I have always loved to cook and I have always had a knack for being able to make epic meals out of whatever was available. For most of my life, these meals were full of processed foods. When I was 35, I realized that I had to change the way I had been eating & feeding my family. I was sick all the time, overweight, out of shape, & depressed. My husband (I was lucky enough to marry my best friend) had horrible psoriasis covering 75 percent of his body and the disease started attacking his joints. It was horrible watching him be in so much pain and even worse watching people’s reactions to his skin plaques. To make all of this worse, our marriage (which had always been the kind others yearned to have) started taking the brunt of our stress. Something had to give.

I didn’t know anything about nutrition & SO wasn’t ready to change the way we were eating (why oh why are peanut butter pop tarts so dang good!?!?) but I knew that if I could loose some weight I would surely be happier and maybe just maybe my marriage would get better. My daughter Syd started to try to get me to take a yoga class at her school. Yoga? Sounds easy enough.  She also wanted me to stay for the Zumba class afterwards, but I had ABSOLUTELY no intention of dancing in public! As if!

After about a month of her hounding me, I finally went to that first yoga class just to make her hush. Teenage girls can be quite persuasive! I struggled thru that first yoga class and finished a red faced sweaty mess. I was getting ready to leave and in walks the Zumba instructor. She exclaimed, “Tammi! You finally came to my Zumba class!!” Turned out that the instructor was the same woman who hosted my daughter, Lauren, on her post high school graduation trip to Europe. I just couldn’t walk out of that room.

So, dancing in public happened. After the first two songs, I thought I was surely going to have a heart attack right there in the middle of the studio. I was so uncoordinated and my body just wouldn’t do what I was telling it to do. I was so embarrassed and ashamed of my body that I hid behind the girl in front of me so that I couldn’t see myself in the mirror. I was mortified that day. I left telling myself that I would never have to go thru that ordeal again.

But something changed.

Something woke up inside of me.

A dancer was born.

Magic happened in that dance studio. Within a month I was rocking the front row, singing along with songs that I had no idea what they were saying (high school Spanish was apparently a waste of time) and moving my body in ways I never imagined I could. Dancing helped me find myself. I found confidence I hadn’t had for more than 10 years. I worked through so many demons and left so much baggage on that dance floor. As I got happier, my marriage got healthier. We were finally happy again. And my body started to change.
Fast forward a year, I was teaching my own classes. I was slowly transitioning my class from Zumba to mainstream music- my favorite being hip hop. I was happy but I was still the “Fat Instructor”.  I knew I needed to make the hard changes, the ones I had been avoiding.

I learned that the girls I had been getting choreo from on YouTube, Lauren & Kelsi, were coming to do a master class right before my 40th birthday. I was determined to get the rest of the weight off. I set my mind to finishing this thing I had started. Time for some diet modifications. Goodbye peanut butter pop tarts. Sigh. (Maybe one day I will find a way to make fit girl pop tarts… this just got added to my list of things to create)

I got out a dry erase marker and wrote on the fridge:

• No Sugar
• No Dairy (no milk?!? The horrors!!)
• No Fried Foods
• No Soda
• No Wheat
• No Processed Foods
• No Preservatives

I wish I had a picture of my husband’s face when he saw this list. He was flabbergasted that I would even think about anything so drastic. When I started this next phase of my fitness journey, I thought that I would never be able to eat any of my favorites again. I remember thinking “I can’t eat anything!” And for a while, I had about 4 things that I would make because I knew they fit into this new way of eating. This was particularly hard for me because I have always cooked for my family. Preparing amazing meals for them was my love language. While my girls were in school, our house was known for the spot to go and have a banging meal.

I stuck with it and it and by the time I went for my birthday trip, I felt like I could accomplish anything. It wasn’t easy. In fact, it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. Oh! Did I mention I also quit smoking on the same day I quit sugar? I don’t recommend this! I’m lucky to still be married & that John is such a patient man. But I DID IT!!!

2 years have passed and I haven’t had another cigarette. I have had some sugar, but only on occasion. I have had failures and felt like giving up. But what I have gained far outweighs the all the difficulties and struggles.

My marriage is better that it ever was- even from the “good ol’ days”! I am truly blessed to be married to my best friend.

I still teach dance fitness- actually ALL the choreo I teach is from Lauren & Kelsi. Since that first master class, I turned into a Fitz groupie. I’ve been to every Club Fitz Master class I could get my rump shaker to. I can proudly say that I’ve been to more master classes than any other person will ever be able to say. I have become friends with both Lauren & Kelsi over these past years. Now, John goes along and takes pictures. He plays security and is our (Lauren, Kelsi, & I)  chauffeur. He also does the check in for my classes. Dance truly changed my life. Changing my diet changed my body. Putting my happiness and health first changed my marriage.

Will it always be easy? Nope. Recently, I’ve lost some of the “gains” I had this time last year. I have tried several ways of eating – some of them backfiring. (I will tell you all about that on a different blog post) But, I will not stop reaching to be my best self. I found myself at 40. I feel like I started living my life at 40 instead of letting it live me.