Truth About The Weight

It wasn't a food issue with me, it was a heart and health issue.

When it comes to my weight loss, I get the feeling that some think I was a bigger girl from the beginning of time. Questions fill my inbox on wanting to know quick ways to lose weight and so on. So I thought I would share a painful truth. I wasn't a bigger girl from the beginning of time, instead my weight came from pain, abuse and health issues. 

I was an athlete in school , basketball player, and track star; fitness and healthy ways of living has always been a part of my life since I was 14 years-old. After high school, I kept up with my cardio but this time I also added weights. What needs to be understood from that is that I have muscle memory, so when it came to losing weight it happened fast and my snapback wasn't hard to attain for me. 

Left: 3 years ago Right: Me a couple days ago

 At a KFAT 92.9 event  3 years ago, I was with a man who was abusive in many ways. I was upset, sad, insecure, hated myself, lonely the list goes on. I went from a size 4 weighing at 145 lbs to a size 12 weighing in at 190. It's amazing to see what stress can do on the body. 

The weight gain wasn't all stress and abuse, it was also due to a health issue that people don't know about. While dating this horrible person, I was diagnosed with cervical cancer, it was the beginning stages, but nonetheless the tactics to go about this issue to make sure it didn't spread wasn't easy, fun or nice. Imagine getting parts of your cervix frozen, biopsy after biopsy while having other procedures on other parts and so on. It hurt, and while my body was battling that, my heart murmur was battling to kill me, and my ex was hurting me in ways that I wish he would've killed me. Since I'm being honest, I wanted all the pain to stop, I wanted him to kill me because I had NO energy to grab my things and leave, I had no one to call for help, and when I called the police, they didn't help one officer laughed at my situation. God where are you? I need you now is all I can remember praying and crying every morning and night. 

My days during this time went like this, work, hospital, home to get screamed at or worse, then sleep and do it all over in the morning. What makes it even more worse, is that despite being in the public eye I had no friends to turn to or family that I trusted. I was smiling, hosting events, going about my radio show, saying hi to my parents, attending 'friends' birthday parties etc. Smiling at them while no one cared to ask "how are you?" not a single person asked how I was, instead it was can you do this? can I barrow that? hey Ebony can you loan me...I think you get my drift, I'm sure you can relate to being used and having no one there either right?

I had enough of it all, which lead me to take a job in Texas. I was free, I was able to see what I allowed to happen to me. I was always a size 4-5 weighing 140-150lbs... all of a sudden I'm a size 12 and weighing in at 190. I didn't notice what happened, I was in pain and focusing on staying alive I didn't notice the weight. Also, no one who 'loved' me, who said they would keep it 100, told me that I gained weight; I guess that's because it would have to lead to a "What's going on?" questions and in all honesty, no one cared about what was going on.

Moving cleared my vision, helped me seek God in many ways. Once I got the keys to my apartment, I started running on the treadmill. I'll never forget it, I ran 10 miles the first night. Then I cried. I cried out the pain, betrayal, every emotion I cried and asked God to heal me.  I love to run, I was a track star so it wasn't new to me.  The next day I ran 4 miles,  and everyday after that. Slowly increasing to 5, then 6 then well you get my drift. 

When I finally got a gym membership, I started lifting weights, oh the release you get from lifting! I dropped the weight in a matter of months, first month I dropped over 15 lbs and in total I dropped 50lbs with a gain of 10 in muscle! I would like to reiterate that I have awesome muscle memory so my weight loss was rapid, effective and will stick. When I say it sticks for me, it's been two years and the weight is still off and wont be coming back. 

It wasn't a food issue with me, it was a heart and health issue. So fiddling with my "diet" would make no sense. Nonetheless, I'm back to who I was prior, actually I'm even better because now I have a booty! All laughs aside, each weight loss or gain journey is different, we all have different triggers. You might be in pain, lazy, lost, it doesn't matter we all have a story. My perfect body was ruined by pain and me allowing the aftermath, but I said enough. So, what's your story? 

<3 Ebony