"If we really want to care for our children, our spouses, our friends and family, we need to put ourselves first," says Scritchfield. "Only then will we have the energy and spirit to be at our best."
Putting yourself first requires support. Arruda's husband Jeff stayed home with their three children when she went to the gym in the evening. In the morning, she'd see the kids off to school and her mother-in-law would watch Zak during her workouts. Arruda recognized that while her new lifestyle required her to be absent from her family at times, in the long term, it made her more present as a mother, spouse and daughter.
"When you can ask for help, or even just tell people what you're doing, you get that verbal support that reinforces that yes, you can do this," Scritchfield says.
A Lifelong Commitment
Before a woman accepts her health as a lifelong commitment, before she enlists the support of her friends and family, how do the wheels get put in motion for lasting change?
"A catalyst," says Scritchfield. "A woman has to be moved beyond whim into physical action." Arruda's initiator was a very dramatic and emotional experience, but other women have found their ideal weight from much more ordinary strikes of inspiration.
Take 27-year-old Megan Pierce, who's kept off 80 pounds for two years by becoming a runner. Suffering from exercise-induced asthma since childhood, the grad school student was far from being an athlete. For Pierce, the pivotal moment occurred when she visited the doctor for a cold and stepped on a scale.
"I weighed over 200 pounds for the first time ever, and for me, that was it," she says. By the time she had stepped off the scale, Pierce had already made a commitment to lose 30 pounds. She incented herself by swearing not to buy any new clothes until that weight had come off.
Like Arruda, Pierce joined a gym. She began by walking on a treadmill for 30 to 40 minutes, three days a week. Six months into her program, encouraged by her progress, Pierce decided to up the ante. She started jogging on the treadmill for as long as she could, just minutes to start, and then returned to walking.
"I was always the kid who couldn't run a mile in gym class," she says. "So, for me, jogging was as much an experiment to see what my body could do as it was a mechanism to lose weight."
Having small, measurable goals is another key element to lasting weight loss, says Scritchfield. If Pierce decided to lose 80 pounds right from the start, she would have had trouble staying motivated. The same applies to exercise. Walking on a treadmill for 30 minutes, three times a week, is a reasonable start for someone who's been sedentary her entire life.
Similar to Arruda, Pierce made changes to her diet. She started by reducing processed foods, substituting a bag of baby carrots for crackers, for example. She also avoided fast foods and other convenience products. "I was commuting two to three hours a day for grad school, and I think my on-the-go eating habits really contributed to my weight getting so out of control," Pierce says. She switched to eating her meals at home, including a hearty oatmeal breakfast, and brown bagging it.
It's not a coincidence that both Arruda and Pierce achieved success with the combination of dietary changes and running. "Running and nutrition are very tightly connected in weight loss," says Scritchfield. "One feeds the other." Running releases a particularly large amount of serotonin, a happy hormone in the brain that makes you feel good and compels you to eat healthy. When you eat healthy, your energy level rises, motivating you to run. "People who diet without exercising don't have this built-in motivation that comes from the serotonin," says Scritchfield.