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How Weight Watchers Helped Me Lose 96 Pounds In 2 Years

June 18, 2017
         
By Holly Pernice, Prevention
               

Before: 300
After: 204

I had been overweight most of my life, but in May of 2015 I was in a lot of pain. I fell down the stairs and tore my meniscus in both of my knees and had bulging disks in my back. I had surgery on one knee, but still had to have the other one done. It hurt to do simple things like go to the mailbox or walk up the stairs—things that should be easy to do. As a result, I became sedentary.

[post_ads]To cope, I started to eat a lot. It was the only thing that seemed to make me happy. I stopped going out with friends because every time I'd go to my closet to find something to wear, nothing fit. So I'd stay in and eat. I knew that was a sign that I needed to lose weight, but I always thought, "I'm 5' 10", I'm tall. I can carry weight better than other people."
               
             
The Change
When I finally went to a doctor's appointment and stepped on a scale, I weighed more than 300 pounds. That was my breaking point. Before I hit that number, I thought, "Oh, 250 pounds, 270 pounds, that's okay." But when I saw 300 pounds, I was stunned. I broke down, sobbing. My doctor and I talked about it and decided to come up with a plan. I told my doctor that I wanted to join Weight Watchers because I had heard great things about the program.

I was still young and I wanted to live life. I wanted to go out and dance and travel. I'm single, so I wanted to be out there meeting guys. I didn't want to just give up.
                          
A post shared by Holly Wood (@amazonbella) on
                 
The Food
Joining Weight Watchers was definitely the major change I needed to get my health and weight in check. I needed to find a plan that would be a lifestyle change, not just a diet. Weight Watchers taught me the value of different foods through their points system, which assigns a point value to every food and gives you a personalized point budget to follow every day. That really put everything into perspective for me. I didn't have to stop eating my favorite foods, I just had to track what I was eating and control my portions. I didn't eliminate anything.
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Though I used to be an emotional eater, which meant never paying attention to what I was eating, with this program I have to acknowledge what I'm putting in my body and track it. So I learned how to plan out my day and figure out what kinds of foods would make me feel good—and taste good. Now, I'll have scrambled eggs in the morning, and I'll pack a salad filled with protein for lunch. I'll still pack a brownie or a cookie or some sort of treat for my midday snack because those are the things that make me happy. But now I don't need to have six cookies to be satisfied.
               
A post shared by Holly Wood (@amazonbella) on
               

The Workouts
When I first started working out, I was pretty heavy and I had a lot of injuries. So I started by just moving more. I got a fitness tracker to monitor how much I was walking and parked my car further away so that I could get more steps. I'd move around my apartment or march in place during commercials while watching TV. I started incorporating as much movement as I could during the day. After I got some of the weight off, I bought a treadmill and an indoor bike. I knew that if I had those things in my apartment, there'd be no excuse not to work out. I started out by spending 10 or 15 minutes walking or biking.

[post_ads]Another thing that got me active was adopting my puppy, Niko. Puppies have a ton of energy and require a lot of attention, so he forced me to run up and down the stairs to potty train him. At first we'd do 10- to 15-minute walks here and there, but now we're up to taking walks two to three times a day for up to 30 to 40 minutes at a time.
                       
A post shared by Holly Wood (@amazonbella) on
              
Sticking With It
I'm a social person, I like challenges, and I'm a little bit competitive. I think joining Weight Watchers, making friends there, and sharing my accomplishments with them really helped me stick to the plan. Once I learned which foods were more nutritionally valuable, I started realizing that there are healthier alternatives for foods I normally ate. I learned that if I managed my points right throughout the day, I'd have enough of them left to have a great dinner. That made the plan easy to stick to.
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Planning out my points and meals is really helpful for when I do want to go out after work to have a few glasses of wine or a slice of pizza.

A post shared by Holly Wood (@amazonbella) on
                
The Reward
Since I've lost the weight, I can get up and down the stairs without any pain. I have more confidence and more energy in general. For me, the biggest reward has been being able to walk into any store I want and find clothes that fit. After being plus-size for the majority of my life, buying clothes anywhere I want to is the thing that puts a smile on my face.

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Health Magazine: How Weight Watchers Helped Me Lose 96 Pounds In 2 Years
How Weight Watchers Helped Me Lose 96 Pounds In 2 Years
​​Holly Pernice says learning food values and portion control was key to losing more than 90 pounds.
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Health Magazine
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