Brooke's Story

These pictures show myself over the past 12 years and in many different stages of health. I was always pretty thin growing up and when I went on birth control for the first time after getting engaged to my now husband, which is what I thought everyone naturally did, I gained 30 pounds in 6 months just from the pill!

After getting married, I went on strict keto and only ate protein and fat (because that's what a lot of people were doing at that time) and I lost 30 pounds in just one month - yikes! For about 2 years after that I "yo-yo dieted" and kept gaining weight then losing it back and forth and was very miserable.

I came across the term "pro-metabolic eating" and learned a lot about how to better support your metabolism & hormones and I felt like my eyes were finally open! I knew I had to make my body feel safe again and actually feed it nourishing food and CARBS to help it heal and run efficiently again. I then switched up my meals by eating way more than I usually did, stopped fasting for long periods of time except for bedtime, and ate a variety of foods for their nutrients. I then gained 30 pounds in a month - also yikes - I just went all in on the plan instead of slowly transitioning like I was supposed to. This was my safety weight that my body put on and I honestly didn't mind so much because I knew I was in a "healing stage" of life. It wasn't about what the scale said any more but rather about how healthy my body and metabolism actually was.

I then joined a CrossFit gym, kept eating pro-metabolically and over 1 year I lost those 30 pounds that I had put on through weight training, cardio and other variations of exercise. I was so proud of myself for losing that extra weight in a healthy way finally! I finally felt GOOD. I could eat real food to fuel my workouts, I had zero food fear, and I wasn't exercising to punish myself for eating something yummy like you see done in our culture unfortunately. Once I got to a place of having quite a bit of muscle (for me) and not much body fat, I got pregnant! I tried to train normally like I had always done and unfortunately ended up quitting because I got mad that I couldn't do workouts the way that I wanted to do them. Instead of scaling down or changing my methods, I just decided to stop. I gained 50 pounds during that pregnancy and after having my son, I lost 40 pounds within a year.

I got pregnant with our daughter and the same thing happened again where I would try to exercise but just felt so sick that I felt like I couldn't do anything! I also gained 50 pounds with that pregnancy but felt much larger than I did the first time because I started out at a place where I had less muscle and more fat than I did the first time around. Now, my daughter is 9 months old and I am down 55 pounds so I'm doing a little better than I was before! I am exersicing when I can, being strict with my food choices and all of the baby weight + some has all came off. My next goal is to just keep gaining MUSCLE! I had horrible back pain during both pregnancies so I'm really trying to get stronger glutes to help carry the weight of my next babies. I would love to have at least 2 more, God willing, so I'm literally trying to get in shape so I can just get pregnant again!

I hope some of my story resonates with you in some way. It's so important to have grace for ourselves as moms and as women in general. I never want to define my health by what the scale says or what I look like on the outside. I believe what we believe, our thoughts, our words and our attitudes produce our health or sickness just as much as the food we eat does. I want to have joy in every season that I'm in - pregnancy, chubby, flabby, thin, strong, weak, etc. It is my dream to be able to help women in their health journeys to discover just how strong and beautiful they are! It would be an honor to work with you.

Brooke