Update September 30, 2019

I have not been using this blog. My last post was in December 2018 when I was 6 months Keto. I shared more on FB than here but apparently sharing so often during the journey made folks think I was seeking attention. I feel I was seeking support, accountability, friendship and maybe encouragement. I also want a record of my journey. Looking back on FB in so much of my life brings memories and challenges me to have the faith I did then or whatever the case may be. I have decided to bring my health journey back to the blog for my record and for any who truly do want to follow along and encourage me, pray for me, and hold me accountable to trying to get healthy. Looking through the posts on this blog is hard and it’s good. 

My last blog post I was 6 months into the Keto way of eating and doing pretty good. 

Top recorded weight- 360 BMI 58.1

June 1st weight (began Keto)-336 BMI - 54.2'

Dec 1 weight 293 BMI- 47.3

Total loss- 67lbs ( 43lbs in last 6 months)

I  faltered a little New Years Eve at a party and struggled a little but got back on track and continued to loose. I lost down to around 288.6. For those that may not know our little boy Jeremiah was admitted to the hospital March 13, 2019 very ill. His blood pressure bottomed out that night and I went off Keto and drank a Coke. I battled on and off to try and do Keto during the stay but overwhelming emotions and all that was going on I failed and eventually was totally eating whatever if I ate. March 23rd Jeremiah went left my arms to heaven. I am forever shattered. I have had an incredible difficult time with anything so cooking and eating healthy have not been a priority. I lost my motivation and my why. September 23rd was Jeremiah’s 6 month Heaven Day and I was up to 315 lbs.

 

I have been trying to get back on target for myself and my family. I spent extra time at the cemetery that day and had a meal out with some of my mama tribe.  My friend Kristi over at Keto and Faith and the Red Chute Keto Challenge Group has been trying to help me more and more and finally this past week I was 100% on track with Keto. I weighed in this morning. 

Loss for the week: 5 lbs

Starting weight:360 lbs

Last weigh in: 315 lbs

Current weight: 310 lbs

Total loss to date: 50 lbs

Total Percentage Lost of start weight: 13.89 %

BMI: 50

Pounds left to loose: 185 lbs

Thank you if you read this far! I am trying so hard to help my family get healthy band find my why again. I promised Jeremiah that I was gonna loose this weight and get healthy in honor of him during our chat at the cemetery last week. I am trying to hold on to the Lord in so many areas. Yes, I know I am starting yet again on this journey and I covet your prayers, encouragement and support if you are willing. It doesn’t matter if anyone else believes, I’ve still got a little fight left in me! I love that song! Please follow along the blog for future updates and comment too.

6 months that changed my life!

It's been forever since I posted on this blog. I have no clue if anyone is reading or not. Today marks 6 months of a new life for me. I have prayed for years to finally loose weight. I have gone up and down but never really able to loose weight. 6 months ago today I was down 24 lbs from my top recorded weight on my fitness pal from 2011. I more than likely was higher previously. I began this blog is 2009 and gained instead of lost. Anyway, 6 months ago an answer to prayer began! I had been begging for the Lord for help and knowing I can't do this and I feel like I'm dying .my biggest fear is dying of super morbid obesity and being buried in a piano box! The Lord allowed me to find out about a weight loss challenge literally less than 2 minutes from my house at the Red Chute Chiropractic Clinic! The challenge was the Keto way of eating lifestyle.  My insulin resistance is horrific and even on medication is off the chain! The endocrinologist said until we get that under control it will be impossible for me to loose weight no matter what I do. I was maxed out on medication and insulin still super high and so I started thinking I would try to eat as if I was a diabetic and see if that might help. Sugar itself was not really a bug issue but potatoes, rice, bread and all those things to stretch meals were an issue. So I was researching and had just started reading about the Ketogenic lifestyle and then I see a post by my friend Renee about a challenge starting and I KNEW it was a sign from God. I decided to join and be 100 percent faithful for the 8 week challenge! It was starting in early June so I decided June 1st was the day for me! I weighed 336 lbs that day!  When I went to my first weigh in I was 329. I was shocked abd excited that less than a week later I was down 7 lbs. Probably water I said. I consistently lost every single week of the 8 weeks!!  I can't tell you what this means to me! This was actually working! On top of that I have added a community of Support, a family in this journey! I have learned so much, including adding to my other diagnoses I added adrenal fatigue. This journey was not going to be easy. It is not gong to be easy but just maybe it's doable! I can't even express how life changing this 6 months has been for me! On top of weight loss and inches lost I am able to do more! My health issues and pain are far from gone BUT they are more bearable most of the time! I still cook and clean in a rolling chair but I can do it for longer! I still shop in a scooter, still get looks and even verbal insults but I am learning to hide the tears and pray through. I know I am healthier and though still super morbidly obese I am better than I was!  I see the Dr Dec 5th. I can't wait for her to rub blood work and see what my levels look like! I hope they are better. So here are my results!

