Healthy for Him

Welcome to thejesusdiet blog! This is something I have created to help keep myself accountable and to share what I learn as I go on a journey to become the healthiest person I can be, physically, emotionally and spiritually. I have two personal goals that I am focusing on right now in my life, (besides being the best mom I can be!) and that is to become physically and spiritually healthy. I had my first baby in January (what a blessing!) But I am not happy with my post-pregnancy body. I let it get me down, even depressed. God loves us, no matter our outward appearance, but I was finding it hard to love myself. A couple weeks ago, I made the decision to change my attitude, because a bad attitude isn't going to get me anywhere and in fact, it is only pulling me farther away from my Savior. And that's far from what I want. Let me share with you my two goals and the history behind them.

I want to be physically fit and healthy: I was 126 lbs when I got married. 3 years later, I weighed 145. They say you gain the freshman 15 when you start college, but no one mentioned the marriage 20!! Although not happy with my weight at that point, I wasn't doing anything about it. April 2010, I find out Im pregnant! YES!!! We are more than thrilled to become parents! I gain 30 lbs during my pregnancy. Another YES! Thats a healthy weight to gain. Then the last 2 months of my pregnancy hit me with pre-eclampsia and I gained another 20 lbs of water weight. Ugh! Not yes! In fact, a BIG OH NO! After giving birth to our son, Elijah, I lost nearly 30 lbs in the first few weeks. YES! But I got stuck at 168 lbs. After getting the clear from my doctor, I began to work out and started weight watchers. I use at home dvd collections by beachbody.com. They can really rock your world! I started with turbojam with Chalene Johnson and loved her so much that I bought her new workout system Turbofire which is a a High Intensity Interval training workout and Chalean Extreme (more to come on these specific work outs in later blog posts). I lost nearly 13 lbs and 5 inches! I am now at 146 lbs. My goal weight is 120-125. I am 5'1" so that is a healthy weight for me.

I want to be spiritually and emotionally healthy: I fell into a slump, a depressive slump. My husband could tell a difference as well as my parents. I felt like a fat girl with no hope! At the time I was on reglan to increase milk supply while breastfeeding our son, and reglan has a major chance of causing postpartum depression in women after birth. Well, I tried to resist it, but it got me. Without the help of reglan, I wouldn't be able to breastfeed and I REALLY REALLY wanted to continue breastfeeding. I had to make a choice, be emotionally distraught or quit breastfeeding. After a couple weeks of dwelling on it (and continuing to take reglan), my moods seemed to worsen and I finally decided it would be healthier for my relationship with my husband, my child and my self, to quit the reglan and stop breastfeeding. So I did. Within a week of quitting the reglan, I could feel a difference and my spirits were beginning to lift. As that cloud lifted, I felt God knocking on my heart saying "umm, how is that feeling of darkness treating you? Let my light in. I can help you. I can help you become fit, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. Let me into this part of your life!" And I made the decision to do just that.

I'm calling this the Jesusdiet because without Jesus, I, personally, don't think I could do this. I need Him to make these changes in my life. And its not just about becoming physically fit, its about becoming emotionally and spiritually fit as well.

So if you like, follow me, on this journey to become physically, emotionally, and spiritually fit. I am not a personal coach; I am not a dietician; I am not a theologian. I am simply a mom that wants to become healthy in all aspects of my life. We will learn as we go. On this blog, you will find articles of inspiration, recipes, my commitments and goals; any tidbit that I find helpful in my own journey, I will be posting on this blog.

I want to end by leaving you with an article that was very inspiring to me. In this article, the author encourages us to look at ourselves as "perfectly imperfect." Look at our flaws as something to inspire us to become better, rather than something that brings us down, stresses us out and leaves us generally unhappy. I really love one line from this article "Don't let your weaknesses or flaws define you. Let them fuel you." Amen.