Life changing!

The pictures to the left were taken back in 2007. While I have always been a very bubbly and smiley person, behind the smile it was a very different story. I was suffering from debilitating depression, anxiety and panic attacks I hardly left the house and I had just lost my job. I had bad knees and struggled to exercise and even tie my own shoe laces.  My blood sugar spikes and lows gave me chronic lightheadedness all the time, I had daily headaches that would sometimes result in migraines. 

There was this one day when I hit rock bottom and the reflection I finally saw staring back at me changed everything. Call it a life changing moment, an epiphany, a moment of clarity, the state of denial I'd been living in came to light!

I realised I had to choose between a life of physical and mentally daily struggles where I had become the person feeling sorry for myself everyday or was I going to make changes that felt extremely overwhelming and impossible but I knew would change my life.  At the time the latter felt like the hardest thing in the world and unabtainable but I just put one foot in front of the other and begun, with the support of my amazing husband and family I worked my butt off everyday and as the physical changes started happening it was like peeling an onion, I found the core person that I had always been, I had hidden myself away with all those layers.

Five years on and I still cannot believe that I am where I am today.  I no longer suffer the debilitating depression, anxiety and panic attacks I once did, while I certainly still have my struggles and days that feel harder than others my life is no longer a pity party and I have a huge amount of gratitude.  I run my own successful sewing business that I started by myself and worked hard at, I am thankful for it everyday.  I can exercise freely with no knee pain and I don't have to constantly eat every couple of hours to stabilise my blood sugar, I am happier, I am healthier and I have a completely different outlook on life, suffice to say I am a different person but my spirit always remained the same. This journey has taught me so much about myself and while I love the physical transformation I am truly thankful that I found myself again.