About
March 20, 2008
I am Jolene. I am a 30-something woman (born in August of 1973, you can do the math) who has been morbidly obese for the past 15 years, at least. This site chronicles my struggles with Weight Loss and will hopefully be a record of my eventual success.
I have been overweight my entire life, but have always been proportionate and carried my weight well. It wasn’t until I was 22 that I discovered The Internet and got a sedentary job that I actually began to gain weight. Never having experienced an actual weight gain in my life, I didn’t recognize it for what it was until it was too late. At my highest weight (when I was over a month due with my first daughter), I weighed over 400 pounds. I claim my highest weight ever at 411.
In 2000/2001, after giving birth to my daughter, I attempted to get healthy. My attempts only lasted for a month or so, as I didn’t actually weigh myself before getting started and when I went to the doctor’s office to weigh myself, after a month of “hard work”, it didn’t appear to my mind that I had lost anything. Naturally, I got discouraged and gave up.
In March of 2003, I tried again. I stopped eating fast food and on April 1, 2003, I began a program of counting calories and working out at least three to four times a week. I lost 43 pounds in six months doing this. At which time, I was derailed by finding a lump in my breast. It turned out to simply be an abscess, rather than anything more dramatic, but the abscess would not clear with antibiotics and I ended up having to have surgery to have it removed. This restricted me from working out for a month. By the time the restrictions were lifted, I was dealing with my impending divorce, financial woes that go along with that, and with my usual depression that was a lot tougher to get under control when dealing with these things. I couldn’t seem to get myself back on track at that point. I went through a year and a half of “I’m getting back on track this week! I mean it!!” before I finally just sort of gave up again.
In June of 2005, I had been re-married for a month, we had gone through a move to a house that was perfect for us at the time and Summer was here. Things were finally good again and I should have been able to jump right back into the fitness thing, but couldn’t seem to do it. I felt like things were all good. I was married to the man of my dreams, had the perfect daughter and for once in my life I felt like I wasn’t dealing with a lot of friendship or familial drama. Money wasn’t perfect, but was good and getting better, so I felt like life was perfect. I remained deeply depressed, however, and finally figured that it had to have been my weight that was causing my depression. I finally told my husband that I thought I was going to join Weight Watchers. I researched where the meetings would be held and picked a day that I could go. On June 21, 2005, I ate dinner, then slunk out of the house, and slipped into the Weight Watchers meeting, just watching and thinking that I wasn’t going to join. It just didn’t seem like something I would enjoy and I just knew that I could lose the weight on my own.
The leader and the two receptionists who were there that night dragged me kicking and screaming through the registration process, until I finally said: “Fine. I’ll join. I’ll even buy a set of coupons for 10 weeks of meetings. Then I’ll just go back to doing it on my own.”
Ten months later I hit my 100 pound loss. Four months after that I hit my half-way mark. And then it all went downhill again. I got scared of the success and was tired of spending the money to lose weight. I was certain that I could do it all myself and got smug and arrogant and began skipping meetings. My depression started coming back and my eating habits slipped. I wasn’t exercising as much and so I hit a plateau.
In December of 2006 I started regaining. My husband had been wanting to have a baby anyway and so I figured that if I was going to be gaining weight anyway, it may as well be for a good cause and so in March of 2007, I got pregnant.
The Jelly was born in December of 2007 and on the day I gave birth to her, I had gained back 103 of the 125 pounds I had lost. By the time The Jelly was two months old, I had lost 30 of those pounds. I then began gaining and losing the same 8 pounds over and over again.
On March 10, 2008, I slunk back into a Weight Watchers meeting and rejoined. It hasn’t yet been my Saving Grace. It hasn’t yet been all Sunshine and Roses. However, I have been back for just 10 days and what it has been is Successful. I have broken through that 8 pound barrier and am on my way to losing again. The first time I joined Weight Watchers, I had a chip on my shoulder because I didn’t think I needed it. This time, I have a chip on my shoulder because I know that I do.
I hope you enjoy continuing this journey with me.
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I once had a personal goal weight of 161 pounds and a Weight Watchers goal weight of 169 pounds. I think that still holds true, but something I’ve learned in the past two years and 9 months is that I need to be flexible with myself and that things can change. We’ll see where I end up in a couple of years.
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People Who Might Be Mentioned:
Jesse: My husband of nearly three years. If you have been following me since the inception of my journal 9 years ago, this is “James”, AKA “PB”, AKA “Printer Boy”. We’ve been together over four years and I couldn’t be happier.
Peanut Butter (PB): My oldest daughter.
The Jelly: My second daughter.
MB: The mom of one of Peanut Butter’s classmates. We were pregnant at the same time and her daughter is nearly two months older than The Jelly. They are destined to be BFFs, of course… (and so are we). She has joined me in doing a modified version of the C25K running program. I’m going to drag her through the Run With Nature with me (at least). I’ll get her hooked, yet!