My weight loss journey

This post is long overdue. Many reasons for publishing this post which was in draft form for a while (draft from May 2011):

1. I want to remember for myself what I went through, my thought process, my actions. This is kind of a "lessons learnt" post. If in future I ever "slip" and need inspiration, I'm setting something up to help myself.
2. I truly hope it will help others like me find motivation. For years I was in denial about my body. Once I opened my mind to the change, change became me.
3. This is part of Rian's blog because Rian makes me want to be a better mom, a fitter mom, a more healthy mom. Children are a mirror of their parents' habits and I want to set very good ones for Rian.
4. I am also kinda superstitious about these goody goody posts and believe somehow that I'll jinx my efforts, so never posted a word about my weight loss while I was trying to lose weight. Now that I'm 10 months into maintenance, I feel this is worth sharing.
5. After the fact discovery of this 3min+ TED talk: Keep your goals to yourself.

Disclaimer: This is my blog, and the opinions expressed are solely my own. You may or may not agree with my thoughts, and are free to comment so. I'm not affiliated and am not a spokesperson for Weight Watchers. The program helped me achieve my goals. Also, YMMV. Every human body is built differently. I just had to tap into mine, and figure out the ways in which I could make my unique body use calories more efficiently, burn off fat, and build muscle. The first step to do this was to believe it can be done, to believe that I have the power to change myself. That first step was the hardest.

The journey

Transformations don't happen overnight. For me, this journey started after my marriage, in small steps, and the biggest change came after 7 years in the form of Weight Watchers.

I've forever been a fat person. In strict BMI calculation sense, I've been "overweight" all my life. Thankfully never went into the "obese" category. I was absolutely happy with my body most of the times. Mom always encouraged me to sit and study, and I was always the last person in my sports class to finish the 100m running race -- no big deal. Everything worked out great till my post graduation M.Tech. finished in IITB. In Jan '02, I was engaged to the most wonderful man :-) and had a job in hand.

The 10 month stay in my first job in Bangalore was where my first big weight gain happened, ~10 pounds or so. It happened slowly, with free food at work, and almost 12-14 hrs every day being a "common" theme. Food was rich and tasty, and cooked outside. This was a complete change to hostel food which tasted horrible, and mom's food which used to be cooked at home, so still very healthy in comparison. My first brush with "working out" happened in Bangalore at a local club with a lovely lady teaching in her home terrace. This was a step class, and I absolutely loved it. I went almost 3-4 times a week on weekday mornings. In the Diwali of 2002, I took a break to be with parents for one final Diwali before getting married. Mom went overboard in cooking wonderful stuff, and I too had one too many of her delicious items. The Mamata who got married was way different from the Mamata who got engaged. After coming to the US in Jan '03, I didn't change much. 5'4" at 155 lbs, +/- 2-3 lbs was the norm for me. I was a size 12 forever, and pretty happy with it.

My hubby is a wonderful person. He loves to hike and ski and play tennis. You get the idea - handsome dude who likes to stay active. Then he ends up with this woman who'd rather drive than walk :-) He never pushed me hard, although he slowly started nudging me to invest in the activities he loved. In 2003 I tried skiing for the first time, and absolutely hated it. I had no balance, a heavy body, and no muscles.

After I got back, I signed up with Curves, a local gym meant for women. I started enjoying the workouts, and was motivated with the little achievements I had - a few inches lost here and there. I never lost pounds though, and so I quit Curves. Keep in mind I only did their workout part, and never bothered to look at what or how much I was eating. I always thought I eat healthy and I do not need to change that. I now admit I was too lazy to count calories.

In summer I tried hiking with Amit and loved it. We tried to go up to Half Dome but either Amit over-estimated my enthusiasm or under-estimated the great dome. We did well though, for starters, and noted our mistakes. Over the next 3 years I enjoyed our small hikes here and there, but I was always the last person in the group :-) We started playing badminton on and off too, and a swim here and there.

The motivation

I joined VMware in Feb '06, and met a wonderful person called Craig Williams, and he started a 3-days a week workout program class "vFit Bootcamp". It was tough, but very very fun. This was my first brush with "real" workout and training. Some things pushed me to go 3 days every week. Craig also had incentives like if we did 15 of 18 classes, we'd get a t-shirt etc. I loved those small goodies, and also wanted "check marks" in my "attendance record". I guess the child in me enjoyed these. Never once though did I pay attention to what I was eating, again. Just assumed I was always eating (and drinking) healthy. No weight loss. No inches loss. I did gain muscle though, and increased my endurance. I could sustain an hour long workout, and I did a few 5k jog/walks.

