The Lifestyle
I always seemed to be a little bit heavier than everyone else. By age 12, I was on Weight Watchers with my mom. When I got married in 1991, though, I was 122 pounds. I had worked hard to lose 40 pounds to get to that point.
I kind of went into a downward spiral from there. Unhealthy habits—like baking and cooking for entertainment, not being mindful of what I was eating, and totally disrgarding physical activity—got the best of me. Although I wasn't an emotional eater or even a binge eater, I started gaining about 10 to 15 pounds per year after getting hitched.
By 2006, I weighed 268 pounds and sometimes had to walk with a cane because my knees hurt so badly. One day, I was walking to my car after running some errands, carrying my infant son. I tripped over a pothole, and my son and I went flying to the ground. Luckily, we were both okay, but I was really shaken up.
I realized that if I had been at a healthy weight, I would have been able to catch myself, but since I was so overweight, I wasn't strong enough to regain my balance. I thought, "My weight is no longer about me. It's time for me to take action for my son's well-being." My son already had health issues and needed a kidney transplant; obviously, I wanted to do everything I could to protect him from the health hazards I could prevent.
The Change
Not long after the fall, I saw an advertisement for a meal replacement program called Medifast. In the ad, a woman claimed to have lost 130 pounds in nine months. I thought, 'If she can do it, I can do it.' I ordered the program that day.
At first, it was really hard to quit baking, but I knew that I had to give it up if I wanted to make a difference. The program encourages you to make one non-program meal for yourself each day, so I used that as an opportunity to totally change my cooking style by incorporating lots of healthy fruits and veggies.
After losing about 60 pounds, I started walking and eventually running using an app to train for a 5-K. I'd always loved running on my own in high school, and it felt so good to get back into it again. I actually enjoyed it so much that I began training for a half-marathon and completed one not long before reaching my goal weight.
Fourteen months after starting my journey, I hit my goal weight of 128 pounds. That same week, I found out I was pregnant again. That meant I had to give up the program, and I almost immediately began putting on weight from the pregnancy.
Sadly, about three months after that, I had a life-threatening miscarriage and ended up in the hospital. Then, within three months of my miscarriage, my mother passed away and my son underwent a kidney transplant. Needless to say, weight loss was the last thing I worried about.
After the transplant, we lived in a Ronald McDonald House for about eight months while my son recovered. It was probably the most challenging place to make healthy choices, so we didn't. Instead, we ate out all the time and I stopped exercising. One year after hitting my goal weight, I had gained everything back and then some. At 272 pounds, I felt like a total failure.
After my son recovered, we went on a Make-A-Wish trip to Disneyland with former NFL player Kurt Warner, his kids, and his wife Brenda. On the way into the park, I got stuck in the turnstile. The park staff had to let me in through the stroller gate without a stroller. I was so embarrassed. Later in the trip, I chatted with Brenda about how I was frustrated with my weight-loss journey. She said, "It's never too late to become who you want to be," and that really resonated with me. From then on, I changed my mindset. I realized I didn't have to give up trying to lose weight just because I failed one time.
About a year after that, I got back on the meal replacement program and picked up my running habit again. Only this time, I decided I needed to make changes that would be sustainable forever. I stopped seeing my new lifestyle as a diet and started thinking of it as a way to live a healthy life. Even though I was doing the same program, my mindset was that I wanted to create health. I didn't have a final goal weight.
After 18 months, I lost 142 pounds and weighed 130. I felt so confident that I was going to keep the weight off that I got rid of all my clothes that were too big.
The Reward
This past summer, I got to run a marathon in Paris. It was the most amazing experience. I feel fit and I feel healthy. I feel that me taking control of my weight has rubbed off on my family's health. I've even become a health coach for others trying to lose weight. That's something that I never would have done if I had not lost weight.
My life would look so different if I had not decided to make a complete lifestyle change. I would probably have a knee replacement by now and would be more at risk for diseases like breast cancer and diabetes. I feel good knowing that I'm not going to die because of my own negligence.
Stacy's Tips
Think about who you're doing it for. I'm easily distractible, but because I focused on getting healthy for my family and myself, it helped me say no to my temporary wants like sugary snacks.
Take it day by day. Every day I thought about the choices I was making with my diet and exercise. I knew that each choice I made would have an impact on my goal of becoming a healthier, happier person. If I messed up, I didn't dwell on it—I made better choices the next day.
Follow others' weight-loss journeys. When I started losing weight, I looked to other people who did what I was attempting to do and got inspired. I told myself, "If they can do it, so can I." That really helped keep me going.
Stacy Phillips, 45, is 5' 3" and lives in Gilbert, Arizona.
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