Top weight- 360 BMI 58.1

June 1st weight (began Keto)-336 BMI - 54.2

Dec 1 weight 293 BMI- 47.3

Total loss- 67lbs ( 43lbs in last 6 months)

This picture shows me in the same shirt 1 year apart. 

I am finally beginning to see a little difference.

These are a few pictures of me at my heaviest weight. It was very hard to find any and most I'm behind someone to hide. I still do this. Maybe someday I won't need to.

2011

Christmas 2010

2011

Thank you for reading this if you did! I would love to hear from you! I need all the cheerleaders I can get!

Slow movement is still movement

So January went pretty good. The fast for Church went well 😀 I did loose weight though not as much as I wanted or thought I might especially with the fast as well.

Weigh In

Weight~ 1/31/2018~ 332 lbs

Weight loss this month~ 5 lbs

Total lost from top weight~28 lbs
BMI~ 53.6

We were blessed to be able to join the YMCA around the middle of this month. I truly feel this will be life giving and life saving to me. I have been going 3-4 days a week the 2 weeks since we joined. I can usually go Tues-Fri as long as Jeremiah is well and able to attend Caring Hands Pediatric Day Health Center and we don't have field trip conflicts. I am doing a water class on Tues and Thurs and working on my own in the water on Wed and Fri.  One of the water aerobics teachers has herself lost 140 lbs! She has been so encouraging to me.  She is a personal trainer as well and does training in the water which is the only place I can walk and stand any length of time. I am praying to be able to come up with the $ to have even one session with her. 

I am also measuring neck, bust, hips, waist, both arms upper and lower and both legs upper and lower for a challenge FB group I am in. It is interesting to see the inches come off that I don't see when I look in the mirror and strange to me to have a bigger inch loss than weight loss.

I covet your prayers! Thank you for caring and following along as I journey towards my goals to a healthier me! My first big goal is Twoville and then eventually an even bigger goal is ONEderland and on to my final goal weight! Please pray for my Fibromyalgia, arthritis and Chronic Fatigue and that I can tolerate standing and walking better and better without excruciating pain.

New Day, New Week, New Month, New Year, New Start!

So it's been almost a year since I posted. Last post was January 7,2016. That was the beginning of our Church's 21 day fast. I made it through that with no Dr. pepper and never started back drinking any soda at all :) feels good to have accomplished something! I also can say I am down 13 pounds from last year. I am thankful it is down but sad that in an entire year I am only down 13 pounds. I am I worse shape physically with my health though. I can't stand any time at all without severe pain. Anyway, yet again I am trying again to get healthier. It's so hard to try and realize nobody believes I will ever loose this weight. I have to try! I have to hope. I have to believe! I can do ALL things through Christ!! I know HE can move this mountain! Today I began tracking everything I eat and really paying attebtion to stop when I have had enough and work on portions. I have measured and weighed to start the new year. I am telling myself just because I began this blog in January 2009 and have still not done this that NOTHING is impossible with God!! So I am documenting this hear in hopes that later I can see how far I have come and how well I have done! January 7th begins our Church 21 day fast again. This year I am fasting sugar, fast food, junk food if any kind even chips with a sandwich, and anything white (White potatoes, white rice etc). Last year Dr. pepper was a huge thing and I did it!! This year I have to do this!! 