After working out with Craig for ~3 months, I attempted Half Dome again, and this time around we did it. We reached the top. This was a big big achievement for me. We packed well, and we covered 17 miles with 5000 ft elevation gain in 12 hours. Vidyut, Snehal and Sudarshan accompanied Amit and me on this trip. On the way down though, due to bad form, I hurt both my knees.

Numerous doctor visits followed, with lots of physical therapy, and cortisone shots, some of which helped. We also bought a townhome later that year, and got busy with setting up the nest.

In spring of '07 I attended an informational lecture and workout series by our clinic PAMF, a class called "Taking charge of your body". This helped me understand that there is a big component of health which comes from good food, and perhaps I'm missing these items. I started making small changes in my diet. For starters, I started having more fruits. I remember clearly, I was a total fan of grapefruit back then :-) Those 6 weeks started a journey of introspection for me. I started to have a concept of making choices in food.

The final panic

Finally in Oct '07 I had knee surgery on my right knee for lateral release of the patellar muscles. My recovery has just begun, with physical therapy, when we discovered I got pregnant. It was not in our plan right after knee surgery to have a baby. OTOH somehow I felt motivated by this little being inside me to start becoming a better mom. I started taking my physical therapy very seriously. Unfortunately I ran into insurance issues and could not take any more physical therapy. This was a scary period, and Amit helped me understand I needed to supplement it with personal training. I remember very clearly when I went for my first session with Maria, I marked on the form that I was not pregnant, and a week later I was seeing her and telling her I was pregnant. That was funny in some sense. Maria decided to focus on strengthening my back, and helping my knee recover by strengthening my leg muscles.

A whole lot of good advice started flowing in once friends and family knew about our pregnancy. The most helpful piece came from my OB about how much weight I needed to gain. Her words were very clear: You’re 157 pounds. Even if you don’t gain a single pound, I would not be worried. I knew I had to be super careful. Amit’s mom agreed to come and stay with us for 5 months, mainly so that I could have nutritious home-cooked food while I was nurturing a little being inside me. I don’t recall any crazy “pregnancy cravings” and did not have too many incidents of over eating. Amit also started working for a start-up at that time, so having her with us helped me tremendously for all the planning, the baby shower, and the baby registry. It’s a blessing to have her in our life. I continued seeing my personal trainer Maria once a week. I also started walking with Amit’s mom in the evenings after dinner. I joined an aqua aerobics class in a nearby 24 hour fitness gym. I also kept working almost till the week I delivered Rian, in an effort to remain active. With all these little things planned out, I was happy to gain only 16 pounds due to pregnancy. I continued with my personal trainer and aqua aerobics till my delivery week. Three weeks after Rian was born, the scale again read 157 pounds, and I was happy. After Rian was born, I didn’t continue with personal training or aqua aerobics. The only workout I had was feeding Rian :-) and taking care of his schedule of sleep and food. I used to enjoy an occasional walk with mom or Amit, but didn’t invest any time in workout till I had finished breastfeeding (~8 months). 

The workouts

After Rian turned 9 months old, I joined our on-site office gym in April 2009. My three previous workout experiences had been in a group setting: step class in Bangalore, vFit bootcamp with Craig, and group-ex with 24 hr. Personal training was too expensive, and served its purpose when I needed it, but I needed to find a longer-term sustainable solution. I started off with gym and found some classes to attend. I was not very regular in the beginning.

Two friends helped me keep my workout routine. Parul had her second daughter 5 weeks before Rian was born. Anjali’s son was born 4 months after Rian. When these ladies were done breastfeeding, they too joined the gym. Together, we started motivating each other to keep our gym class schedule. If I was feeling low and lazy on days, Anjali or Parul or both would make sure I got up and out of my chair. The trio of us became fairly regular to the gym group-ex classes. Even our managers knew we spent lunch hours at the gym. Lunches became working lunches where were grabbed food at our own desk. The rest of the day became super efficient, with no time to waste and chit-chat. Stress level at work also slowly started reducing, even though we had less time to work, since the body was feeling better, physically and mentally. 

