Hello everyone! I’m J…your typical everyday middle class penny-pinching suburban mom of 2. I will be celebrating my 5th annual 29th birthday this year, and have been happily married for 10 years this month. So here’s the deal: I am that woman who was skinny in high school, married my high school sweetheart prince charming, and now after having two kids is living not so happily fatter after.

I may be like you and you get it. You get the constant struggle to be the perfect “everything”; a wife who keeps things cooking in the kitchen (and the bedroom!), the mom who does everything Pinterest-perfect with smiley, rosy-cheeked kids, and is successful at work. My current and biggest struggle is my weight and my size. I am tired of squeezing into size 10-12 jeans and having a closet full of clothes that I am afraid will show my “muffin top”. I HATE that I HATE to do summer outdoor activities with my kids because of the way I look in a swimsuit. My kids deserve better. My husband deserves better. (Sure, he has told me “Oh you are beautiful the way you are”…but I want to go back to being his arm candy, not his arm jell-o.)  And I deserve better. I was once an all-state track runner. While I know there is no sense dreaming about the “glory days”, I MISS the thrill of the race and the good feeling that came with crossing a finish line and achieving a goal.  This blog is about my journey to being ME, hopefully a more skinny and in shape me, but in the end a happier-about-my-body me. So here it is; take it or leave it;  but hopefully you find my story to be either inspiring or entertaining or at least something to fill your time playing on your smartphone while you should be watching your kids on public playgrounds.

To help force myself to do something, I have done 2 things:

1. Signed up AND PAID FOR for several races. I signed myself up for a 5, 10 and 15K, all to be run between July and Christmas. I am lucky to have a good friend and neighbor who recently completed her first half marathon and is a great motivation. Another motivation is the money. I have spent about $150 on these races. (This is 2 weeks worth of groceries in my house.) If I don’t run these races, I will have to run from my husband chasing after me with the checkbook register.

2. PALEO DIETING:  WHY????

WHY did I decide this path? My baby brother is a personal trainer. A good one. He and his wife are in fantastic shape and look like red carpet movie stars even in sweats. He gave me a meal plan and sold me some gluco-something supplements and told me to “go hard” for a month and I wouldn’t regret it. For the first time, my husband didn’t argue when we paid for the supplements, then we headed to the grocery store to let the adventure begin…