Exercise

So, I think that maybe since I am half way through my journey here, I need to do this by topic.

I think that the topic today will be exercise... yes, a very dirty word I know! My number one form of exercise is walking. The reason why I began walking is very very simple... I became so unbelievably pissed off at my ex husband one evening that I couldn't sit still... so I went for a walk. I walked 2 miles, including up Red Hill. If you are from my area, you know that Red Hill is a very steep hill and it almost gave me heart failure.

I then figured out that walking also helped to relieve other frustrations... if you get what I mean... :) I am now up to 6 miles a day, if that tells you anything at all! haha!!

I suggest that if you have problems with motivating yourself to walk (or whatever your choice of exercise is, I walk so that is the example I will use) that you find someone to walk with you. There were many times that I just didn't feel like walking, but my best friend Krissi pops up on a facebook chat and says... Hey!! We walking tonight? ... Well, of course we are... (dang it). We have had some of our best conversations and most brilliant ideas while walking. We have learned many things about each other while walking... For example: Krissi will do really nice dance moves to avoid stepping on a crack. And she goes all Ninja if she runs into a spider web... for some reason Moves like Jagger just popped into my head.

I also enjoy walking by myself sometimes. I turn on Pandora.... love the Def Leppard station, excellent walking tunes... put in my earbuds and clear my head of all of the days problems and worries and just enjoy the scenery and the music.

I know it can be hard to find the time to do it. Here is my thought on that:

 

I get up at five in the morning to walk on days that I know that I won't have time to walk in the evening. I have had monstrous blisters on my toes and yet I still walked 5 miles... because it is important to me. I walk in the dark just as much, if not more, than I do in the light.

Exercise does not have to be work... make it fun for you... make it work for you.

Beginning

I guess this is just like any story... you start at the very beginning. I at first thought this would just be about my weight loss, but have realized that it really is more than that. My whole journey in losing weight involves me trying to find myself and figure out who I am and who I want to be.

So, here is a brief bio of me. My name is Jill Barnes, I have the most amazing parents that I fondly refer to as Ward and June (because they are so darned normal!) I have 2 sisters and a brother, who are just as amazing as my parents. We were raised to be loyal, honest and hard working and to think for ourselves.  And I am thankful for that. At the age of 21 I had a daughter named Emaleigh and then married Scotty a couple of months later and then when I was 23 I had a daughter named Kaitlyn. These girls have no idea how much they have meant to me, especially over the last year... there are many days that they are the reason that I got out of bed in the morning.

Anyway... my marriage was a difficult one. I wouldn't say unhappy really, although at times it was. I am in no way shape or form using this to trash Scotty, my children are half him and to trash him would be to trash them. We both had our faults. We stayed married for 18 years... no one can say that we didn't try! We did. Our divorce was granted the first week of August. I can honestly say that I did not shed a tear that day.

Anyway.... When I met Scotty, at the age of 17, I was a size 7-9. I will have to find a picture of myself to prove it haha! After 2 kids and 18 years of marriage.... I had become... and I can't even believe I am going to put this out for the world to see.... a size 24... and it was tight.

 

 

 

 

Yep... that was me alright. I didn't start off intending to lose weight really. I just noticed that since I wasn't cooking big meals every night, since it was just me and girls, that I just seemed to be losing weight. I would say that I lost about 20 pounds and about a size between April and August. After the divorce was granted I decided that I wanted to make some real changes to my life. Not just on the outside, but on the inside. I had lived my life for so long as Scotty's wife and Emaleigh and Kaitlyn's mom.

 

Anyway.... that is where this part of my journey begins... deciding that I have to make a life for myself... apart from being anyone's wife or mother. Some days in this journey are good, some days are bad... some are just downright confusing. But it is my journey.