In the Spring of 2020, just as the quarantines had begun, I found myself sent home from my job and had a lot of time on my hands. I had cleaned and organized every area of my house that had been on my to do list, except my closet. As I looked through my clothes and found the box of clothes labeled “too small”, I got very sad. I have always struggled with over and emotional eating. I grew up celebrating with, comforting with and focusing on food. I had gotten to a healthy weight once in my 20’s and knew how good it felt, but after marriage and 3 babies I was staring at an extra 68 pounds. In the last decade, I started figuring out how food was affecting my overall health and how it made me feel, but still binged when it tasted good or I was emotional. I had “tried” to get control of my poor eating habits many times in the last 20 years, but gave up within weeks of starting. I would wake up every morning with good intentions and by the end of the day, I was eating to cope. Programs that focused on food, didn’t work because I was sensitive to many of the suggestions and I was so overweight that every muscle in my body hurt when I focused on exercise alone. An ad came up on my phone for a different coaching type program that piqued my interest, but once I tried the free trial, I knew it wasn’t going to work. The idea of having a coach though was now in my brain and I wondered if there was a better, more hands-on program out there that I could afford. Google led me to MBT. I read a success story of a woman who wanted to be at her goal weight by her 40th birthday, so she could celebrate in style. She was 60 pounds overweight and did it in 9 months. I was 9 months away from my 40th birthday and wanted that story for myself. The personal approach of having a 1:1 phone call with Adam was a huge selling point for me, but I was still scared. I don’t like to fail and when I am unsuccessful in an area of my life, I struggle to get started again and almost never try the same things twice. I felt like this might be my last chance and I didn’t want to fail again. I also knew my personality and knew that I needed to be locked in to my success. There was a bonus to paying for a full year up front and though it was a big commitment, I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. The journey of weight loss is such a rollercoaster and I wanted to quit so many times, but I couldn’t get my money back or quit paying the monthly fee, so I was locked in. This was obviously a big piece to my success, but had this been any other program, I probably would have just lost the money and had another area of regret, but MBT is different. You have someone working with you that cares about you and wants you to be successful and won’t give up even when you want to. I ghosted my tutor on multiple occasions, because I had “failed” at a party and didn’t want to tell the truth, or I was angry or frustrated by work or family, I dealt with loss, personal health trials and surgery. My tutor was amazing. She was calm, consistent and encouraging. There were times when she needed to call me out, but most of the time, I was the one being hard on myself and she would point out the things I was doing right, which was just what I needed to keep going. She was gentle in her guidance and gave me tools that slowly changed the way I saw food. I was using willpower less and less and feeling empowered. By my birthday in November I was 5 pounds from my goal and surpassed the “small” clothes in my closet. A month later I unexpectedly found out I was pregnant for the 4th time. This obviously wasn’t part of my plan and I struggled with many emotions, which my tutor was there to support me through. Just before I started gaining pregnancy weight, I reached my goal of 69lbs gone. I stayed on a maintenance program with MBT through my pregnancy which was pivotal in re-enforcing the skills I had been taught, without the incentive of weight loss and now that my daughter is born, I am continuing to lose my pregnancy weight better than I ever have previously and I feel good doing it too. Before this journey began I was a prisoner to food and I was teaching my kids to be prisoners to food as well. Now I am a good role model to them. They watch me deal with my emotions without food and eat healthy portions and the seeds for their future are being planted. By my next birthday I see myself back to my goal and living there comfortably for the rest of my life, because I finally have the tools that make that a realistic goal.