Weigh In

Weight~ 1/01/2018~ 337 lbs

BMI~ 54.4

Total lost from top weight~24 lbs

I covet all your prayers!! And if you are following along please let me know! I am Tamijoy Sisemore on Fb! Send me a message! :)

Goals..and other things

So here I am again.. another new year, another time to reflect on myself and this journey to a better me.  Another year of not liking what I see.  Part of me really wants to give up, and has really battled with the thought that this truly is impossible.  Just maybe I have done so much damage to my body and so far into Super Morbid Obesity that just maybe there is no coming back.  This past Wednesday our Pastor preached a message on We Live On!  Boy it really amazes me how many times I sit under a message and feel like it is the Lord sending a personal message just to me.  I really felt like I was being told DO NOT GIVE UP.  Failure is only if you give up.  I know IF anyone is reading this you have probably all given up on me ever really getting healthy, ever really loosing the weight, ever really being all that the Lord has called me to be.  But I think HE made it pretty clear to me recently though the message at Church and a few people He has placed in my path that HE has not given up on me. I know one thing in all this I need more and more of HIM and less and less of ME and the world.  I cling to HIM to get me through this and I have to find a way to stay motivated and with my eyes on HIM and not the journey ahead or the failures behind.  I need to be healthier in every area of my life!  Spiritual, physical, weight, you name it.  I look at this blog and I think back to 2009 when I started the blog to officially begin this journey to health and loose weight.  I am bigger now than then and less physically able.  I am battling health issues that contributed to getting me here that have increased.  I think if you look back over this blog and then look at me now in a picture or in my life rolling around my kitchen and dining room cooking, sweeping, doing what I can in a rolling chair, you would say not only did she fail, she regressed.  All of that is correct and it is what it is.  What makes me keep wanting to try again?  I want to live, to really live.  and YES I have said that before and nothing changed, so what is different now, I have no clue.  But I do know one thing.  I have to Live on.  I have to try AGAIN.  There is power in my again.  Again is the name of the series of messages our Pastors are preaching right now.  Very timely for me I do believe. 

So IF you are reading, first of all, Thank you!!  And Secondly I NEED PRAYER and I NEED SUPPORT.  YES AGAIN!  Our Church will be doing a 21 day Fasting period beginning tomorrow.  Each person is to fast the things that really mean something to them that they feel they are led to fast.  THIS will be super hard for me and I go into it afraid I can't do it.  But I also go into it knowing if I do that to God be all the Glory!  I need super prayer going forward for the next 21 days, for the following days, weeks, months and years as this weight loss will take years.  I keep telling myself that if I can loose more than 30 and then just keep doing that over and over but for some reason I have not been able to before.  But AGAIN I try.  Here are my goals for 2017 and for January :)  Included in January goals I share my things I am fasting and I need extra prayer for those. If you are praying and supporting PLEASE let me know :)  

TamiJoy Goals

Long Term:

Loose 225 Lbs (235 from highest weight) to reach goal weight of 125

Loose multiple clothes sizes

Be more active and be able to really play and go places with my kids

Go on tours, Go to Disney, Go Camping~ GO!

January 2017 Goals:

Fast Dr. Pepper for 21 Day Church Fast at least

Fast going through for fast food for 21 Day Church Fast at least no matter how healthy the choices.

Walk at least 1000 steps every day using my Fitbit {look me up if you want to be friends :) }

Loose 8-10 lbs before January 31st

Start and attend Physical Therapy with the Fibromyalgia/CFS/Arthritis PT the Reumo is sending me to see

That sums it up for now.  I am sure everyone is as tired of hearing me say I am working on doing this and then not as I am so I do understand if you are in disbelief this time will be any different.  

I leave you with a picture of my family at my daughter's Wedding last February.  I am so blessed she has married the man of her dreams and is happy. I want to be around a very long time to spend as much time as I can with these people and with some very dear friends and Church family!  I cling to the fact GOD IS ABLE!

