By Chelsey Everett
Years of emotional eating, anxiety, and depression combined with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome led to me being over twice what a normal weight for my height and age should be. I was always a bigger kid, I had kind of accepted that; but when my mom passed away from complications of diabetes and heart disease, food immediately became my comfort and my shield.
My life before Clean Kitchen
What I thought was a total breakdown in 2014, ended up being a breakthrough. I was getting up at 3:30 in the morning to go to the gym, taking my dad to work, going to work as a graduate assistant, then going to work a part time job. After a full day, I would go pick my dad up, and then complete graduate school work until at least midnight. This was my normal Monday through Friday schedule, which caused intense stress. Because of all this stress, I started having panic attacks, complete with chest pains, heart palpitations, dizziness, and pain in my arms; I thought I was having a heart attack.
I ended up in the emergency room twice because of a panic attack only to be told I was fine and given Xanax to calm down. I never knew if the next panic attack I had would really be a heart attack. My diet definitely wasn't helping. I was usually skipping breakfast or grabbing something from a drive thru. I almost always worked through lunch only to hit up another drive thru after work or just eat entirely too much at dinner.
I realized I was not even 24 years old and too young to feel this way. I was only 10 years younger than my mom was when she passed away and I knew I couldn't continue to live like that. I thought that maybe I just needed a different workout routine.
I hired a personal trainer and started working out 3-4 times a week. My trainer was beyond phenomenal. I thought I should be able to eat what I want and workout and be fine, right? So wrong. I never lost a pound… and I was pissed. I became severely depressed causing me not to care about school work or either of my jobs.
I would only allow myself one meal a day and, while I lost weight, I felt terrible. My hair was falling out, I wasn't sleeping, I was still constantly anxious and I was honestly tired of trying. I knew I had to do something, but I didn’t know what that something was.
I found Clean Kitchen and everything changed.
After months of trying almost everything under the sun,
Clean Kitchen entered my life and completely changed my view on food, weight loss, and living a healthy lifestyle. The program taught me to use food is fuel and not therapy. It taught me that I can be that person who cooks meals at home that are not only healthy, but also taste delicious; that I can be the person who brings a lunch to work every day instead of eating out; and that I can be the person who makes better choices because they care about their health and want to live a long, healthy life. Clean Kitchen taught me that eating healthy is easier when you can say “I don't want that” instead of “I can't have it.” The
12 Week program isn't about deprivation at all. It is about enlightenment. The
Clean Kitchen 12 Week Challenge teaches you how to plan and prepare for normal life situations. Whether you're working late, have an event come up, or just don't feel like cooking.
In 12 weeks, I lost 43 lbs. and over 40 inches, but I gained so much more. If you are on the fence about doing something, do THIS. You will have a completely changed outlook for the rest of you life!
