Intro

I'm Megan. In 3 months, I'll be 34 years old. I've been married for 8 1/2 years, and I have two kiddos; Charlie is almost 5 and Sarah is 2 1/2.

This is me:


My life for the last seven years has primarily revolved around my home, my husband and my children. It's been a rewarding time, and I'll always treasure the fact that I've been fortunate enough to have children, and stay home with them. However, like many moms before me, I somehow let myself go, and lost my sense of self.

It's time to refocus some energy on ME.

I've been feeling that way for a while, and this year, I finally started doing something about it.

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At this time last year, I was lugging myself and my kids around at my highest weight ever (not counting pregnancy). I was 5'7", and topped out around 265 pounds. By the time I finally started getting serious about getting the weight off and started keeping track of it, I was down to 253. This was me, last August:



I was tired of being tired all the time. Tired of looking like a slob no matter what I wore. Tired of having to order all my clothes online because I couldn't find my size in stores that I could actually afford to shop in. Still, I wasn't fully committed.

My son's 4th birthday rolled around, then Halloween (ie: candy season). I took a rare opportunity to have a girls' night out on my birthday, then ate my way through Thanksgiving and Christmas. Still, by the end of 2008 I'd lost 17 pounds from when I started tracking it.

I don't believe in New Year's resolutions. For me, if I called it a resolution, I was setting myself up to fail. Every time.

But in January, I started making more small changes to my diet: no more diet soda (I was drinking anywhere from 2-5 Diet Rite's per day); no more buying chips, sweets, less processed food. Our budget played into this decision quite a bit as well, as I could no longer justify paying for stuff that wasn't essential.

By the end of March, I was down 40 pounds, just by changing my diet. I was back into clothes that I hadn't worn in four years! I was feeling better, lighter, more confident. It was time to kick it up a notch.

I started walking in mid-April, and by the end of that month, I was up to 2 miles. I'd love to say "a day" but let's face it... when you've been a lazy butt for years, old habits are sometimes hard to break! But I was walking most days, and the weight kept coming off.

Suddenly, as the 200 pound mark, my old self-destructive behaviors began to resurface. I went up and down throughout the months of May and June. But finally, in mid-July, I did it! I finally was down below 200 for the first time in FIVE YEARS!!

In the last month, I've hit another plateau, but it's finally on the way down again. All told, since last year, I've lost nearly 70 pounds! I'm walking regularly, and doing my FIRM workout when I can... that requires a pre-workout routine of removing dog hair from the living room rug, so I admit that I haven't been as committed to that workout as I'd like to be.

This is me this morning, ready for my first official training run:


So why start running? I'll be the first to admit, I never saw the point to it. You get just as good a cardio workout, and burn just as many calories by walking 2 miles as you do by running it. But lately, during my walks, I've felt like running. I tried throwing in some intervals here and there, only to wind up very winded with shin-splints. But when one of my online mom friends suggested a get together over a half-marathon, the idea sounded like a winner. Not only was it a goal to work toward, it was a chance to meet in person some super great women I've come to know (online) rely on over the last few years. What could be better?

Then my rational brain kicked in, and I decided, if I wanted to make that half-marathon next April, not only do I need to train for IT, it might be best to start off with a shorter, local race.

Like a 5K.

And what better one to start with, than Race for the Cure? The timing is right (just under two months away) and the cause is a great one!

So I'm doing it. I registered today. And I'm running not only for me, but in honor of the survivors in my family: my great-grandmother, who had 2 mastectomies, and later died at the age of 89; my cousin and my sister, who are both recent survivors, living cancer free today!