Ok.  Here's the disgusting truth.  I stepped on the scale today and it revealed a MAJOR problem....  One which I've ignored and battled off and on for years.  I've NEVER been this heavy and YES, I am what the medical professionals consider morbidly obese.  Shoot.  Forget the medical professionals.  I KNOW I am morbidly obese.  This has to change.  Permanently.

Growing up, I was never fat.  In fact, I was a tall and skinny kid.  Even though I didn't have a weight problem, I wasn't the most athletic or fit child either.  At one point in my teen years, a nutritionist told my parents that I had a propensity toward obesity because of my BMI, which I truly don't remember what it was now.  This hurt my feelings, but didn't change the way I ate or thought about food.  I just sort of kept cruising ... and then came college.

I didn't gain the freshman 15.  It was more like the sophomore 50.  In between my freshman and sophomore years of college, I spent a summer working in the churches of Mexico City.  While there, I contracted a parasite that 1.) made me feel TERRIBLE and 2.) made me lose a TON of weight.  I went to the doctor in Mexico and he gave me a pill... just one pill.   I felt better.  One year later I was at least 50 lbs heavier.

Over the next few years I ballooned and ignored the issue.  Throughout the past two decades, I gained and lost weight here and there... and then I got married.  Now, I'm not blaming marriage on my weight....  but something happened.  My husband and I finally had found one another and suddenly exercise seemed to go on the back burner.  Life began to pick up speed and ....

Here I am, now 40 years old, and I weigh 338 lbs.  You have NO idea how hard that is for me to broadcast.  I'm embarrassed and ashamed by my apparent lack of concern for my health, appearance, well-being, and family  However, I have to share that with you so you all know the gravity of this issue.  It's time to shift gears and I have a few reasons why it is NECESSARY for me change NOW and blog about my journey:

1.) I now have a daughter.  So far, I don't have type 2 diabetes, but I know that's right around the corner if I don't change IMMEDIATELY.
2.) Perhaps someone else, if anyone else ever chooses to read this blog, will resonate with my situation and be encouraged.
3.) Those of you who read this can pray for me as I begin my personal reformation.
4.) By blogging about my journey, I can remember where I started... how I started.... how I felt as I started.
5.) As I move forward, I can write out my goals, celebrate my victories, and bemoan my failures as a press on.

Well, that's enough for a first blog.  There's a lot more to share, but my last thought on this for today is this:

My body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.  Really, He doesn't need this big a temple.