He changes us from the inside out

Melanie and I were talking the other night and she made a suggestion. I trust Melanie completely and value her input and opinions so I took her ideas to heart and am going to act on them. Mel has come to hear me speak many times and I appreciate that so much. She has said she never gets tired of hearing my story but she thinks I need to add to it.  I don’t go into much detail about some of the things that have happened in the last couple of years namely my marriage and my weight loss. So I am going to begin to share and blog about these subjects one at a time and I will begin with my weight loss.

Melanie said I need to share about this because I lost a SIGNIFICANT amount of weight starting at the end of 2009 and through the first half of 2010 and that people would be inspired by it. I did a program called SLIM4LIFE and I called them to see if I could get the photo they took when I started the program.  A picture is worth 1000 words so I hope they can find it .I don’t really have any other photos; I refused to let my picture be taken because I was so ashamed. When I first joined Facebook I had no pictures of me up because I was just so very embarrassed.  

 Let me take you back and share my weight history. In school I was always little and never had a weight problem, I might would gain a few pounds but I could always lose them and I stayed quite active. My eating habits were not good though since my mother was usually passed out and I spent so much time alone. I would usually go get fast food. I never really learned to cook or anything but I always had money so I would just go out to eat at places like: McDonalds, Jack in the Box, Wendy’s, Burger King, Taco Inn, Arby’s Taco Bueno, Taco Bell, etc. I could tell you my favorites from all those places back in the late 70’s, it was kind of an adventure when I would decide where I would eat each night because some of these places were kind of far from my home but it was a way I passed the time and got out of the house so I wouldn’t feel so lonely.

After mother died I was probably the skinniest I had ever been as I prepared for my trip to Hawaii but by the end of the summer I began to pack on the pounds.  Where I had felt lonely before mother’s death after her death I just felt desolate and so very isolated because I was in that house by myself. I guess I ate to comfort myself. I think by the end of that first year at Eastfield I had probably gained 30 pounds, I’m not sure but I had gained a lot.

Not long after that I went to live with Kathey where I began to eat a lot healthier and as I felt better about myself and my situation some of the weight came off. It was just so nice to feel loved. I still wasn’t as thin as I wanted to be so I ended up going to a diet doctor and getting some diet pills ( this is where I was first introduced to speed of any kind and I really liked it, I didn’t have a problem taking it because it was prescribed by a doctor. This act and attitude opened the door that would lead to my drug abuse, it can start so innocently.) The weight dropped off really fast and my last couple of years of college I was thin and felt good about my appearance again.

Weight issues are a difficult situation: when people feel bad about themselves they can turn to food for comfort but as they put on weight they feel worse about themselves and the weight gain can spiral out of control just like any addiction.

I gained weight when I had my kids and it was hard to lose that so I stayed a little heavy but it wasn’t out of control, I was just overweight. But as I said weight was always an issue.

In 1996 when we moved back to the Dallas area and I got my job as a Special Ed Coordinator I went back to a Doctor for diet pills that I found in Rockwall. He was quite liberal with the diet pills and I dropped weight really fast. I felt the best about my appearance than I had in a long time. My job was great, I felt thin, and things were the best they had ever been.

But then Kathey got sick and when I knew she was going to die I not only became a meth addict I got extremely overweight. I guess the food comforted me like it did when mother died and the meth made me feel as if I was invincible. No one would have ever thought I was a meth addict. To this day I don’t understand how I stayed so heavy. I was very overweight and using meth everyday. Maybe my metabolism was out of sorts. But when my life imploded I was struck by the irony that I was a fat meth addict. I couldn’t even find solace in the fact that I was thin. It was almost comical in a bitter sort of way.

Things would get better after I went to rehab where I lost weight and everyone else gained, I think I finally got my body balanced and I felt good. After rehab I relapsed on meth and lost more then I went to prison. In prison I gained and when I got out on parole I was overweight again but I just didn’t care. My weight was the furthest thing from my mind and I just didn’t think I could change it, I didn’t think I had the will power so I just accepted the fact that I was overweight trying to convince myself that some people are just meant to be heavy. Then I accepted Jesus Christ as my savior and HE placed an everlasting hope in my heart and began to change me from the inside out. To be continued……………….