In nursing school, I was determined to graduate first in my class. I was so determined that my health became an afterthought—I still went to the gym, but not consistently, and mostly I did strength exercises, without any cardio. I did finish first in my class, but in two years I went from 240 to 311 pounds. I was 25 years old at my heaviest.

After graduation I realized I needed to rein in my weight. I had a few options, but my friend owned a Peloton. I’d tried it before and found it really didn’t work for me. This time, though, I decided to give it a week and see what happened. I started out with a progress picture to see how much I’d changed. At the end of those seven days, I’d lost 16 pounds.

The experience really changed my mind about working out. My whole life I had the false belief that getting in shape required being sore. With the Peloton workouts, I wasn’t getting sore or hurt. I was amazed that I lost that much weight and felt great doing it.

My plan was to work out every single day, even if it was just 20 minutes. And if I could only do those 20 minutes, I was determined to give it my all. I was still strength training, too; I’d just finally recognized the importance of consistent cardio workouts. I still ate whatever I wanted, but I was burning way more calories and found my appetite wasn’t as big.

Over the next 6 months, I lost 106 pounds; my waist went from 51 inches to 34 inches. Cardio was genuinely fun, and progress pics and tracking my shrinking waist kept me motivated. I went from running painful, 12-minute miles to doing a 5K in under 24 minutes.

It wasn’t until I started losing weight I realized how out of shape I’d really been. I’d felt strong while weight-training, but my knees and back were always in pain. I dropped pounds and that pain went away—I started sleeping better, too; my obstructive sleep apnea went away, as did my high blood pressure. I started to think, “How much could I test this body?”

Everyone was shocked by my transformation. People who know me now see pictures of me at my heaviest and don’t believe it’s the same person. My family was very proud of me.

I signed up for a half-marathon that was canceled because of the pandemic, so my training buddy and I decided to just run it ourselves. I’m looking ahead to doing a full marathon when things get back to “normal.” I want to continue this healthy lifestyle. I am just having fun with it at this point!

For me, finding a fun way to exercise really made a difference. Mine was Peloton, but yours could be anything. Taking progress pics, measurements, and weighing myself helped me recognize the gains I’d made and keep from getting discouraged. Finally, I just tried to stay consistent—and it’s a whole lot easier to stay consistent when you’re actually having fun. —As told to Jesse Hicks

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