Cori Magnotta — Weight Loss Success Story
I never found fitness fun. I would join a gym, go once, and never go back. When I was pregnant with my son in May of 2014, I developed severe preeclampsia (high blood pressure) and was put on bed rest for the last 2 months of my pregnancy. Being sedentary contributed to my weight gain during my pregnancy tremendously.
Weeks after I had my son, although I was eating less and taking him for long walks in the stroller, I wasn’t able to lose any of the pregnancy weight. The scale was stuck at 250 pounds. I went to my doctor who at first attributed it to “not sleeping” and “the stress of being a new mom.”
Despite being positive that I “just needed to try harder,” she agreed to run a full thyroid panel of blood tests on me just to be sure. The results came back showing that I had acute hypothyroidism, a thyroid disorder that slows down the entire metabolic process, making it much more difficult to lose weight as a result.
Having a diagnosis motivated me to not become a statistic. I had overweight parents my entire life and I became determined that my son was going to have a healthy mom! I began to search the internet for fun workout ideas, as I knew I loathed the treadmill and gyms.
I came across FXP Hoop Fitness, which uses a weighted Hula-Hoop and incorporates Barre, Yoga, and Pilates in fun, innovative, dance-like routines. I had always been able to hula hoop from a very young age, I won every hula hoop competition as a child and even used it as my talent to win the Miss Connecticut Teen title in 1996. I was immediately hooked on hooping as my new fitness strategy!
Since no classes were offered in my area, I purchased the 2 pound FXP Hoop online and started hooping at least 10 minutes a day while watching TV and worked my way up to an hour at a time. Studies show that hula hooping for just one hour can burn between 600–800 calories!
It is absolutely impossible to not smile while hula hooping! As I began to lose weight, people started asking what I was doing and I wanted to share this fun way to get fit with them! Never in my wildest dreams did I think I could ever be a group fitness instructor, but that’s exactly what I did; I signed up for and passed the certification program to become an FXP Hoop Fitness Instructor!
After falling in love with hoop fitness and losing 85 pounds, I decided to enter the America’s Fit Miss pageant and was awarded the title of America’s Fit Mrs. 2016. I use my title as a megaphone to raise awareness and advocate for hypothyroidism and thyroid disorders.
My son just turned 2 years old and I am proud to be healthy enough and have the energy to play with him all day long! He even hula hoops with me using his toddler sized hula hoop!
Originally published at cmagnotta.wordpress.com on July 30, 2017.