Once we got into the groove, our workouts became very intense. We were hitting hard with at least 3 times a week, and sometimes 5. Most of our classes were an hour long. Spinning was the toughest to sustain. Joleen didn’t give us breaks. Osnat was merciless in the bootcamps. Melinda made us breathless in her classes. There was no compromise. No pain, no gain. It took us sheer willpower to get up from our seats, and go to the gym, change and get to class on time. Having invested those 15 minutes and brain power, there was no compromise for that one hour of workout time. That became our “me time”. At the end of the workout, we were sweaty, messy, and exhausted.Slowly, we started seeing results. Actually, let me rephrase: Anjali started seeing results in weight loss. Anjali had been skinny to begin with, but had 40 or so pounds from her pregnancy. She worked out two classes back to back two days a week, and at least one class every other day – 7 hours of workout in 5 working days. By the end of 2010, Anjali was fitting into her pre-pregnancy jeans already. 

Parul and me were definitely feeling fitter, gaining muscle, and our clothes were fitting better. But the scale would not budge. In November, Parul made aggressive changes to her diet: she started having a super-light salad for lunch, 5 days a week. She also started staying away from sweets and other cravings. By end of December 2009, Parul started seeing a big change in the scale and was pleased with the results.For me, both Anjali and Parul’s success motivated me to start moving the scale. But I did not have Anjali’s energy for such intense workouts or Parul’s perseverance to a strict diet. In the first week of Jan 2010, I happened to see an invitation for Weight Watchers at Work. This was a weekly one hour meeting on Tuesday mornings in our office for an hr. The 19-week commitment was ~$200. The way I saw this was: the most successful weight loss program of America is coming to my office, and all I need to do is invest an hour every week. They were offering two free meetings for trial. At the end of two Tuesdays, I had my doubts, but I was committed to giving this a shot. I signed up.

Weight Watchers: My biggest break 

I used to believe it is not easy to count calories, especially for Indian food. Then this meeting came along, and had a simplistic way of calculating Points from calories, fat gms and fiber gms. To an engineer, it made sense. Eat overall less calories, more fiber, and less fat. The math was simple on paper: to lose a pound of weight, I had to lose 3500 calories. If my target was a week, it translated to losing 500 calories every day. Eat 250 less, and burn 250 more. This had me sold.The essence of the program is simple: based on your current weight, you are allocated a certain number of Points that you can eat daily. In addition to the daily allowance (which expires every day btw), you get a few Weekly allowance Points that you can use on planned splurges like birthdays, dinners outside, or those devilish snack attacks. As long as you stay within your Points allowance, you are guaranteed to lose weight. It’s a no brainer!  

I started making efforts to participate in the program whole-heartedly. This unleashed a new me who became crazy about calorie research. After the first 4 weeks (1/12/10 to 2/9/10 – Amit’s birthday), I had calculated the Points values for all my veggies that my cook made regularly, rotis, desserts, and I had lost 6.6 pounds. I was very proud of my progress, and it became a cycle. My leader said I really worked the program scientifically. Counting and keeping score really works in weight management. Regardless of the yardstick you use, the basic rule is to keep a log of how much you eat, and reduce your intake to reduce your weight. 

As Amit called it, these are my KPIs plotted over time :-) 

Mamata weight loss KPI

The meetings were very helpful. I got many good suggestions for food substitutions. I never knew egg whites are so tasty and filling, and an omlette containing spinach, broccoli, tomatoes, onions, egg whites, with ketchup and whole wheat toast bread can keep me going from 8am to 1pm! I discovered sandwich thins when the burger craze came in. Every week the meetings deal with one topic, and it helps to maintain the focus. My challenge was the “eating out” week, and I got many good suggestions from my team members.

Monday through Friday I diligently hit the gym. 

Motivational quotes

- If you fail to plan, you plan to fail- Knowledge is power 
- When I would do less than 20 reps, and I'd crib to myself that I was cheating, Craig would always remind us "Hey, it's not cheating. You did 15. Think of all those people who are still sitting on their office chairs".

- I remember instructor Joleen would make us do lunges and squats and bring us to a point where we would literally cry. And then she would say “Now give me 8 more!”
- Nothing tastes as good as being thin feels
- Success comes in CANs 

What helped

- Friends

- Having an easily accessible gym at the workplace, with good group-ex offerings
- A very supportive husband who never pushed, but always gently nudged. The initiative has to be born within me and come from inside.
- A super cute healthy baby who made me want to be a better mom
- The taste of initial success, and its immediate benefits on my improved health and happiness 

What did not help (Challenges)

- Feeling too guilty about missing workouts. Later I discovered that the negative energy just made me feel worse and eat even more. It’s alright to miss once in a while and bounce right back when you get a chance.
- Eating too fast. The brain needs 20 mins to register the food that goes into our stomach. 

