Music Video:

Over the past couple of days, I've been taking care of our HSN blog, after that nasty virus attacked all of the 'javascript' on the page. It was such a thrill to find that I still had my 'celebrating my faith' music on this blog. I hope you enjoy listening to it as much as I do! I definitely won't be changing my template any time too soon! (If you change your template, no more javascript!)

Oh, yeah, sorry I got distracted by the music! One thing that we all have in common as mothers (well the greater percentage of us) is our struggles with our weight.

Mine began after the birth of my beautiful son in 1990. When I found out I was pregnant with him, I was a mere 102 lbs, by the end of my pregnancy I was a whopping 212 lbs. Yikes, eh? Our Father is wonderful, he trusts us to fall in love with this precious gift that he's entrusted us! I wasn't worried, I was so in love with being this child's mom, I didn't even think about it until...Yep, bathing suit season.

Luckily, I was a single mother and couldn't always afford to insure my car. That's right, it was walking for me and I dropped all of the weight except for 15 lbs. It took 13 months. Then I met my wonderful husband and he made me feel so good about myself, I didn't worry about those extra pounds. Since then, I've had two other blessings and despite special diets, I gained an unbelievable amount of weight. I went up to 215 with my dd and 218 with my youngest ds.

As we all know, when you have three children under 5 in the house, the only real exercise you get is cleaning and the occasional walk to the local park. I'd be praying the whole time that there would be an available park bench to park my voluptious self. I was Kristie Alley, truly! Color her hair dirty blond and you'd find me. Okay, minus her beautiful face, too! And like her, I tried every diet with some results. I'd lose the weight, only to gain 5 to 10 pounds, the minute I thought to eat 'normal'. Today, I'm 13 pounds heavier than I was in 1989. But I'm in control now.

I think personally, it's normal to put on a few extra pounds during the winter and the constant moving around that we've been doing the past couple of years. But I'm approaching 40 and I refuse to take on my family's health problems. My mother has put on at least 45 pounds in the past 10 years. Four years ago, she had to have an operation on her knee, after a fall. She has problems with her blood pressure and thyroid. My dad suffered 3 stokes over the past 2 1/2 years and his cholesterol is too high!

It's been 9 years now that I've been a vegetarian. It started when I began to have pain in my legs and found myself visiting doctor after doctor for relief. I was finding myself unable to run after my young family. Until I met a rheumatologist, who suggested that it might be in my head! And she was right! She explained how food is processed in our bodies, the chemicals that are released, how it reacts with the chemicals produced in our head. Not only was I harming myself with too much processed 'mommy' helper foods but I was eating food combinations that my body found intolerable.

It didn't take long for me to find my enemy - it was meat. Looking back, again to the family tree, my grandmother was also a long time vegetarian. She was unable to process meat, like me. A great book that I bought was 'The Hayes Diet', which talks about food combining and the no-no's! I'm not telling you to throw out the contents of your fridge but think about the order in which you put them in your body. I need to go but I'll be back! I'll tell you what I've got planned for myself over the next couple of months. Hope to see you on the flip side!

Blessings,

Thea >< ><