My name is Tyesha Sosa (@fitness_ambitious), and I am 26 years old. I live in New York, and I work as a dispatcher. I learned to meal prep and started strength training with heavy weights and successfully lost 70 pounds.
I always struggled with my weight. It would always fluctuate up and down, and each time I gained, I’d gain more than before. But I didn’t know how to start or who to turn to for help.
Dealing with my weight felt like an emotional roller coaster. I felt so up and down, and overall just horrible. I felt depressed in my life and felt such a void. My job also put a lot of stress on me as well.
But my motivation to take action only came after my doctor told me that I was at high risk for high blood pressure, and chronic diseases related to it. At 21, my weight had hit 205 pounds.
My journey wasn’t about looking a certain way—it was to get healthy and feel healthy.
I started doing a lot of research on nutrition—what to eat and how to eat. It was a difficult transition because I was so used to eating all the junk in the world. Changing my diet and eating habits wasn’t going to come easy for me, but I knew this was the key to a successful weight loss, and a healthy body internally and externally.
I started to meal prep to make sure I don’t make any poor eating decisions throughout the day. I focused on eating healthier carbs and getting lots of protein.
Here’s what I eat in a day now.
- Breakfast: Egg whites, turkey bacon, and apple slices with almond butter.
- Lunch: A source of protein, veggies, and healthy carbs. For example, I recently made baked chicken with Brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes.
- Snacks: Fruit (like a banana) and mixed nuts.
- Dinner: Usually a protein shake or a very light meal because I don’t like to feel bloated at night.
- Dessert: Light & Fit yogurt.
When I first started to work out, all I did was cardio because that’s all I really knew.
Throughout my life, I always did some type of physical activity, but never stood by it with consistency. But with all of the cardio, I didn’t love its effects on my body, as it caused me to almost lose too much weight.
So, I decided to hire a trainer. It was super costly, but I knew that’s exactly what I needed in order to get the rhythm of having the consistency of working out. My trainer introduced me to weights and I started really feeling myself as I was getting stronger.
My weight went from 135 pounds to 150 pounds with heavy weight training, and I immediately fell in love with what it did to my body, helping to give it the shape it is now.
Now, I typically warm up on the bike for about 10 minutes and then jump right into the weights.
These three changes helped make my weight-loss journey a success.
Overall, I have lost 70 pounds.
All great things take time, and if it were easy then everyone would do it. Trust me, it wasn’t easy for me and it took a long time. But mentally you have to believe in yourself as much as you want people to believe in you. There’s no real quick fix. You have to lose weight the right way—meaning with healthy and sustainable changes—for it to really stay off.
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