Newly motivated

After a week of rationing bite-size Snickers and trying to find ways to get some extra exercising in (it's pouring this morning so no walking today!) I received some new motivation to get moving and hide the bite-size badness my kids brought home on Monday night...

I saw a video of myself a few months before I got pregnant with our third baby, in mid 2010.  Yesterday I decided to go through all our camcorder footage from the past 5 years and organize and move it to an external hard drive so I could edit and organize it all (I finally found the disk that came with the camera to put movies together and burn DVDs).  I found a clip where I had been videoing our daughter dancing around at Disney's California Adventure Park and had asked my husband to video my son and I (I wanted to get him dancing on camera - I try to avoid the moving pictures...) and as I was watching the clip I almost cried...I looked so large. Now, I am 20 pounds lighter right now than I was then, and I have to admit, looking at that video made me feel REALLY good about where I am now - but it also made me realize how much I REALLY don't ever want to be that woman again.  I never want someone to look at me and see that ever again.

So...even though it's pouring outside and my plans for a walk have been derailed, I have the motivation I needed to get out an exercise DVD.  When my son takes a nap I will be putting the baby down for a nap as well, pulling the van out of the garage and exercising out there.  I will have my daughter bring out her school work and she can work on it in the garage with me while I exercise. This is it, I think seeing that video really made me feel like I'd hit rock bottom. I even felt bad for my husband...he's never once made comments to me about losing weight, or telling me I shouldn't be eating junk food when I did. I actually felt guilty that he had to claim that chunky monkey when we were out in public. 

On the plus side, I can definitely see the difference 20 pounds makes - and for the first time in many years I felt good about the way I looked - I might still be chunky, but at least I'm not THAT chunky anymore!! So, today is a new day. I am going to head to Target and get my own scale so I can weight myself every few days instead of having to wait to drive to my husband's family's home on the weekends. One thing I have discovered is absolutely essential to weight management is a good scale.  If you are constantly weighing yourself you will know when you are starting to creep up and can nip it in the bud before it gets bad - unlike the way I was doing it before, which was when clothes starting getting too tight it was time to start thinking about doing something.

I guess sometimes it takes seeing that old video, or feeling like you've hit rock bottom to really get that kick in the pants you needed. I still have a goal of reaching One-derland before this competition is over, and if I can get serious and do this I think it's still possible!!! I am just having such a hard time motivating myself with so much other stuff going on....kids, cleaning, homeschooling, working from home, a new baby - I need to focus and remember that I am just as important and that losing weight isn't a selfish goal. If I lose weight everyone wins because I'll be healthier and have more energy and I'll be a much better representation of our family.

I would love to hear any motivational comments you guys might have - did you have a rock-bottom moment that made you stop and say "enough is enough?"