healthy living

At the age of 15 I was in the best shape of my life.  I ran everyday and lifted weights.  I am 5’1” and I was 115 pounds of pure muscle.
I was on my high school soccer team and I had been playing for over 10 years.

In the spring season I played indoor soccer (because most of spring is snowy in NW Ohio) and it was then that I felt it.

The step that changed my life.
Okay, so its not that drastic.  But it did alter the way I do things.
I planted my foot after kicking the ball, came down wrong and ended up tearing…a lot.

After screaming obscenities in the indoor soccer center I saw my knee swelled up 3 times its normal size.  Ouch.

At 15 I had my first knee surgery.  My knee was imobile for over 6 months.  But within a few short months I was ready to go back to playing soccer.

My doctor cleared me and I was off!

Man did it ever feel good to get exercising with my team again!

Then during some combat drills I felt it.  POP!

I had just torn almost everything I had spent a year fixing up.

After my second knee surgery at age 16 I knew I would never play soccer again.
It broke my heart but with 2 surgeries under my belt I knew my knee would be angry if I played again.

I slowly put on the weight from not exercising enough and my sophomore year in college I weighed 120.  Again, not a heavy weight by any means but at my height every pound shows.

I had my third knee surgery at 21 and it left me even more scarred, literally, I have holes everywhere on this knee now!

And just this year (2010) I had my fourth (!!!) knee surgery at age 28.  I am a big ol mess.

In the past I could only walk, no running.  And now my weight has crept up to almost 125 pounds.  YIKES!  With a Full Time job at The University that keeps me busy a lot of nights and weekends it is hard to keep everything in check.
I was recently given the go ahead by my orthopedic surgeon to start running again.  13 years later.

I am still small-ish and I still have oodles of muscles but I need to work on eating clean and working out.

The working out part of this equation has been the hardest.  I still have constant knee pain and I am NOT looking for another surgery.

This is all changing though.
No longer will I rely on frozen pizza and Taco Bell for meals, I am eating cleaner and more natural foods.  Buying less processed crap for my family and taking it all one step at a time for now.