Hindsight 

It is always easy to go back and criticize the past. That is not my intention here. Looking back at life now from this current healthy perspective, and absolutely loving my healthy new body, I wish I had done a few things differently. Here's a short list: It is always easy to go back and criticize the past. That is not my intention here. Looking back at life now from this current healthy perspective, and absolutely loving my healthy new body, I wish I had done a few things differently. Here's a short list:

• I had no job for the first 6 months after marriage. I wish I had picked up basic cooking skills to make healthy food at home, and gotten into a routine of it. Mom always kept me away from the kitchen, and in her place, she was right - it gave me more time to study. Getting into routine is important so it gives you speed. I still take an hour to make a sabji, or 10 rotis.

• In those jobless days, I wish I had taken up simple things like walking for an hr in the afternoons. Yes it was cold in winter/spring, and I had jackets on till July, and I loved my afternoon 3 hour naps after eating loads of rice, but looking back I think there was a window of opportunity which I should have explored.

• A friend commented I am good at google search and research/planning for vacations, etc. I should have investigated in some weight loss program. I had all the time in the world back then. America's most successful weight loss program would have been easy to discover. 

 

Lessons learnt

Here are some take-aways from the "Taking charge of your body" class that the instructor Karen shared with us. Reviewing them now, while writing this blog post – all of this makes a whole lot of sense. I assimilated this same information from my Weight Watchers meetings over time: 

Eating in a Sensible WayEating in a Sensible Way 
* Eat smaller portions. Be observant of plate size. Share portions in restaurants or order smaller portions or half portions. 
* Remember intuitive eating -- eating when you are hungry and stopping when you are just full. To practice, get out your food record, and keep one for several days to fine tune your intuitive eating. 
* Don’t underestimate the value of eating three regular meals. If you are over hungry at any meal, you may need a small, healthful snack to fuel your body, and to keep yourself from being over hungry at a meal, and then overeating as a result. Eating regular meals and snacks can also help diminish food cravings. 
* Make sure that breakfast is part of your day. Skipping breakfast means that you will most likely eat high calorie, not so healthy foods in the late afternoon or in the evening after dinner. 
* Do not eat while you are working. You need to be conscious of what you are eating when you are eating-- especially to tune into hunger and satiety. You need to appreciate what you are eating to get enjoyment from the food you eat and to perhaps less, instead of more. 
* Read labels to make healthier choices. How big is the portion, and how much are you eating? What kind of fat are you eating? Are you balancing high fat foods with eating plenty of low fat foods? How much sodium is in a product? What about the quantity of sugar? Are you eating foods which will contribute fiber? Are you eating plenty of whole grains? 
* Are you eating the same foods all the time or are you varying the foods you are eating so that you are eating a wide variety of foods helping you to get all of the nutrients your body needs to carry you through your day? 
* Plan ahead. You cannot eat something if it is not in your cupboard or refrigerator? Be sure you have plenty of healthful foods around? 
* Portion control. Do you need to get out the measuring cups to see how much you are really eating? What about measuring foods like rice and pasta and grains? What about the size of your plates? What about the portions you are getting in restaurants? Resign from the clean plate club!! 
* Eat more high volume, low calorie, nutrient rich, fiber rich foods such as fruits, vegetables, and whole grains? How wonderful the tastes are............. 
* Eat low-fat or non-fat dairy products -- they supply so many healthful nutrients. 
* Eat lean portions of meat, fish, and poultry. Be aware of portion sizes with cheese. 
* Go for healthy fats -- more fats higher in monounsaturated fats. Be aware of foods high in saturated fat and trans-fat which increase your blood cholesterol levels. 
* Eat responsibly..........pay attention to your first wave of hunger and be ready with a food supply to diminish your hunger and to avoid overeating. 
* Keep food records. Note what you are eating and how it compares to the recommendations in the food guide pyramid. Track hunger and fullness. Note any emotional eating and find alternatives to eating emotionally. 
* Be a good role model for your children. Have family meals.Using Your BodyUsing Your Body 
* Keep exercise records. 
* Wear a pedometer. Take note of how many steps you are taking a day, and try to increase that amount each day. 
* Walk with a buddy, or with your radio, or just enjoy the beautiful out-of-doors. 
* Make a date with yourself for your exercise; put it on your calendar. 
* Participate in a variety of exercises --it means less wear and tear on various parts of your body. 
* Enjoy what you do for your physical movement. That makes doing those activities all the easier. 
* Be a good role model for your children. 
* Don’t set your expectations so high that you set yourself up for failure. 
* Exercising most days is really helpful, and then it just becomes part of your day. 
* Little things count such as walking up steps and parking farther away from the store.  
* The first ingredient on the list should be a “whole” grain such as “whole wheat” or “whole rye”. 
* “Wheat” and “enriched wheat” refers to refined white flour. 
* “100% whole grain” means no refined flour 
* “Made with whole grain” means that the food may be made with either a little or a lot of whole grain 
* “Whole grain” can mean that only 51% of the flour is whole grain. 51% is the minimum amount that a food needs to carry the health claim that “whole grains may reduce the risk of heart disease”. 
* “Good source of whole grain” means that there may be as little as 8 grams of whole grains per serving. 
* “Excellent source of whole grain” means as little as16 grams of whole grain per serving. 
* "Multigrain” means that the food contains several different grains; it may not contain any whole grain. 
* Oat bread usually has little oats in it. 
* Healthy sounding names such as Harvest Wheat, Crunchy Oat, Honey Wheatberry bread often contain little or no whole grain. 
* Fresh-baked, “whole grain” breads and bagels at bakeries and delis may just have a sprinkling of whole grains. 
* Hard white wheat is a new variety of wheat that can be finely milled, including the bran and germ, to produce whole wheat flour. It contains the fiber and nutrients but has the taste and texture of white bread. Products made with this flour are still only 30% or less whole wheat. 
* Stone ground does not necessarily mean whole grain. There is no FDA definition of “stone ground”.

