The mindset challenge: My previous "trauma"

Eight years ago, I weighed 124 pounds and I was doing modelling gigs to pay some of my university expenses.

I achieved this weight in the unhealthiest way possible while participating in a beauty pageant at the age of 17. The regime they imposed me for the required fast results consisted of three meals of tuna and green salad, plus two portions of pineapple as snacks.

I was also required to train at the gym daily (it later increased to twice a day) and I had exhausting runway trainings every day (try walking for two hours on 6 inch heels and tell me if it's not exhausting)

Let's keep in mind that I was studying at the university, 7 subjects per semester, and the commute between my university and the gym/training room was an hour long.

For that reason, I don't attribute all of my extreme weight loss to diet and exercise exclusively. I should also give some credit to exhaustion.

The day of the pageant's press conference, I was asked to arrive at 7 am for prep. We were also required to take dehydrating pills to make us look leaner.

I didn't bring any lunch, so I went with a friend to the closest supermarket to get a tuna can. While standing on line to pay at the cash, I passed out.

After that day, everything went downhill. I barely survived with that diet till the day of the pageant.

The day after, I turned 18I ate a big meal and I went back to normal (and normal doesn't mean fully sedentary) I would either do zumba or yoga three times a week (not twice a day as before) but I would eat as a regular student: not a good diet, too much caffeine, sugar and carbs.

Slowly but steadily, and without even realizing, I gained all the weight I loss and even more, logging 208 pounds at the beginning of my program.

As I said in my previous post, my height helped me keep the illusion that I wasn't overweight, even though the scale and my clothes said otherwise.

My main mindset challenge was to convince myself that I was able to achieve a healthy lifestyle change and get to the shape I wanted without starving myself and going back to that insane regime.