I sat at my kitchen table, as the tears streamed down my face. I had just gotten off the bathroom scale and realized that I was 100 pounds overweight. I decided to write an entry in my journal. “ How do I start the process of losing 100 pounds?” It seemed like such a daunting task. Was my life over? Was I just destined to be an unhappy , unhealthy overweight person for the rest of my life. I guess this was the point at which , I hit rock bottom. I was so sick and tired of being overweight. I did not want to try another diet. I had tried them all and although I may have lost weight temporarily, I could never just lose the weight once and for all and keep it off. I was angry. It wasn’t fair! Why did I have to deal with this struggle. I just wanted to be normal and enjoy my life , like everyone else did. I have always been pretty stubborn and determined about things. On this day, I decided, I was going to overcome my life long struggle with weight and when I figured it out , I would share my secrets to success with others, so they could achieve ,what had always eluded me … A normal life and a normal healthy body.

So… here I am, years later and happy and excited to share my success story with you. I have lost 101 pounds. I am happy. I am healthy. I did it! I did not use drugs, or surgery to accomplish this goal. I changed myself from the inside out. I made permanent life style changes at a slow and steady pace. I know that I will never again struggle with my weight. I have gotten in tune with my body. I have learned how it works. I changed my way of thinking. I no longer think like a fat person. I have learned to nurture my spirit. I am joyously embracing my life each day and feeling so grateful for my life. I have beaten the battle of the bulge and now I know that I will positively impact many people , who will read this book and will realize that whether they want to lose 20 pounds or 200 pounds, that they don’t have to feel hopeless. There is a solution and I have found it and now I want to share with you, how I changed my life around and I hope that you will now find the way, to turn your life around also. I realize now that this is more than just about losing the weight, it is also about becoming happy and about leading a fulfilling life and going after your dreams, no matter how unattainable you think they are. So please read on with an open mind and perhaps your dreams will come true for you, just as they did for me.

As a person who has dieted repeatedly, I would always fall into the trap of going from one extreme to the other. I would be extremely strict with myself and then when I cheated (as I always cheated), I took the all or nothing approach. I convinced myself that I’d already blown the diet anyway so I might as well eat the whole chocolate cake! This would negate any positive results I’d had by being so strict and hard on myself.

I have succeeded in permanently losing my weight, by slowly and methodically educating myself and by slowly implementing changes at a pace that I could easily adjust to. This I feel is the real key to success. It is not about implementing drastic changes into your life that can not be maintained on a permanent basis. Throughout this book, I will educate you about many things that you could do to change your life, but I really need to emphasize how important it is, to not overwhelm yourself by implementing change too quickly.

I will tell you now that if you do this too quickly, you are going to fail. So take it from someone who has been there - simply read this book, take in the information and that is all that you need to do at the moment. Once you have absorbed the information, you can, if you are ready, to start to implement small changes that will start you on the road to permanent weight loss. Success isn’t about hitting it out of the ball park on the first swing, it is about slow progress that lasts. So please, just sit back , relax, take a deep breath and know that this is the first step to a new life.