weighed 125 or so. But then I gained weight yet again, this time going up to an all-time high of 155 or so, around age 27.
I decided to try a semi-low carb, 6 meal per day thing which worked wonders. I felt amazing and had tons of energy, and lost weight quite rapidly. But when I got to about 143 or so, the weight loss stopped, so I cut out even more and more carbs until I was back doing an Atkins type of thing again.
And guess what happened…? Yep. I was drinking huge amounts of water again - after being told on several diet sites to do so - I started feeling crappy again. I was getting cramps in my leg muscles and felt kind of weak. One night, I had a really depressed, dreadful feeling. I drank a huge cup of water and went to bed.
An hour later, I woke up with symptoms similar to those that I had when I was 22 and doing Atkins - extreme weakness, seeing spots in front of my eyes, super-fast heartbeat. I could barely walk - and I knew something was very wrong. One of my pupils was enormously dilated and I could barely focus my eyes. I called a taxi to the ER, feeling like I was literally about to die. (Little did I know how close I was to actually dying or having a seizure).
I got to the ER and thankfully it was mostly empty. My blood pressure was around 157/90 or something and they were concerned when I told them how weak I was. I had little to no reflexes and the doctor thought I might have brain problems or something because of my pupil size.
Anyway… I got a blood test, which came back showing a level of 124 for sodium, which is enough to send you into a seizure or coma! My magnesium level was also low, as was my potassium. They were very concerned and said they were admitting me. I was supposed to go to work the next day and said “no, can’t I go home and drink gatorade or something?” But they wouldn’t let me leave. Not that I could do much walking or much else! They gave me pills (painkiller and potassium right up front) that I almost couldn’t swallow. It is a scary, scary thing to have your muscles so weak that you can’t swallow.
To make this already long story short, I had hyponatremia caused by overloading my body with water while losing weight. !!
To be continued later…
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Tuesday, October 9th, 2007 |
I figured that it is time to tell my weight story. Sit back, as this will be long…
For the very first year of my life, I was unable to digest much of any food. I would constantly spit-up. My mom was worried sick- thought I would die from malnutrition. (I have journals from her during this time to prove it). I had some sort of digestive problem that would prevent me from eating a normal amount.
Fast-forward to my teen years… things were OK. I was super-skinny all through my childhood - never once being anywhere near overweight or even a normal weight. I was always underweight.
From ages 7 to maybe 17, I would be OK so long as I didn’t eat too much. When I either ate too much, or too big of portions, or whatever - I would get really sick… and throw up. It wasn’t bulimia, as I never, ever wanted to purge. It was some sort of digestive problem. After a big meal, or whatever (I never figured out what caused it exactly), I would become nauseous for a few hours, then eventually throw up everything in my stomach. It was MISERABLE and HORRIBLE. I HATED IT with a passion.
During this time, around 14 years of age, one day, I looked down at my thighs. I remember that I was at a school assembly or something. I thought: “damn, my thighs are huge! I must be fat.” I was really upset and truly, seriously, thought I was fat.
I was probably 5′4 and 92 pounds. And I THOUGHT I WAS FAT. At the time, I was at a 15.8 BMI, which calculates to underweight. But I THOUGHT I WAS FAT. At the time.
Thankfully, this phase only lasted a few days, I think. (Could have been a few weeks). I vaguely remember getting all weird about food and calories. I wouldn’t have any snacks or anything. If I did, I’d wonder if the calories would make me fat.
One day, probably only a week or two later, I was sitting on yet another bench in yet another assembly at school. I remember clearly looking down at my thighs… and thinking: “you know what? Compared to other people, my thighs aren’t fat. I’ve seen myself in photos, and I am very skinny. Everyone’s thighs spread like this on a bench”.
I think I was 14 around this time. After that day, I gave no additional thought to “being fat”. I ate what I wanted and didn’t think about dieting or anything like that. I would occasionally suffer from that ridiculous “throw up” disorder, where I would be inexplicably sick and nauseated for hours and hours until… well you know.
However, about 1 1/2 month before my 18th birthday, things changed…
(this story will be continued in a later post)
Posted in About Me | 2 Comments »