My personal lessons

When you’re trying to lose weight:

1. There is no substitute for hard work. To lose weight, you have to eat less and move more. Basic science does not change. Yes you will be hungry and tired and fatigued, but no pain, no gain. There are ways to cope with the hunger, and these are lifetime changes you need to make – choose more veggies and fruits over bread and butter.
2. Make lifestyle changes. Fad diets do not last and do not help, long term or short term. Make meaningful, small changes one at a time, and stick with them.
3. Do it before you say it. TED talk about keeping your goals to yourself. It just made a lot of sense to me.
4. Track, track, track. Note down every single morsel of food that you put in your mouth. If it’s more than 25 calories, it goes in your tracker (food diary). If you eat 25 calories extra every day, you will gain 2.57 pounds at the end of the year :-)
5. Be consistent with your workouts. Try to go for 30 mins every day. It may just be a walk or elliptical/treadmill. 
6. Drink lots of water. When I workout, I drink way more water through the rest of the day. I’ve often noticed (not surprisingly) these are the days when I feel less hungry and have fewer snack attacks. On weekends, I carry my Nalgene bottle everywhere. My cars are stocked with water bottles.
7. Find healthy snacks that you love. Go bananas over bananas. Seriously. I spend 5 mins every morning packing fruits (yes, plural) into my lunch box. A banana is now a part of my weekend pack for me. Two easy peel cuties are part of my every day lunch box. A cup of blueberries is my preferred morning snack after coffee and before breakfast. A bowl of watermelon fills my desire for dessert after dinner.
8. Do not keep yourself hungry. Eat regular snacks at 2 hr intervals, and keep it limited to small portions. In anticipation of a large buffet if I skip my breakfast, I end up eating breakfast + lunch + extra calories by the time it’s lunch hour.
9. Every bite of food counts. Eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re full. Every extra bite you eat goes to “waist”!! Less calories, more fiber, less fat, more protein, less carbs.
10. Do not swear off “untouchable foods”. The mind just makes you want them more, some sort of forbidden pleasure. Everything in moderation.
11. Handle your stress. We all have sources of stress from work, kids, food, spouses. (5) will help to handle some of it. Practice relaxation breathing. Get a therapist if it gets extreme.
12. Go easy on the alcohol. This packs in a lot more calories than we can imagine. There’s a reason alcohol containers and wine bottles do not have nutrition information :-) In my 30s I do not need to drink till I drop, I have many fond memories of doing that in my 20s!
13. Friendly competition helps. This is what drives me to group-ex classes – I push myself looking at someone better than me. It keeps me challenged and focused.
14. Learn from others. Loads of personal lessons learnt come from observing other skinny people practice their discipline with food and exercise. The next time you see a skinny woman (you know), ask her the secret of her size. More than likely she is a workout junkie or a hiking freak or bikes to work.
15. Learn to control food. Do not let food control you. A slip once a while is forgivable, but make it a planned slip, and indulge in what you want to eat rather than what’s in front of you.
16. Keep temptation away. I once had a t-shirt: Lead me not to temptation for I can find it myself. If you are a sucker for ice-cream, don’t keep any in the freezer! We go to Krispy Kreme for donuts almost every other week, but we buy single serve donuts and consume them in the shop. They never come home with us.
17. If you fall, get up and walk again. Everyone makes mistakes. Acknowledge your slip-ups, account for them, and treat every day as a new day. So you had a huge piece of cake – no biggie. Go out for a quick walk, and load up on water and salads for dinner.
18. Move around more. If you work 8 hours in an office chair, find excuses to get up from your chair every half an hour. Walk up and down stairs and get right back. Walk to your colleagues’ desk instead of using the phone or IM. 
19. Find healthy hobbies. Tap into your inner hiker and ignite the love of outdoors in your kids.
20. Keep it real. Weekly weigh-ins help a lot to keep me accountable. Some weeks are bad, and I am aware of my increased weight. I still go for the weigh-in to keep myself in check, and face my fears.


