Not So Easy

I am a Personal Trainer...I should have the perfect, cut. lean, fit, crazy low body fat percentage body right?  Well let me tell you, it is not so easy!  I should be eating perfect, healthy, no sweets, no soda, no nothing foods right? Not so easy.  I am a Personal Trainer...but...I am a human.  I have periods, which as every women will admit makes you desire chocolate like no other!! (those of you who say not so much...I want a lie detector test done!)  I have hypothyroidism.  Sweet foods taste good, fatty foods taste good.  They don't hand out a new set of taste buds with your Personal Training Certificate.  I wish they did. THAT would make it a lot easier!  Let me start at the beginning, which is really the middle...
When I graduated from High School I was a lean mean swimming machine, I had NO idea what it was like to be overweight, I really couldn't empathize with the emotional and physical issues that come along with being overweight...my thighs never touched and I could eat what I wanted..in fact I couldn't get enough food in my mouth to maintain weight!  Not long after HS graduation I was diagnosed with mono, boy was that a treat.  I was told I needed to take a break from swimming, they were concerned with my spleen bursting at the seams...I was also diagnosed with a stomach infection, which made me unable to eat..what a weird thing for me!  Not being able to swim was heart breaking as I had dreams of walking on to the University of Utah Swim Team.  That summer I managed to maintain my weight because I couldn't eat very much, my stomach just wouldn't tolerate it.  As soon as I starting feeling better, right around the start of classes at the U, I started getting my swimmer appetite back.  I am sure I knew better, or least I wish I knew better, you can't eat like a swimmer while not swimming!!  I decided to go ahead and talk to the swim coach to see if it was too late to walk on the team, he took a look at my times and liked what he saw.  If you swam with me in HS, then you know that I was never a great workout swimmer, but I was not to shabby off the blocks.  After three weeks of the hardest swimming sets, dry land workouts and weights I was cut from the team.  I never got a chance to show what I was capable of in a race.  I was so out of swimming shape from taking the summer off! DEVASTATING!  Welcome to emotional eating!  As I started gaining weight my Dad suggested I get my Thyroid tested, he has hypothyroidism, it is a hereditary disease, I am grateful for getting tested and treated when I did, because I am sure things could have gotten far worse. Where I think I was lucky that freshman year by dodging the 15, it was more like 10, I slowly gained about 50 pounds by the time I graduated from college(it took me 6 years), all while completing a Exercise & Sport Science degree.  Mind baffling right?  Two weeks after graduation I decided to take the American College of Sports Medicine Health Fitness Specialist test (Personal Training) by far the hardest test I have ever taken in my life.  I passed the practical and missed the written by 2 points.  I later passed the written.  I moved to Hawaii to pursue my dreams of being a SCUBA Instructor outside a land locked state, I may be an extremist as I chose to live on an island! :) It was in Hawaii that I finally really saw what had happened to my body...WOW...I was FAT!! And so extremely out of shape.  I was embarrassed to tell people what my degree was in, I was ashamed to admit that I was a Personal Trainer.  I didn't think I would EVER actually train because really, who would take me seriously?  The first year I was there I joined 24hour fitness and tried to eat better.  The second year I joined Weight Watchers and a Triathlon Training group.  I started doing Tri's, 5k's & 10k's.  I saw amazing results.  I lost 47 pounds!  After living there for 3 years I decided to join Dan in Bozeman, Montana.  The long distance thing was just not working for us anymore, and lets face it I was playing on an island, he was enrolled in school.  While in Bozeman I maintained my weight loss within about 10 pounds, I fluctuated depending on how freezing it was outside! I had an active lifestyle, I skied, swam and biked a lot. We moved back to Utah after living in Bozeman for 3 years. We got married, we got a house, Dan got a big kid job, I got a job as a Personal Trainer!  WOOHOOO Finally I was using my degree!  I mean teaching SCUBA & skiing are sport's so technically I was using it all along!  I was so happy in my life and so busy that I just didn't really pay attention to what I was putting in my mouth like I should.  I'm telling ya, I even look at chocolate and it goes straight to my Ass!  I gained about 10 pounds in a year, I was starting to fell uncomfortable at the gym.  I started working out more and watching food again and low and behold...I started to gain control of my weight again.  Then we got great news, pregnant!  Pregnant! I continued to workout and have an active lifestyle, but wasn't not watching the food as much...I was pregnant, when else was I going to be able to eat what I want right? Wrong!  I gained 40 pounds! Which wasn't to far off of what is an ideal weight gain, but as I have found, baby weight loss is a different ball game.  And let's be honest I haven't given it 100% all the time.  I dropped 20 pounds rather quickly, breastfeeding is great!  Then we found out Zoey was allergic to breastmilk, that weight loss train stopped in a hurry.  So here we are, for the better part of a year I have been hovering around a very unideal weight.  I have had wonderful changes in girth measurements and Body Fat %. but my scale weight just isn't budging.  I am not going to lie, it is my diet.  I workout like a champ! 4-6 serious cardio bouts a week and at least 2 resistance workouts a week.  My current struggle is getting my nutrition under control.  I need to walk the walk, so I can talk the talk!  It is time! I am ready!  I recently decided to join weight watchers again, it worked before, it will work again, it was hard, I had to let go of a lot pride to walk in there and tell them I needed help, I am a trainer, serious!  Yes, I am serious, having to weigh in front of someone helps out so much, it is all about accountability, and until I break down some walls and be accountable to myself, I will be accountable to someone else.  So there you have it in a nutshell, my heart on my sleeve for everyone to read.  I struggle daily when I go train others.  I have hopes that I will get things under control and I won't worry about people wondering why I am training people when clearly I can't do it for myself.