"One" U2 & Mary J Blige

27th August- 14th of November 2012

When I began the program, and declared it to the facebook world, I just didn't know how my real world I was living in was going to change.

It's out there now, will people be watching me? No one really seemed to care, but I felt like I was walking around with a neon sign above my head "fat person walking, I'm exposed now", why wouldn't I be thinking that? It was all confirmed in THAT BEFORE photo. I now knew exactly what they were looking at because frankly I didn't like looking at me either. My husband and my BFF - Beautiful fitness friends, knew exactly where it sat with me.

I may share a whole lot of myself, and I'm o-kay with that.  I gave it great consideration whether to do this or not. I had found myself a wonderful little facebook group. I was always happy in the facebook world, but just like google, I found this group had become my "home" page. Each time I opened it up, I would find some new information, or someone's point of view, great sense of fun, and reality all rolled up into one. We had the same battle , our number began with 3 numbers, 120 was my number.

There is weightloss to look good, there's weightLOSS, where you feel completely lost because you've felt isolated because of your weight ........ and that was me !!!!! I was lost, I didn't have anybody around me who was 100 kilos, ( before Nina) or if I did, nobody wanted to talk about it,  hell I never wanted anybody to know I was over 100 kilos, but to join a group who were announcing I am 100 kilos plus, WOW,  that, within it's self was enormous because that's an honest and opened as it gets, say it out aloud and then share that too ................I just knew I had found the right place for me, and it's all about finding the place where you fit.

Emma "our creator" often would "like" a comment I made then write, please can you at least considering blogging. Which I would never had thought about doing, and Reiki gave me the insight to trust those inner instincts, to make those comments, Reiki allowed me to block all the negative thoughts that was my driving force of self doubt.

It's not like I woke up and said, "Oh I think I might just give that program a go and I am going to loose an enormous amount of weight in 12 weeks". I had been working towards THAT moment for at least 18 months, having Reiki done every month and already exercising, and weight watchers , I was just about there, but somehow I just couldn't put them all together. As soon as I began 12WBT it was like OMG, it was time, all my ducks are in a row, and for me it was ALL ABOUT MINDSET !!!!!!! ACTIONING IT AND JFDI. ( Just friggin do it)

Often I would hear that little bit of self doubt come into play and I found I had an answer to it ........ I would ask myself, WHAT IS REALLY STOPPING YOU FROM "ACHIEVING ??????"

WHY DO YOU REALLY WANT YOUR LIFE TO BE MISERABLE, BECAUSE THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT YOU WERE. YOU ARE UNHEALTHY & UNHAPPY.

Why would anybody want to feed the need to be miserable? Everything else was pretty amazing about my life, but why did I not respect my body?

For as long as I can remember I've always had a saying " I am the only person who determines whether I'm happy or sad, and I CHOOSE to be happy." Again in most cases, this served me really well in most situations, but why can't I choose to be completely happy in my alone time because all I wished for was to not be overweight ?

Just like the food that went into my mouth, I'm the only person who is to blame for where I am, so I NEEDED TO TAKE THE REINS OF MY OWN DESTINY !!!!!

This was also sooooooo much easier to achieve when I had my bestfriend dying too.

She was my driving force, my Thursdays would be an aqua class in the morning, and I would take my lunch and sit with her. It certainly broke the inner negative thoughts I had.

How can she be so thankful that I would be sitting next to her? She NEVER said, "Shit Anth I'm in so much pain, not one complaint", she just wanted to get better so she could volunteer at the library and deliver books to people who were sick, just like herself, how could she pay it forward? At the beginning of her sickness she said, " I'm not going to have grey hair, I'm not going be considered elderly, so I need to do what I can do right now".

After that conversation that led me up to signing up I would only get to see her twice because everytime she would have more chemo, they would find the cancer somewhere else, she would have many blood transfusion, and more medication, she would never let me come to hospital to see her, she was too proud, so texting and phone calls I would have to rely on, and even then when her darker moments were so dark, I would check my phone a thousand times to see whether she needed me.

