Worth the Weight

I took a deep breath and pushed the dumbbells up from my chest. My arms shook uncontrollably and I felt like I’d break in two.

I signed up for this, I reminded myself, when I became a contestant on The Biggest Loser—four months away from my family, suffering through the most intense workouts and dieting I’d ever done, competing with 17 others to lose the most weight.

I knew it would be a challenge, but here it was, my first week, and already I was cracking under the strain. Quickly, I brought my arms back down and let the weights fall to the ground with a crash. “It’s too heavy,” I gasped. “I can’t do it.”

Jillian, my trainer, glared at me. “Why are you here, Julie?”

“To lose weight,” I answered.

She shook her head. “Get out of my gym,” she snapped.

“What, why?”

“Don’t come back until you can tell me why you’re really here.”

I trudged back to my room, wiping the tears from my eyes. God, what’s the right answer? It seemed like all my life, when it came to losing weight, I only knew the wrong ones.

That’s how I’d ended up 5 foot 2, 218 pounds, at age 34. A few months earlier I’d been in my kitchen when my friend Melissa called. “You’ll never guess who’s in town,” she said. “The Biggest Loser. They’re holding auditions.”

Melissa and I were both addicted to the show, but for different reasons. Melissa was thin—she just watched for entertainment’s sake. For me, watching those people go through such an intense weight-loss program—and succeed—was like watching an impossible dream.

As out of reach as having another child, something my husband, Mike, and I had been talking about. The doctor told us that pregnancy would be too risky at my weight and with my existing health conditions. We considered adoption, but I doubted I’d even be able to handle raising another kid.

Our Noah was a rambunctious six-year-old. I didn’t have the energy to keep up with him. At the playground, I’d sit swathed in my baggy black clothes, watching him from afar. I’d grab fast food for dinner, too tired to cook. When I did find time in the kitchen, I usually baked chocolate chip cookies—hardly healthy (but my favorite!). My weight had gotten so out of hand I refused to go to my husband’s company Christmas party for the past five years.