Fitness Snapshots Friday Five Link up

For this Friday Five Link up with Mar, Cynthia and Courtney we are discussing fitness snapshots, I never take pictures when I'm working out but I do have snapshots of my different levels of fitness and they tell my journey to becoming healthy and happy.

Fitness Snapshots.... hmmm well since I've never really taken pictures of me working out I think I'll just take you on a blast from the past chronicling my yoyo weight adventure.

I am not a petit frame girl, so growing up when Kate Moss was the "It" girl sort of sucked. I didn't have that shape and I had friends that did so I was totally envious.  What teen girl isn't envious of girls who get to be like the "It" cover girl of the day?  I seriously wish I was a fat as when I first thought I was fat back in High School, because obviously, three kids later, I didn't know what fat was hahaha. 

I've got an hour glass figure, with great "birthing" hips, yup a doctor has told me that!  And all of my life I've struggled with accepting my body for the way it is.  It's a human thing, and a girl thing, it's a thing. But I've never really felt fat or obese, just very curvy.

Here I am in 2005 or 2006. I'm in Lake Tahoe,(maybe you read about my favourite city) for a friends wedding.  I definitely have some added padding in the picture around my muffin top, but I felt I looked great and I still think I looked great (don't like it, that's fine I'm comfortable with it) but I didn't feel in shape, that was definitely something I was going to work on. This is right around the first time I discovered running, it was love after the first run.  There was something very cathartic about that first run.

In 2007 and 2008 I started hitting the gym big time and there were some definite changes to my body!! I was happy, I was energetic, I felt I could take on the world!! And I did!! I was working as a bartender at the time and it was a lot of fun but I was on my feet for 8 hours a day!

This is 2007 after a six months of living in Red Deer, going to the gym and running!! It's also my 28th birthday in this picture, this was the fittest I ever was!! I wasn't sculpted, because I wasn't doing any weight training, I was only running and doing ab work.  I really didn't understand fitness back then, I mean fitness for being athletic and healthy. I  was only using fitness to be skinny, that was my goal and I ultimately reached it.

In 2008 I met my (future) husband.  It was all romantic and wonderful, but it cut into my gym time.  I had to give time to grow this new relationship so going to the gym stopped.  Now because I was working out to be skinny, not healthy it was easy for my body to go back to what it had been.  Then in 2009 I got pregnant with my second child, my first was born in 1998 (yup I had him young) and I wasn't in a job that had me really active.  I remember going to the doctor for my prenatal appointments and hating to step on the scale because those numbers were so detrimental to my self worth. I felt like a bulge whale!!  My husband and I got married in 2011, so after the birth of my second son I went to work at getting in shape, not to be skinny but to be healthy and fit.  I was eating right and exercising.  I definitely saw improvements, not like back in 2007, but I felt the results were more maintainable and the lean muscle mass was substantial and my body fat percentage  decreased significantly.  

 Now we have baby number 3, I was very ill for this pregnancy so working out was not high on my priorities. It is now and I'm working to be fit and healthy again.  It is going to take some time, but I have the drive and ambition to get there.  I want to be around for my boys for some time and to be healthy and energetic with them. Even if I can get half the energy they have that would be terrific!!

So there are five snapshots of my different fitness levels and the journey I've gone on to finding a happy balance between healthy and happy!!