From
Covered Up To Cover Girl
My Joyous 36 Pound Journey Weight Loss Success
Story
From eDiets - The premier online diet, fitness, and healthy living
resource
Since
shedding 36 pounds with the world's leading online weight loss program,
peppy-again Cheryl Bates has practically become a poster gal for eDiets.
 Not only did her trimmed-down image grace the cover of
the October 21 issue of First For Women magazine, but our slimming
superstar also appeared in her local newspaper where she raved about her
favorite diet program.
Becoming a weight loss celebrity was the
last thing Cheryl expected when she joined eDiets last January. For starters,
she wasn't all that confident the extra weight would come off her 5'2" frame.
And at 158 pounds, Cheryl did her best to avoid the limelight.
"I’ve always been the kind of person
in the background," she tells eDiets from her Tennessee home. "To see myself as
the person standing in front was a really neat experience.
"I feel like a million bucks. I love
getting dresses. I love shopping for clothes. I like how I look now. I’m
not embarrassed. I have more confidence, not just in how I look, but in
everything.
"I make jewelry and I’m having a
jewelry show in a few weeks. The old me wouldn’t have the confidence to go
in business and talk to people. When I walk into a room, I feel like I can do
anything now. It’s so weird how weight can affect you that way."
 Cheryl, 37, now weighs 122 pounds and sports a
constant smile from the satisfaction that accompanies successful weight loss.
Just last week she bought a pair of size 4 jeans. It wasn't that long ago that
she was squeezing into size 14's. Cheryl says it was the "too tight clothes
syndrome" that got her to think seriously about dieting.
“My size 14 jeans were so tight," she
recalls. "I refused to buy a bigger size. I was like 'forget it... I’m not
going to do this.' A few weeks before joining eDiets, I watched what I was
eating. I didn’t have any kind of plan. I lost a couple of pounds, but I
had had it.
“I kept seeing the eDiets banner
everywhere while I was trying to do it on my own. I almost felt like somebody
was trying to tell me something.” Cheryl was miserable. In addition
to being tired all the time, she was embarrassed about her appearance. Simple
things like getting up in the mornings and putting on clothes were emotionally
taxing. Cheryl wanted to run and hide before she put her trust in eDiets.
While browsing our website and seeing the
sample shopping lists, recipes and meal plans -- plus the overwhelming amount
of professional and peer support available 24/7 -- something clicked.
The first thing Cheryl had to do was divide
and conquer the bad habits that had weighed her down for far too long. From
late-night snacking to cleaning her overfilled plate at every meal, Cheryl had
plenty of work to do. And that’s where the eDiets tools came in handy.
“I was excited about having the meal
plan laid out for me so easy," she says. "I liked that I could have recipes or
frozen meals, which meant I didn’t have to cook everything. I liked that I
could change meals if I didn’t like something. It was all very
convenient."
Although Cheryl had once been an avid
Jazzerciser, it had been a long time since she attended classes. Embarrassed by
her weight gain, she opted to do workout tapes in the privacy of her own home.
She also got a treadmill. When those workouts got tiresome, Cheryl returned to
Jazzercise class and now attends two to three times a week.
 Ive committed myself to exercising at least
five days a week," she says. "When I go to Jazzercise, I do a 60-minute class.
At home, I do 30 minutes of cardio and 30 minutes of toning. I try to do 30 to
60 minutes when I do exercise. That is usually five or six days a week.
Despite being a fulltime mom to daughters
Kayla, 12, and Noelle, 3, Cheryl still makes time for fitness. She gives credit
to her husband Danny for lending a hand.
So what kept this former Weight Watchers
member on track after what seemed like a lifetime of dieting failures? Cheryl
says it was the support and motivation from family, friends and fellow
eDieters.
“When I joined eDiets, I looked around
the support boards," she says. "I posted that I was new and not sure what to
do. I needed guidance. I got such a response from so many people. I was like,
‘Wow, people want to help me. They care about me.’"
Cheryl found an online family with the
Soon-To-Be-Skinnies on the Stay-At-Home Moms board. The unconditional support
was just the push she needed. Through thick and thin, her dieting companions
were there with words of encouragement, even during the tough stretches when it
felt like the scale needle wouldn't budge. Their communication goes beyond
posts and emails, says Cheryl. Not only do the women regularly chat by the
phone, but they recently traveled from all over the country to meet in person
in New Orleans. She also got to go to New York with three other eDieters to
appear in the First For Women magazine spread on diets that work.
Cheryl never dreamed that she would forge
lasting friendships on a computer website, especially after her not-so-great
experience with the popular brick-and-mortar diet program. She says her Weight
Watchers days left her feeling more like an outcast than an insider.
“I want to tell everybody YOU CAN DO
IT!" Cheryl says. "I want to see people succeed. I want them to know what it
feels like for me."
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