“For as far back as we can remember, Chase, my youngest son, has been a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. We don’t know why because our family is full of die-hard Bears fans and truth be told, most of us, including Chase, have never even been to the state Pennsylvania! We all have our theories but I think mine’s the most accurate. His older brother Cole has inundated Chase with NFL football since before Chase could even talk, so when it came to picking “”his”” team, I think he went with color, just like I would have!! He chose the yellow team because it’s his favorite color and I think it’s his favorite color because that was the color of his nursery–even the ceiling!! I could be wrong, but I’m the Mom and that’s my story!——–So today, on his 10th birthday, we are in the midst of our road trip to Pittsburgh, PA to take him to watch the Steelers play the Baltimore Ravens. (SIDENOTE: I’m most excited to see Michael Orr! He is the player on the Ravens who the movie Blind Side with Sandra Bullock was based on!!)——————–Ironically, as I look at the clock, this is almost the exact time I was giving birth 10 years ago. Ten years can seem like yesterday and then it can seem like a whole other life. I can’t help but think about my weight when I look back at my past. I can gage every stage of my life by my weight and the weight loss program I was on at the time. Growing up, I mainly tried to count calories, in college it was counting fat grams, after my older son was born it was low carb. When I look back on Oct 2, 2000, I know I was preg, but even so, I was about 100 pounds heavier than I am today. That would be the equivalent weight of Chase now, in 4th grade, along WITH my 2 month old niece, Myla Marie. How dramatically different my life would be today if I had not gotten control of my eating and health habits. It gives me chills to think about it. No, it wasn’t easy but it was worth every ounce of effort. I always thought it was about what I looked like and I can’t fib, I’m still very self conscious about how I look, but now it’s much, MUCH less about that and much MORE about my inside matching my outside. It’s about who we are on the inside being reflected by our outside with no (well at least less) guilt or shame. I hate shame. That’s just a crappy emotion that does no one any good and not having control of our eating and our weight can be a major contributing factor. When we are over weight it’s easy to let shame and guilt take a hold. Our “”Evil Twin”” can have a hay day making us feel shameful about what we eat, what we don’t do (like exercise enough), what we look like, what we wear or maybe what we can’t wear-the list goes on and on and all the while we are left feeling weak and out of control. BUT the kicker of the whole vicious cycle is that we DO have control and we always have-we just need to stand up to our Evil Twin and claim it. When we are over weight, the majority of us know why. It’s not usually that big of a mystery, although we tend to act like it is. I claimed and DID eat healthy back then but I also knew deep down that I ate too much. It’s not rocket science but to me it seemed like it at the time.—–Thank goodness for my friend Julie Ribordy who had lost weight and looked great and who insisted I go with her to her Weight Watchers meeting even though I desperately DIDN’T want to!! Thank goodness when I got there the Leader was Shelly Elaty–the Weight Watchers leader who helped me to change my life. Thank goodness I finally “”got it””. This is a life change-a process-that is never perfect and doesn’t have to be but DOES have to be continued. You may “”fall off”” a hundred times and that’s absolutely fine-you just have to get back on 100 times as well. I promise you, if I can do this, you most certainly can too!!!————Have a great weekend and GO Steelers!!!