I have my clients keep “Celebrations and Confessions” journals. This is a journal where they write down some of the things that they feel that they need to confess as they go through their weight loss journeys. It’s a safe place that they can get it out, let it go and move on without beating themselves up to much over it and in the process of doing so, cause themselves to fall into the vicious cycle of feeding feelings and emotional eating.  It is also a place where they write down the things that they are proud of and the things that they want to celebrate in their journeys. 

Sometimes the only way someone else knows we want them to acknowledge and celebrate an accomplishment with us is if we make the effort to make them aware of what the accomplishment is.

Today I have a really BIG accomplishment I would like to share with you all and ask you all to celebrate with me.

Three weeks ago I ran the Star Wars The Dark Side half marathon with my partner-in-crime Jeff Newell. It was Jeff’s first timed and chipped half marathon and that was a really big accomplishment for him and that is what the majority of my focus was on. 

But it was a really special accomplishment for me as well. It was my 26th half marathon.

26 half marathons. A full marathon is 26.2 miles. I know this real well because I just ran my first full marathon last January when I took on the Dopey Challenge and managed not to die after 4 days of getting up early and running far too many miles each day. So 26 half marathons is quite literally a marathon of half marathons. That is quite a feat.

If you had told 420 pound me who could hardly stand in the kitchen and cook a meal without experiencing foot and back pain that just 6 years in the future I would be celebrating an accomplishment like this I would have wondered what sort of drugs you had been taking and why you weren’t sharing it, because obviously that was some pretty good stuff.

I look back at photos of that girl and I scarcely recognize her or the lifestyle that I was living back then. 

I think back to that moment that my Dad came to me and told me that he would love me no matter what, but that I was digging a grave with a fork and a spoon and that he was worried I wouldn’t live a happy and healthy life.

I started running as a coping mechanism of dealing with the loss and grief that I experienced when my Dad passed away. Running has been my way of staying emotionally connected to him even though he can’t be here with me anymore. When I run I talk to him, I share what is going on in my life with him and I always know that he is listening to me.

26 is just a number. But it is a number that has held a lot of symbolism for me in my life and in my weight loss journey. My father was born in 1926. It has always been one of my favorite years. When I had lost 260 lb. I got 26 stars tattooed on my back – one for every 10 lb. I had lost. The number 26 has great significance to me. 

I looked up my split times for this latest half marathon the other night and my fastest mile was mile 11 – my dreaded mile. Mile 11-12 is usually the one I struggle on the most. But in this last event I ran that mile in 10:01— Who ever would have thought this girl would be running a 10 minute mile. That astounds me.  I remember a day only 6 years ago that I couldn’t even walk a 30 minute mile.

I am amazed each day at the difference in my life the moment I started living it outside the confines of obesity. For the first time in my life I am experiencing life, love and happiness without having to try to change myself or who I am to feel like I earned it. I am just being me and enjoying every moment.  

Since Star Wars I have run the Myrtle Beach Diva and the Tinker Bell Half Marathon and now have 28 Half Marathons on the books and I am currently trying to decide what my next goal is going to be,

But for today, I am Nashville bound to speak and teach an exercise session at this years the WLSFA ( Weight Loss Surgery Foundation of America ) Annual Meet and Greet. — Now if only I can find the time to go to the Johnny Cash Museum while I am there.

Until next time, remember that celebrating your wins against obesity and sharing your story and giving yourself credit for your  successes can be very important part of your weight loss journey.

See you all in Nashville. Yeehaw!

Pandora Williams author of Desperately Seeking Slender is a  Cooper Approved Wellness Coach Trained in Weight Management Strategies and Motivational Speaker studying to become a Certified Personal Trainer.