Breaking Out

Don't faint that I am actually blogging on this blog again.  I spent an amazing 24 hours with the Lord and about 50 plus women on a retreat!!  The theme of the weekend was MORE!!!  More of God.  He came to give ME life and give it MORE abundantly!  I am alive.  I have life.  But its not abundant right now.  Alot of things happened in and through me this weekend and one biggie was some major feelings and stirrings to do with WHY I am 350lbs.  Why I can't seen to loose and continue loosing weight.  Also some very eye opening experiences realizing just how not living I am.  This weekend was HARD HARD Physially.  I am in agony and can barely move now that I have driven home. Lots of walking, up and down a small hill outside, up and down some steep steps many times.  Everyone else it was just normal for them.  For me every step agony, and I was so short of breath and emotional.  I could not stand in worship the whole time, I could not jump when my inner self craved to jump in worship, though I did go up and down on my toes and boy am I paying for it now.  All that to say lots of self reflection.  BUT I think this weekend more than ever before I am seeing this spiritual battle.  I am not even sure how to put this into words.  But I think I have to break out of my own self, out of the fat, and prayerfully out of the joint and pain and breathing issues.  Its like I am surrounded by this super morbid obesity shell.  What purpose is it serving me other than to take life from me.  So WHY is it so hard, WHY can't I manage to do this no matter what I try, WHY can't I do this even when I have been praying and saying I can do all things with GOD.  There is a spiritual reason I am this way.  I can't find the words I need but somehow the weight is how I am getting the internal needs I have always craved since I was a child.  BUT they are not actually filling the need but somehow I think that is how it started.  There is something deep inside all this fat that has to heal.  That has to get to a point it can truly accept that Jesus would have died for just me.  that Father God really loves me even at 350 lbs.  That though I hate myself HE does not hate me, He can love me and sees past it all.  Why am I blogging, I have no clue but this weekend feels so important and I feel like I need to record this as best I an get the feelign out.  which I am bombing at :(  I think somehow this is a turning point, a beginning to really beating this.  I need PRAYER.  I need to fully understand all this and figure out why I have put this shell around me and can't let it be broken off and what I need to do to break it away , to break out and live MORE!  Live life abundantly!   Actually live and move and be active and not in agony and hate myself.  It seems SOOOO clear to me during worship today and now I can't figure out how to put this into words.  I have to get past this hopelessness I have been in and wor on seeking FIRST the Kingdom and the rest will be added.  Monday morning I start a Bible Study from Time Warped Wife with 3 amazing friends!  I think God's timing is perfect.  I need MORE and MORE of Him so I can figure out what it is I really need to do.  I can't go on this way and I have to find a way to not fail.  Something broke in me today and I pray it is the first chain falling off that is holding me in this bondage of super morbid obesity.  Thank you if you read this and for your prayers as  seek to understand what this means and how I can truly do this with God. 

Eye Opening

I have not posted in a long time.  I have not been even trying.  I failed and I gave up.  So why a post now you may ask? Yesterday I went to Physical Therapy ordered by my Orthopedic Dr. because I injured myself and went through a time I could barely walk! The physical therapy is in a pool they put you on a big treadmill and lower you into the water. The water is at a therapeutic temperature. And I walk and do all types of exercises that the therapist has me do all in the water. It has been very eye opening opening how I can't stand long enough to cook without being an utter tears and practically falling over but I could stand in there for over 30 minutes walking and doing exercises. The physical therapist said being in that water is like being 150 to 175 pounds as opposed to 356 pounds! I can't even explain how it felt and I thought man I have so much energy! Then at the end of the 30 minutes as he's raising me up out of the water just below the chest is out of the water and I almost fell over it felt so incredibly heavy. It felt heavier then when I went in. It really made it evident what life might be like if I could really do this! The physical therapist seemed very knowledgeable in a lot of areas including safe ways for people with health issues and severe weight issues to exercise and lose weight. He inform me that I really should not at this weight and with my arthritis and fibromyalgia be doing workouts outside of water. The water really protects my body. He said it is possible to work out in the water and lose great amounts of weight over consistent time. 

When I am done with these prescribed therapy sessions they will give me an option to have a discount at the Wellness Center connected with the hospital. The upfront cost would be waived and the monthly would be a better deal than I could get on my own if I go straight from therapy. I would have access to several types of water classes as well as access to swim or workout in the water or walk in the water on my own from opening to closing. The hours are 5 a.m. to 8 p.m. during the week and shortened hours on the weekend . this would give me the opportunity to work out in water 7 days a week if I wanted. I could do this around Bobby schedule and there is childcare for a fee available at the facility. Unfortunately my insurance will not pay for this but with the discount going straight from therapy it is an opportunity we do not feel like we can pass up and we feel the need for me heath wise is great. Please be in prayer for us to make this work and for me and my body to respond to this opportunity. Even without weight loss with chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia and arthritis being in the water everyday will help me be stronger and help me function better so that I can take care of myself and our family the way the Lord would have me to.  I'm sure anyone that has followed by journey at this point realizes I have failed everything I have started. So there is a huge part of me that feels there's no point in even trying. But there is still a part of me that desperately wants to live, that desperately wants to do this, that desperately wants to not be hampered by my own physical body in serving my family, my church, and my God! I covet your prayers as I continue on this life journey to being a better me in Him.