I would send her a photo, always a head photo, because the body wasn't anywhere I wanted it to be, I wanted her to have a whole WOW factor for the day I walked in and she would see a thinner me.

Why was this so important to me? Because over the 7 years Jenny saw me "join" many weightloss programs, and she had seen it so many times join and fail, join and fail, and so the pattern was continous.

"Oh, again, are you going to finish this now?" She would hint. When she first said it, I was insulted, What?  She doesn't believe me? Friends are supose to support you no matter what. Then I realised she came from a very different angle she would have been mortified if she thought she had really offended me, but it came from a really good place, her concern for me and my weight, she knew my husband and my kids, and she just wanted me healthy and it was because of that honesty I loved her completely. I actually looked for her opinion on just about everything and I respected her opinion because I loved her.

So because I had this empty gap where I would usually see Jenny, when she was in hospital I didn't really know what to do, 12WBT came exactly when I needed it, because with good choices , the exercise and the motivation I was able to really keep my emotions intact and how I could respond to anything she wanted, it sure did make me stronger.

She would call me late at night from hospital, just to have her raw moments, and I could take it all on, and listen and love her, in the only way I knew how. To keep it all together for myself,  I had to find myself.

My friendship with Nina was also developing, and we were both at very different fitness levels, Nina would run, with our other BFF's, and I would pound the path with my headphones on, walking because my knees couldn't really take a lot.

Although I was still surrounded by people ....... positive people, I still had this emptiness that I was loosing her and there was nothing I could do . So I had to find the strength from within, to take on what I really did know was the evitable.

I had to support Jenny but I had to find myself too.

In the first 3 weeks I lost something ridiculous like 8 kilos, I just thought. "Oh, that's just my body detoxing" .

We had been looking at buying a new car for months, and months, a Kluger, Territory, Rav4 were all on the list, I had convinced myself that my knees were so bad and they were !!!!! That I needed to drive a car that I could easily step out of and step right onto the ground. My knees were so bad that even getting up off the toilet was painful, with all that weight it would be grinding and crunching and at night I could feel my body screaming in pain, I had pins and needles and numbness because my blood was not circulating properly, my back ached, my hips ached, everything was just so sore, because when you are bending all the time and your joints are barely holding the weight I was a complete mess.

Looking for cars is such an exhausting process, finding the right one, then going to see it, and then test driving , after 2 months of "researching" I was beginning to have a gut full, each time my husband asked me what car I wanted, my answer was, I just want you driving a safe car, because he was going to have the car I was currently driving.

I was 2 weeks into the program and I was sitting in a car, thinking, god I don't even know how to drive a big tank, thats what it feels like, a tank. My first car was a little ford laser, so I am most comfortable in a little car. Then it completely dawns on me. Anthea, you are changing your life here, this program, this moment in your life, you are JFDI. No more excuses I hear Michelle in my ear, and with that I turn to Michael and say, you need to buy the car you want, because at the end of this program be it   2,3,4 ,5 rounds, I'm not going to have knee problems, I'm not going to ache anymore. Lets not give me anymore reasons to make it o-kay that I need to be driving a car that I'm not comfortable in anyway, bloody hell, let's just do it, lets bloody change my life forever !!!!!!!! And with that we made our decision on a sedan car for Michael and we  bought one that week.

So in a work of pure divine intervention.

Jenny was sick, so I needed to get healthy with me being supported by my BFF's, & The Facebook group, they made me stronger to cope with the most important thing. They had NO IDEA that I had began trusting my own instincts and my own actions  110%  by controllingMY choices.  This was all preparing me for MY LIFE & THE LOSS OF A LIFE .


Which brings me back to U2.


One love
One blood
One life
You got to do what you should
One life
With each other
Sisters
Brothers
One life
But we're not the same
We get to
Carry each other
Carry each other

One
One Love