And the winner is ...

Here I go again!!!
About three months ago I entered a contest to participate in a 90-Day-Fitness where I could receive free personal training, including nutritional assistance to help me in my journey to loss weight.  All I had to do was write a 500-word essay explaining why I should be chosen to participate.  I could have easily gone for the juggler and talked about my family history with diabetes and the loss of my sister three years ago, in order to stand out from the rest, but I did not.  I decided to take a different approach to the task at hand, and guess what?  I was chosen!!!

Starting April 1st, the next 90 days are going to be crazy and hectic, but I am expecting great results.  My only hope is that I remember to call on God daily to help get me through as I try to balance time for me with taking care of a family.  The following is the essay that won me this wonderful opportunity that I would not otherwise be able to afford.

The 90 Day Fitness Challenge

Dear 90-Day Fitness Challenge,

My name is Nicole Trull and I would like to participate in your 90-Day Fitness Challenge because I believe it’s what I need to help me achieve the goal that I have been trying to reach for a couple of years now, but have not been successful for several reasons.

The first reason is the overwhelming and sometimes conflicting information that is put out there on how to properly lose weight.   I have found it frustrating to keep up with it all. 

It seems logical that if I “eat right and exercise,” the pounds will drop and I will be in a two piece bikini by summer, but unfortunately, it has not happened that way for me.  Heck, if I dropped a pound for every time I’ve heard that, I wouldn’t be in this situation, right? 

While I like to consider myself a “take charge” kind-of-gal who can get things done without someone holding my hand, I realize that when it comes to something as important as losing weight to get healthy (not to fit in the bikini), I need and want someone to hold my hand because the usual suspects that I have been trying are not working.  Not only do I do well when shown “what” and “how” to do something, I usually surpass the mark.  I guess it’s no coincidence I am a native of the “Show Me State.”

It’s certainly not for a lack of motivation. I have done some pretty crazy things to stay motivated, including signing up to run in a marathon.  I didn’t even like running, but I heard somewhere that it was the fastest way to lose weight.  I even raised some money for cancer research.  I figured, if I had a purpose, I would not give up.  And I did not. I ran in the Carlsbad Marathon after five months of training.  I learned how to run and lost 20 lbs. in the process – that was three years ago.

Last year I publicly announced to my family and friends that I intended to lose 40 lbs. by my 40^th birthday.  I called it My Journey to being 40 and Fabulous. My hope was to be held accountable if I made my goal public.  I even started a blog with weekly updates.  I turned 40 on Dec. 29^th. 

During my seven-month journey, not only did I gain knowledge that I was already fabulous, I gained 40 lbs.  Clearly, there was a flaw in my accountability plan.   However, aside from the extra weight, I gained a lot of knowledge about myself … like, in spite of it all, I refuse to give up.

I believe I have the right mental, physical and spiritual attitude, I just lack the knowledge and the funding on how to get there; which brings me to reason number two.  Did I mention that we are a one-income military family of four?