numbers 2 & 3

Hey guys, sorry I missed last week; I guess this is going to take a little more getting used to than I thought...
Well since I missed a week to fill you in, now you get double, aren't you excited? you should be. (;
So, lets get started:
Since I last posted I started out by going shopping, I know what a girly thing to do but whatever I actually needed to.. Here's why: Since I have been working out with my support team (for a few months now) my clothes have been getting really big, in fact so big that for the past month my workout SPANDEX have been falling off of me just because of the roman chair exercise on ab day; mind you, with the roman chair I'm not even really moving a lot in this exercise I'm just lifting my legs to contract my abs so imagine how much worse things got for me and my spandex situation when I would run (yeah, not so good.) Well I decided since I was having this problem it was officially time to go buy new work out clothes, so I did! Lately while I've been working out I've been having a problem of over heating more than usual. For me it's a normal thing to over heat, I'm used to it, it happens all the time, but for some reason at the gym it has been really bad and I couldn't understand why. My support told me I should get shorts instead of the longer spandex to help keep my body temperature cooler, so that's exactly what I went shopping for. When I got to Sports Authority I decided to try a size smaller in spandex than normal  since the pair I had were too big. Now, I have always been an extra large and even for a lot of spandex brands extra large was too small for me because of my big 'ol curves so going down to a large size was a huge deal, and one I didn't really think was smart because I expected the spandex not to fit. I didn't plan on going to the store to be humiliated, that's the last thing I wanted but I wanted to try for fun and see if my body size had made a change even though the scale hadn't, heck the scale number even increased so my worries were definitely high. Anyway, I grabbed a few different brands in the large size, along with an extra large of course since the large never fits, and tried them on. To my amazement all the extra larges were really big and the larges fit, no matter what brand! It was great, so I bought a pair of the spandex work out shorts and went home happy as a clam. Well the next day my sister wanted to get some work out clothes since she had none so I went with her for fun and I decided to wear my new shorts and we planned to work out later so I didn't want to have to change. After walking around places for a bit we finally got to Sports Authority and by the time we got there my new shorts were starting to slide down in some places and ride up in others because there was extra fabric from them being too big, I couldn't believe it I had bought them yesterday! So since we were back at the store I figured I would try some more spandex on, maybe it was just the brand. While I was walking around I started thinking about what my boy friend had said to me the night before when we were talking about my new shorts, he kept telling me "baby you're not a large.. you're a medium honey just deal with it, you're a medium" and of course I told him he was crazy. As I was picking up more clothes I couldn't get his words out of my head so I decided to humor him, though he wasn't there, and decided to prove him wrong. I seriously grabbed 6 to 10 different brands of work out spandex all a size medium and took them to the dressing room and tried them on; every single sticking pair fit perfectly! They were comfortable, I could move, I could breathe without circulation being cut off, and they looked really good, I mean dang my butt looked awesome (haha) it was wonderful, so I bought the pair that looked the best, felt the best, and were the cheapest since I had just bought other workout clothes that I was wearing and only had so much money. Of course when I went home and told my love he laughed and said "I told you so" because he was right, but dang was I happy he was. - Now guys the last time I have been a size medium was, I want to say, 7th or 8th grade, maybe freshman year, that was a really long time ago. Now I know when it comes to my jeans and stuff I'm not as small as I was in 8th grade yet but I'm getting there... Still, how exciting is that?!! I still can't believe it. These past two weeks I have gotten to work out in my new shorts and they are wonderful, I am so happy.

Well as awesome as this story is, I want to tell you about one other thing that was HUGE for me these past couple weeks that actually happened just the other day... As if the shorts weren't enough proof for me that my body was changing and that I was making progress God blessed me with another miracle and showed me how much change I truly had made. The other day I was laying in bed and my love and I were talking and resting while he was holding me. All of a sudden he just looked at me and said that he suddenly realized how small I really was getting because of how far he can put his arms around me, and of course being me I said whatever and didn't believe him. Well I got out of bed a little later to get only God knows what and saw a measuring tape used for fabric (it was flexible, not the hard metal kind) and for some reason I picked it up. I don't even think I realized what I was doing until I did it but I unrolled the measuring tape, put it around my waste at the belly button, and measured my size around; my boy friend came over to me, looked at me and then read the number, 37. I was shocked... 37??? he had to be joking, there was no way. The last time I had measured my waste was a little before Thanksgiving and if I remember correctly that number read 43, he had even checked it, how in the heck was it now saying 37? We measured again, this time he put it around me and held it and it came out the same, one time it even came out at 36 or 35. How is that possible, especially since my scale says I have gained weight? I don't understand how but Thank God!!!

One of the men on my support team, who is one of the greatest and most genuine caring men I know, kept telling me in the beginning that it's not about the number on the scale, it's about who you are. This journey is about me being healthy and making a difference in my life. It's about me loving myself for who I am and what I look like no matter what that stupid scale says. I remember this man asking me one simple question when I started working out with him, he said "Sami, if you were 400 lbs but looked exactly the way you wanted to, everything being perfect however you see yourself as being, would you care?" and of course I said no, but I don't think I actually believed that answer until today, until now. I'm so excited with the progress I now see, I can't even begin to explain how much it means to me to be able to find good and accomplishment in myself. I know this isn't easy, it hasn't been so far and it's not going to be. I have had struggles these past few weeks with starting to get sick, battling sleep problems, and eating habits that I know I need to kick. I know going ahead that the hardest thing for me is going to be my eating, it always has been and for some reason I can't seem to get it under control for very long, but I will. My eating will not always be my problem, I refuse to let it hold me back from truly loving me. I can do this, I know I can!

Thank you all for all the support you have given me, it truly means a lot to know there are people here for me; we all need someone, we all need to be loved. I hope through out this journey I can be an inspiration to some of you to learn to love yourselves and believe that you can achieve anything, you ARE worth it. I'm finally starting to believe that about myself. God has blessed me so much with all of you and I can't thank him enough for that. Please leave any comments below. Thank you for taking the time to read all of this, I know it's really long; I just wanted to share my joys I found with all of you. Well God bless.

ps. My weigh-in today was 207.. gained a pound but whatever I guess. I'm losing inches so I'm happy. <3