Amy Parham - 10 Lessons from a Former Fat Girl: Living with Less of You and More of Life

Amy

Parham

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

EUGENE, OREGON

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Verses marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Verses marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996, 2004. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, IL 60189 USA. All rights reserved.

Verses marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. ( www.Lockman.org )

Verses marked KJV are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Verses marked TLB are taken from The Living Bible, Copyright 1971. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, IL 60189 USA. All rights reserved.

Cover by Dugan Design Group, Bloomington, Minnesota

Cover photo Lolo Highsmith (hair styled by Shannon Peery, Halo Salon, Columbia, SC)

Amy Parham: Published in association with the literary agency of Fedd & Company, Inc., 9759 Concord Pass, Brentwood, TN 37027.

The Biggest Loser is not associated with this book or any of the views or information contained in this book.

10 LESSONS FROM A FORMER FAT GIRL

Copyright 2010 by Amy Parham

Published by Harvest House Publishers

Eugene, Oregon 97402

www.harvesthousepublishers.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Parham, Amy, 1967

10 lessons from a former fat girl / Amy Parham.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-0-7369-3865-5 (pbk.)

1. Self-perceptionReligious aspectsChristianity. 2. Body image. 3. HealthReligious aspectsChristianity. 4. WomenReligiouslife. 5. FoodReligious aspectsChristianity. 6. EmotionsReligious aspectsChristianity. I. Title. II. Title: Ten lessons from a former fat girl.

BV4598.25.P37 2011

248.4dc22

2010025556

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any otherexcept for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Printed in the United States of America

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 / BP-NI / 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

To all the women who feel like prisoners
in their bodies and long to be free,
this book is dedicated to you.

I would like to thank Jesus Christ, the giver of all freedom. I would also like to thank my husband, Phillip, for being my best friend; my boys, Austin, Pearson, and Rhett, for loving me just the way I am; my daddy, Don Pearson, for loving me with a love that exemplifies the love of Christ; and my mother, Margaret Williams, for showing me how to be a strong woman by being an excellent role model.

Finally, I send big hugs and thanks to all the women who are too numerous to listbut know who they arefor influencing my life in big and small ways and continuing to teach me fit-girl lessons through their examples, words, and deeds.

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.

ANATOLE FRANCE

Why is everyone so obsessed with their weight? This is the question I started asking myself when I had finally made the decision to settle for being the fat girl. I mean, I had a lot going for me. Why should the extra weight matter? I was organized. I was a great hostess. I volunteered in my church. I was a good wife, mother, and friend. Even though I had ballooned to 240 pounds and was tired all the time, weight was one area I decided to give myself a break. It didnt bother me, so why should it bother anyone else?

I got defensive when family members expressed their concerns and offered helpful suggestions to lose weight. My sister-in-law, who I always thought of as the skinny girl, repeatedly tried to encourage me with my weight loss. I remember one time when she took me out to lunch. As we were getting ready to leave, she presented me with a gifta food journal. She was very excited about the prospect of teaching me how to write down my food intake each and every day. As you can imagine, I didnt share her enthusiasm. Simply looking at that book exhausted me.

See, I looked at the skinny girl as a different animal from me. I never truly believed that the things that worked for her would work for me. I somehow thought that I was different, and so my body worked differently than hers did. I didnt believe I could ever be like her, so why would I even try? This is the mentality of those of us who have been trapped inside our bodies and minds as fat girls.

Then something happened that changed the course of this fat girl. Along came a television reality show called The Biggest Loser. In 2008 my husband and I were chosen out of 300,000 hopeful candidates to go on television and reveal to America our struggle with obesity. This was an amazing opportunity but one that forced me to look at myself in a whole new way. The fat girl was to be exposed, and there was no place to hide from the truth. My husband and I lost a total of 256 pounds together as a couple on that show. That is an amazing victory, but that was just the beginning of the war. The weight-loss process revealed deeper issues that had caused us to put on the weight in the first place. Dealing with these issues would become the real challenge and the thing that solidified the transformation from the fat girl to the fit girl.

That is why this book may be different from any weight-loss book you have ever read. This book talks about not only the physical aspects of weight loss, but also the very real mental and emotional challenges that exist. Its about learning how to transform a fat girl (a woman who has poor eating and exercise habits, a food addiction, a lack of self-esteem, and a distorted image of herself, God, and others) into a fit girl (a woman who practices healthy eating and exercise habits, takes care of herself emotionally, physically, and mentally, and believes in herself and God).

This book is about identifying those areas in your life where youve held yourself back from becoming the woman God created you to be. Its about digging up roots of bitterness and unforgiveness in your heart. Its about releasing those people and things in your past that have hurt you and, by doing so, gaining freedom from compulsions that rule your life. We have all been on a million diets, but have we dealt with the roots of our problems? For me, I had tried every diet I could find, but I never had focused on the core of the problem.

Be assured that this book is not a diet book or a manual to make you as skinny as a supermodel in 45 days or less. It is not a get-fit-quick scheme or program. I am not promoting any pills, potions, or magic fairy dust that you must buy now to change your life by tomorrow. I am not selling you an unrealistic expectation or a promise that the journey toward becoming a fit girl is an easy one. In fact, its quite the opposite. Its a tough process and requires the peeling back of many layers.