Clean Simple Eats

So I have struggled with body image most of my grown-up body life. Once I got into my teenage years I really struggled with confidence with my body. I didn’t like how I looked and was completely lacking in confidence that anyone else would either.

There was a brief year or two period in college where I felt good about my body image.

But then I got married and eight months later got pregnant with Jacob. I then was getting pregnant roughly every eighteen months after that.

I am pretty sure every woman that has conceived a child will agree that pregnancy changes your body. What you body does to bring a child into the world is amazing but it also changes things.

I’ve always felt like I was fighting my body to be healthy. I have gone through various ups and downs of what I thought to be healthy eating and ups and downs as far as physical exercise and it has been hard.

Where other woman seemed to bounce back so quickly I felt like I had to work…and work HARD. every. single. day. It was discouraging and defeating. And every time I slipped I would just say, I will start again next week and inconsistency got the better of me WAY more times than I would like to admit.

Plus, it was a little discouraging trying to go through so much effort to lose baby weight only to gain it back again. I knew I didn’t want to just not do anything but it was something that was nagging me in the back of my mind.

It took me over a YEAR to lose any weight after having Jacob. It was very discouraging. It even got to the point where I went to see a doctor because I had no idea what else to do and wondered if there was something wrong.

But I finally found something that worked and got back to my pre-pregnancy weight the month I got pregnant with Sarah. After Sarah, I could never lose the last five pounds. With Benjamin, I could never lose the last ten-to-fifteen pounds. That was really not the path I wanted to go down!

After I had Lydia I tried for a couple months to begin losing some weight and I was at a standstill. The scale wasn’t moving up but it definitely wasn’t moving down either.

THEN I came across Clean Simple Eats. I didn’t really know what it was or meant but I knew it must be supposedly good for me. I had heard of “clean eating” before but honestly didn’t really know what it meant and it just sounded to hard to commit to with my young family and NO extra time.

So I took the plunge and bought the Fall Meal plan back in September. It was the weekend before they were beginning one of their “challenges” but we were just about to go on our Idaho trip and I didn’t want to start something only to be immediately interrupted.

So I printed out the recipes and meal plans and decided we would start up the first of October.

AND WE DID.

It was amazing how quickly my mindset on food changed.

The only time I would lose weight is when I dramatically cut out calories for an extended period of time and even then it wasn’t always a guarantee. And I was always wanting more.

So that was what immediately blew me away about this meal plan. I was eating TONS. So much that sometimes I had to push myself to finish things. And even more surprising for me was that I wasn’t craving things. I wasn’t wanting to sneak a little treat while the kids were napping or wondering when I could “treat” myself for good eating behavior {which, by the way, isn’t that statement so messed up anyway – treating yourself for good eating behavior!}.

We followed the meal plan faithfully for the whole seven weeks it is outlined. There were a couple times when we were out of town but we would pick right up where we left off and keep going.

And I thought when we were away and we could “cheat” that it would be so welcomed…but it wasn’t. I was craving my good, simple, clean food. Mark was actually the first to bring up how good he felt. We just felt better. Physically, mentally, and emotionally. It quickly became a game-changer.

What started as a way to hopefully lose some weight has become a life-style change. We don’t want to stop. Our kids love it too and I would even go so far as to say it has helped with some behavior issues with one of my children in helping them be a little more stable emotionally.

There are still many exercise and food goals that I want to be better at. But I am giving myself grace and focusing on what I can until I GOT IT and then adding in more.

But the great part is that even though I am not ready to strut around in my swimsuit I am feeling really great and am changing negative behavior and relationships I have had with food most of my life.

I am not one to really comment on my health or feelings about my appearance to others. And I kept putting off this post two or three times but I knew I couldn’t let this year go by without documenting one of my new favorite things. A healthier mind and body for me and for my family.

Here’s to more health goals for 2020!