The Beginning

Obese. Heavy. Overweight. Stout. Portly. Rotund. Chubby. Big-Boned. Large. Generously Proportioned. Plus-sized. Solid. Plump. Fat. These words (and the countless others like them) described me…at least on the outside. Not any more! This is the story of my journey to good health, fitness and “normalcy.” By the summer of 2004, I had become incredibly aware of my own level of inactivity and my increasingly-sedentary lifestyle. The school where I worked was a campus and I could tell that more and more often, I was avoiding climbing the stairs and walking among the different buildings. I began to think it might be time to do something about it. During that summer, I saw a segment on “The Today Show.” The teaser line was, “Lose weight playing a video game.” I was intrigued. The segment had two high-school age kids who demonstrated Dance Dance Revolution (DDR) on PlayStation 2. Both of them had lost significant amounts of weight…but that was secondary to me. They seemed to have so much fun while exercising! I thought maybe that was just what I needed to get fit. I called my husband, Steve, and told him we had to get PlayStation 2 and DDR immediately! As soon as I hung up, I wondered, “How many wives call their husbands to buy a PlayStation? God, he’s lucky.” That weekend, we got the game and the game system. We went to make all the connections and realized we needed another cord. We bought the cord and that was it. It sat unconnected on top of our TV for the next six months. BUT during that six month period, I had reached an important place within myself. I turned 38 that October and decided that I wanted to prevent any potential health problems before they arose. I had been overweight/obese virtually since childhood. I had never been “normal” in terms of weight. My blood pressure and cholesterol had always been good, but I knew my grandfather had been diabetic and I was at risk for that, as well as a variety of other weight-related issues. I decided I had to change my life. I spent that six months thinking about how to change my habits. I had heard lots of “diet” stories over the years and none appealed to me. I wanted to eat bread. I wanted to eat pasta. I wanted to eat dessert. I decided that only I could make my plan. So I developed the “Jane Reed” plan, which was to make a conscious decision to eat better (more fruits, vegetables and whole grains) every day. I also decided that I would eat whatever I wanted (basically), but eat half of what I would have eaten previously. I was also going to do DDR at least one hour a day. I started on January 1, 2005. I weighed 320 pounds.