Hello

Hi Everyone,

Today I'll do a little intro about me.
I am a mom of 7 kids- 5 boys, 2 girls. That may or may not sound overwhelming, but I promise at time it was. In reality there are only 3 still at home as soon as child 4 leaves next week for college. Unless of course you count the 22 year old that sleeps and stores her clothes here. I also have 2 grandkids, their dad and one of my other sons are in Iraq on an extended desert camping trip with a couple hundred of their best friends. They all look great in their dress blues and white hats, not that they wear them on their camp-outs. No, they are stored at my house as well.

I work full time at the local high school as a student advocate. Basically I work with the students to make sure their grades, credits and attendance are where they need to be in order to graduate. A school counselor without the letters behind my name and zeros in the paycheck. But that will change as soon as I graduate in May of 2011 with my masters in school counseling. Unless the principal changes his mind, I will be moving from my current office to the counseling office.

I used to be a dancer and danced everyday. Then I had kids and started a different kind of dance. And I gained weight with each pregnancy. I was able to take off most of it, except the extra 40 lbs I gained with baby #1.

I started having a lot of pain in 2005. I was diagnosed with two forms of arthritis- Rheumatoid and Ankalosing Spondolitis. At one point I was taking 11 meds a day. And I was still always sick and tired. Oh, and when I got up in the mornings? I never, ever felt rested. This past April I was diagnosed with sleep apnea because my airway is not formed correctly. I stop breathing an average of 11 times/hour all night long and have since I was born. So now I sleep with a lovely Darth Vader sounding machine to force my airway open.

I began noticing a difference in my body based on the foods I ate. I did some research, talked to people, read things, and asked my doctor about my plan of changing my diet. I found some good cookbooks to help me make the changes, bought a recumbant stationery bike and a tread mill, a new exercise dvd and had big plans.

We all know about plans. The changing diet wasn't a problem because the pain of not was too much. But the bike and treadmill and dvd? too easy to ignore unless I go downstairs to do laundry. My solution? Teach the kids to do their own laundry.

Really, though, in the last 6 months I have gone off of or reduced the dosage of most of my meds. I now only take 3/day, 4 if you count my allergy meds that I take. I have two that are weekly and one of those has been reduced with the goal of phasing it out by the end of the year.

I wanted to join you here so that I have more accountability for exercising and moving more. My plan is to be on the treadmill- with it and me moving- for 30-60 minutes/3 times a week. Do the dvd work out for 2 days/week. And lose 30 lbs by this time next year and be able to climb Mt. Timpanogos and watch the sun come up.

So that is me in a nutshell. Or just me, the nut.