My Journey to a Healthy Lifestyle!

This last year has had its ups and downs, as does any other. But one of the main things about this year that I've done compared to others is focusing on myself. At the beginning of the year I got sick from neglecting my health by over working myself with work and school and was in the doctor’s office every other week it seemed because of it. I had high blood pressure, vertigo, low B-12 levels, wasn't sleeping. I ate what was cheap and what was convenient, which was primarily fast food restaurants, which got me over 220 lbs. My doctor told me that I had to make a change because I'd only wear myself out more if I kept at the rate I was going. This led me to let eliminate the things that were causing me extra stress and focus on me and my health. That decision was not popular with some people I know, because they wanted me to finish what I had started, but I needed to focus on my well being. And oh how it has been a journey!

I started by signing at a fitness center for a 6 week boot camp. I must admit, I lasted for 3 weeks. The location and time of the fitness center didn't work in my interest as far as gas goes. But they gave the basics for eating right and got me motivated for working out harder.

As I made eating cleaner and working out harder part of my daily routine, I would take pictures of this journey of getting healthy and post on instagram (yes, I’m one of those people who posts pictures of their food, don’t judge haha) to keep me accountable. Every year one of my new year resolutions is to lose weight and it’d last for two or maybe three months after losing maybe 10 pounds and would give up. But being determined not only to lose weight but live a healthy lifestyle, I figured broadcasting my journey would keep me accountable.

So as I posted pictures of my scrumptious, healthy food, I’d hash tag it as weight loss or eating clean (yes, I’m one of those people that use hash tags more than some may prefer, don’t judge haha). And through that I found a lovely lady, Chelsea Osborn that would post picture of living a healthy lifestyle and how she’s lost 50 pounds and gotten to where she is now and started to follow her on instragram. As I’d see her posts on my news feed I got more and more motivated to stay on the tract with working out and eating healthy. Chelsea would always talk about Shakeology, ShredNation, and being a Beach body coach (I’ll elaborate in future posts… don’t worry!) and how they have helped her and I eventually emailed her asking her how I could get involved!

Her and her fiancé Robb (also a Beach body coach!) got me set up with Beach body and ShredNation. In a nut shell Beach body is the headquarters for getting healthy where you can purchase fitness programs, Shakeology, supplements, and connected with coaches to keep you motivated. ShredNation is a group of coaches from Beach body that is a support system to keep each other accountable, motivated, and a place to ask for advice!

I’m so excited to keep going on my journey of getting healthy! One of my friends asked, “why are you broadcasting your workouts or what you’re eating all the time?” And it’s way to keep myself accountable! I've attempted to lose weight at least 5 times in the last 2 years, and quit easily because I didn't let people know that I was trying to get healthy and fit. But not this time! Going to go strong and have a support team to keep me on track! I can see a difference and and I can feel a difference and I'm just at the beginning of this journey.

I'm not a fan of progress shots as of now because of the BEFORE picture. But everyone needs to start somewhere and focus on the progress they've made so far!