The Exact Steps That Helped Me Lose 80 Pounds

The Lifestyle
Growing up, I was always a chubby kid, but my whole family was on the heavy side, so I didn’t worry much about it until college. During my first year out of high school, a friend and I found this weight-loss clinic in our area. The staff there told us to start taking vitamin B12 shots, gave us some weight-loss pills, and advised us to stop eating all carbohydrates.
So since I had no knowledge of how to cook or what to do with a vegetable, I became super malnourished. I was basically eating meat and cheese. After losing 20 pounds over the course of two months, my mom took me to the doctor because I was shaky, sweaty, and had horrible stomach cramps. The doctor told me that I had to eat normally again. I went back to noshing on leftover pasta and breadsticks from the restaurant where I worked. I gained back those 20 pounds I had lost — and then some.
After that, I gave up on losing weight. I got married, became pregnant with my first son, and gained 50 pounds. Not long after, I got pregnant with my second son. At that time, I weighed 200 pounds.
Six weeks after giving birth to my second kid, I stepped on the scale at my doctor’s office and realized that I hadn’t lost any weight since having him. I was shocked that I was 220 pounds. Since I grew up overweight, I didn’t want my children to go to school and be the chubby kid. In addition to that, I couldn’t believe that I was still wearing my maternity jeans. It was time to do something.
The Change
I told myself that I was done buying jeans until I got to a smaller size. The first thing I did was talk to my mom, who was on Weight Watchers, about how to count calories. Then, I started using the My Fitness Pal app to track what I was eating.
I started to substitute my unhealthy calories for healthy ones: I would make tacos with ground turkey instead of beef, wrap my burgers in lettuce, and make homemade sweet potato fries.
