SMALL DISCOVERIES

so my friends and family always tell me that i see the best in people and in situations, that i give people the benefit of the doubt and i always find a silver lining.....well today i found a very significant silver lining which is crucial for my future.....

i tried out for biggest loser season 9, got a call back, said i wasn't going to be big enough to qualify for season 10, but it came around and i still qualified, so i tried out again and got even closer. after i didn't make season 10, i fell into a horrible rut - i gained about 20 lbs during the casting process, wasn't working out, was eating terribly and my body began to feel terrible. i had no energy to do anything.

when i was so disgusted with myself that i couldn't stand it anymore, i said to myself, I HAVE TO DO THIS ON MY OWN. i really don't like when i would hear stories about people just WAITING to get on the biggest loser - there are 250,000 people who try out every season, it is literally like winning the lottery, and your health is so important, it's not something to gamble with. so i started on my own, dragged myself out of the hole i had dug for myself and started the journey once again. this time for real.

so i have lost 17 lbs since 5/22/10 and i am feeling so much better mentally that i have in over ten years. while i started this new chapter of my journey, i heard that casting would soon begin for season 11 - i couldn't believe it had come around again so soon. (i was hoping not to qualify by the time a new season came around). so i debated long and hard about trying out again. part of me thought no question about it, of course i will. but the tiny piece of confidence that i have found in my small but quick success, told me, don't go through that again, you got this, you CAN do this on your own.

i made the decision to give it one last try. i traveled from philly to boston last night, got in at 3am today and went to the casting call. it went really well. my casting director was engaged in what i was saying, laughing at me, kept calling me by my first and last name, gave me a hug at the end, (when she said she wasn't gonna shake hands or hug people haha), and we were done. the people at my table said i really knew my stuff, that i was funny, quick, and that she really seemed to like me. well all of that meant nothing actually because this time i did NOT receive a call back.........

earlier in the day, since i got done so early, i decided to explore the city and had wanted to get some exercise anyway, so i went for a LONG walk, along the harbor, into downtown, it was beautiful and peaceful. i went to the aquarium, and just made it a nice day.

when 9pm came around tonight (the deadline for callbacks) and my phone never showed a call from california, reality hit me that this was not going to happen for me. i was instantly devastated, even though i had prepared for this and told myself not to get upset, easier said than done. i was so upset that i had made this trip......BUT, as i sat in this lovely hotel room, beautiful view of the water, i realized something different this time - i am NOT in that same dark place as i was the other times i had tried out. i felt a second of comfort in knowing that i really HAVE started this on my own and that i AM different mentally about food this time.......so i realized i was running low on water and there is a 7-11 across the street from the hotel. so i went to the store, and on the way to the water, i noticed the ice cream freezer..........

ice cream has been one of my worst triggers in the past.........i LOVE ice cream.......so i walked over to the case, looked at the flavors, saw a few pints of my favorites......and just stared at the freezer for a minute - almost wondering to myself why i wasn't opening the door without thought. so i walked away, got my water bottles and walked to the register. it was so foreign to me.....so as i was walking along the water back to the hotel, it dawned on me that my mental attitude has REALLY started to change - now don't get me wrong, i am still fragile and still have dreams of pizza or chinese food delivery, but this was a HUGE step for me........

when i get upset, i am no longer turning to food. it's like it finally hit me (simple as it should have been in the past), that those bad choices are only going to make me feel worse. i know what i need to do, and i am on the road to success.

so the silver lining to all of this rambling, is that even though i didn't receive a callback for this television show, i discovered something so important in my life right now - and it is that i DO have control, i CAN make the right choices and i WILL do this on my own! :)

thanks for reading!

WELCOME!

LORI HERE,

Thank you so much for taking the time to read about me. I am a 37 year old single woman. I am a Realtor and live in the city of Philadelphia. I grew up in the suburbs in an italian american family. My parents were divorced when I was 7 and my mother raised my sister and I on her own. Even though I came from a pasta eating italian family, I was never an obese or overweight child. In junior high and high school I always thought I was so fat, but when I look back to pictures of myself, I realize I was small, just always bigger than the rest of my ultra skinny classmates and friends.

After high school and as I entered my twenties, I began to gain weight. At that time, I didn't belong to a gym, I wasn't too familiar with exercise. When I realized my weight was becoming a problem, I tried everything - exercise tapes, diet pills, Atkins diet, Weight Watchers, etc. I was never successful and started to get bigger and bigger. I am a very picky eater and don't like vegetables. I was also not secure with myself because of how I looked. I am very confident about who I am on the inside, I'm just not happy with the outside. It consumes my whole life and effects everything that I do.

I was engaged when I was 23 but broke it off before the wedding as he was not the one for me. Soon after, all my friends around me started getting engaged and married, followed by houses, dogs, babies and more babies. I felt lonely and like my social life had come to a screeching halt. We no longer got beach houses for the summer, no longer went on our ski trips as a group in the winter, etc. I think I began to feel lonely and bored. I didn't realize at the time that I began to eat more and more, and was active less and less. When I really stop and think and dig deep inside as to how I have allowed myself to get this big and unhealthy, I can only relate it to the fact that I must have been emotionally eating and filling the void of my social life by ordering a pizza or cheesesteak and ice cream and having it comfort me at the time. If I didn't have any friends to go out with on the weekends, I would order a pizza or chinese food, and that was what I had to look forward to. Then the more I ate, the more I craved.....

I lost some weight on Weight Watchers in 1998 and was down to 178. By 2004 I was back to 205. From April of 2004 to May of 2010, I had gained 85 lbs. My highest weight was 292. My current weight is 280. My goal is to weigh 150.

I have been struggling so much for the past ten years and want to start living my life instead of letting it pass me by. I want this more than anything in the world. I need to be healthy. I want to have a husband and children someday and my clock is ticking! I am going to be 38 this year. I don't want someone to want me the way I look now. Not for vanity reasons, but I would want a partner who takes care of their health and I expect that would be desired in return. I am the most passionate person, and have so much life inside of me and so much love to give. I just need to let it out! I would love to be able to wear a dress, not have to cover my butt with a purse, wear a sleeveless shirt, bend over to tie my shoe and not have to back up against a wall, go skydiving, wear heels, go dancing, LIVE MY LIFE.

This has been a life consuming, life hindering, life threatening issue and I NEED to make this change NOW - and I am READY.

I started documenting my food and exercise with my BODYBUGG beginning on MAY 22, 2010 (7 months until my b-day)

STAY TUNED....... :)

(HERE ARE SOME PICS OF ME AT MY HEAVIEST WEIGHT, then when i was thinner in early 2000's, then high school, then young)