When you’re trying to maintain:

1. Find active hobbies. Be it dancing, hiking, swimming or skiing. Cover all seasons to keep yourself engaged and interested.
2. Enjoy the food and especially the treats. Savor the flavors. You’ve earned it.
3. Have a fitness goal in mind every year – some crazy activity like running a half marathon or doing an overnight hike. That will keep you going to the gym regularly. Even planned beach and other vacations are motivations for me.
4. Take the time to dress and shop for good clothes. Appreciate how far you’ve come and love your new form.

Helpful links

Information overload is a very real problem in the age of Google today. My mantra was to stick to two or three sites, and figure out the rest by personal experience. 

• http://www.weightwatchers.com. Like them on Facebook to get daily recipes and tips. One of my favorite sections is reading about Success Stories from others.

• Dave's blog (WW CEO). He writes as a WW user, not as their CEO and is always very down to earth.

• Hungry Girl newsletters. I like the daily dose of advice and healthy "swaps" that she offers. WW on Facebook also has a feed into the HG dailies. The name made me actually stay away from this website for quite a while :-) but when fellow WW members started sharing the swaps in our meetings, I quietly signed up to experience this.

• Wiki weight watcher. When I was new to the WW program, I had a big excuse: I don't know the values of items of food that I eat outside. Tada, problem solved by one of the WW meeting members. Thank you Jesse, you rock!

Acknowledgments

The first person I'd like to acknowledge is me, myself. I took the initiatives to make my life healthier. But this was a road I could not have traveled alone. 

My husband was my forever companion, motivator, and for months he had to hear about points non-stop :-) Thank you darling for all your patience and for always believing that I have the potential. 

VMware as a company - for having all the right people, right equipment, and right motives behind opening an on-site gym, hiring fabulous instructors, and stocking healthy food. 

Craig Williams who conducted the first ever vFit VMware Bootcamps and was always so encouraging. 

Maria Kyong, my first and only personal trainer so far. She helped me keep fit throughout my pregnancy, helped me recover from my knee surgery. 

My friends Anjali and Parul who dragged me to the gym every single day. It can be hard, and the comfort of my office chair is far better than the squats that I had to look forward to. Day in and day out, these ladies made sure I got up at class time, and I went with them. 

My bff Mausami for being such a wonderful and positive person. She's almost like having my “friend Amit” at work, forever ready to hear my woes and cheer me up. A big hug to you, honey. 

Gym instructor Joleen Butler for being a tough nut, not giving up on us, and constantly asking us to give her "8 more". Roxy for being the second toughest and so lively at her age. Melinda for being so energetic and full of life. 

My WW leader Carol Spinney. She's been a lifetime member and maintaining for 25 years. She gives me motivation that I can be among the 20% of members who keep maintaining their goal weight. 

My WW meeting members. Thank you Jesse, and Doreen and everyone else for your wonderful tips and ideas. I may not have the motivation or need to go to meetings regularly now, but whenever I need a dose of inspiration, I know where to find you. 

And last but not the least...

A before and after picture

Mamata before WW

Mamata 7 months after joining WW, a new birthday

Onto my next quest

Because there is always something to improve :-) when you’re a perfectionist. For 2011, I’m in pursuit of happiness!