Fitness Friday: Our Stories Edition

First of all, some good news ('cause I'm not so sure my measurements are going to BE good news this week!) Look what I fit into this week:

Yeah! I got it on and off. It's still a bit tight to be comfortable. Add the fact that I'm not used to wearing it anymore...anyway, I'll give it another week or two and I'm sure I'll be back to wearing my wedding ring full-time. I can't wait!

Now. I was 7 pounds, 14 ounces at birth, which was fairly big back then. I was bone skinny growing up, much like my Sweetheart is now. In 4th grade, my friend's father nicknamed me "Stringbean." It fit. I don't have them available, but the pictures of me roller skating down the sidewalk? Makes you wonder how my legs didn't snap in half. I was really skinny.

As a result of my excellent metabolism, I ate all the time. My dad used to tease me that I didn't have a tape worm, I had a tape snake. I never had to practice self-control and so I never really learned it. When my eating started making the pounds come to visit and stay...I didn't adjust properly. Enough psychology.

I was 5' 6" in high school and weighed 110 pounds. (And for lunch every day I ate nachos, a Grape-Ade, and a large chocolate chip cookie. Every. Day.) Looking back I don't think I properly appreciated that weight! When I got married I was 5' 7" and weighed 132 pounds. One day after I had been teaching a few years, Glenda, one of the cafeteria ladies where I taught said, "Mrs. E, you're pickin' up." I had no idea what that meant. It meant I was picking up weight. Thanks for pointing that out, Glenda. I can't fault Glenda. She once confessed to me that her boobs weighed X amount of pounds. How did she know? She threw them up on the scale in the kitchen!!! Oh that woman was entertaining.

I was between 140-150 pounds when I got pregnant with Sweetheart. That pre-baby weight was really a good weight for me, by the way. I'm not really happy to say that I packed it ON during my pregnancy. I got up and ate breakfast sometimes at 4:30 in the morning because I was starving and then ate breakfast again when I got to school. I know my gain was over 50 pounds that first time. And now my favorite quote ever:

"He was a beautiful baby boy but, sad to say, he did not weigh 60 pounds. That is what I had gained and that is what I had to lose." --Barbara Bush

I so hear you Barbara. But the thing is, I didn't lose it. Four years later along came Little Bit. And I gained some more that I didn't ever lose. But I still thought I was skinny. CONSTANTLY I was surprised by photos of myself. Do I really look like that?

But it didn't end with babies. Oh no. After Little Bit was born I quit work and lived in jeans and sweat pants for a year. It seems that jeans and sweatpants don't give you a really good idea of your proportions. Imagine my surprise when none of my old work clothes fit anymore. Huh. By then I had already begun telling myself that it wasn't so bad. And I didn't care. Then, that fateful e-mail to Karly and BOOM! Fitness Friday was born.

Boy I'm getting motivated again just writing this! And that's good because my motivation was waning this week Ladies. I could have done a whole lot better. But still, I'm doing better than I was a month ago. That's for sure.

My end goal in all this (for now) is to fit into a size 12. I think for my height a size 12 is a really good size. And I think that goal is achievable. Right now I'm a size 16 and I'm happy to say that there was a lot of hitching of the pants this week. They aren't falling off yet, and I'm not thinking I would fit a 14 YET...but they were loose. Loose is good.

Wedding rings are better!

Have a great Friday everyone!