The Secret of My 32 Pounds Weight Loss Success

by Marna Thall
(Denver, CO USA)

I was 12 years old when my mother was in a car accident, and I remember sitting at the kitchen table a few days after the car accident and her telling me, "My neck is a little tender. Well… I’m sure it’s nothing." From that moment, until I was 19, it wasn’t "nothing." Soon after the accident my mother was bed ridden. She was unable to move her neck and was suffering miserably. Due to her inability to move on a regular basis, I felt it was my duty to take care of my sister who at the time was just six years old.

I had always been an active and athletic child, but now I needed to be there for my mother, my father, and my little sister. I would come home after school and eat while doing laundry, cleaning, playing with my sister and working on my homework. Slowly, I began to gain more and more weight.

I decided at a size 12/14 and a year and a half later, that I needed to lose weight.

I was working out and was even employed at an athletic club, but no matter what diet plan or exercise program, I was unable to lose more then a few pounds. I thought I needed a more structured program and decided to give up the book and magazine diets. I began a popular structured weight loss program. I was excited and ready. My parents were incredibly supportive and they began taking me to meetings to get my weekly weigh-in.

During this time I was measuring food. I could eat only so many carbohydrates, fats, proteins, fruit and dairy products. I was able to eat as many vegetables as I liked, so I remember eating a ton of celery and salsa. I was in high school and I felt uncomfortable having to come home for lunch to measure food. How were all my skinny friends able to go to McDonalds, Taco Bell, and Wendy’s each and every day for lunch and stay thin, while I had to go home to measure and weigh my food? I became frustrated and quit this diet, still eager to lose weight.

I then became a vegetarian. I figured that now I would definitely be able to lose weight. I was wrong! I could still overeat as a vegetarian, and I did. For the next three years I must have tried 40 diets, diet pills, and random diet products all in hope to get down to a comfortable weight. I probably gained and lost the same 20 pounds eight times over. What was wrong with me?

I graduated from high school wearing a size 14, still on a mission to lose the weight. I knew I could! I just hadn’t found the right diet or the right workout regiment. I was still motivated to try anything that I could, and I continued to diet until I hit rock bottom. Boy am I glad I did, because what I would learn in the next years ahead, would change my life.

In college, I began researching various diets and exercise programs. I read psychological journals on weight management and health. I searched the Internet and spoke with doctors. I asked Professors, Doctors, Psychologists, Nutritionists and Kinesiologists about regarding permanent weight loss. I learned about food chemistry and how our bodies assimilate food. I asked and asked and asked, and guess what? For every person that I asked, I received a different answer. Literally, no two answers were the same. Some professionals said to eat mainly carbohydrates, some said protein, while others felt fruits and vegetables were the answer. They told me when to eat, what pills and/or supplements to take, when to take them and how to take them. It was crazy!!

One day in my dorm room in Boulder a group of naturally thin friends were talking about how they could eat whatever they wanted, and never gain weight. They didn’t understand the concept of dieting and had no idea about nutrition. The light immediately went on! Why had I been spending all this time and energy talking to overweight and compulsive dieters? I wanted to lose 35 pounds eating foods I loved too.

I began watching, talking and researching naturally thin individuals. In fact, I became obsessed with them. I knew that I could become an intuitive weight loss success story, and these magnificent people taught me everything I needed to know to be able to listen to my body to slim down naturally. I researched hundreds of these thin individuals on campus, in formal settings, in relaxed settings, downtown, in schools, groceries and in malls. I just had to know! I conducted market research and statistical analysis, all to see the differences between thin and overweight people.

I learned everything I could possibly learn about naturally thin individuals. I compared these secrets to the diets and the methods of losing weight that I had tried in the past. Once I began thinking like a naturally thin individual, I lost weight faster and more naturally then ever before. It was amazing! Sure enough, I listened to my body to slim down naturally - I began literally shrinking right before my eyes. I could hardly believe it and neither could my college friends. They (unnaturally thin college friends) couldn’t understand how I could be losing weight while eating everything I wanted. It was all about become intuitively aligned with my body. Once I began living and thinking like a thin person, the extra weight had to come off.

Currently, I am a size 6/8 and I have maintained this size for over twelve years. My own intuitive weight loss success is because I listened to my body to slim down. I am comfortable in the body that I live in, and I don’t binge, exercise compulsively, or diet. I learned that weight wasn’t the problem, for if it were, I would've lost weight once and would never have had to think about it again. Weight is the symptom to my boredom, my stress, my period, etc.

Everyone kept asking me what I was doing and when I showed them, they too began to lose weight fast. My weight loss tips really worked and so
I developed ThinWithin.com!! My clients have told me that they feel better emotionally and psychologically while losing weight naturally. My goal is to facilitate each individuals weight loss success so that they can free themselves from weight and food as an issue in their lives forever.