Motivation. The key to being healthy.

As the final day of #womenshealthweek dawns, I thought it fitting that I shared my health journey.

Some of you may know it, and many of you would have no idea.

Health is a bit like success to me - everyone has a different definition.

I remember being told by a family member who was on dozens of pills a day that I was the 'unhealthiest person in the family'. Wow did that make me angry. I was obese, yes, but my cholesterol, blood pressure, heart, sugar levels and all other function tests were fine. I was in fact the only person in my immediate family that wasn't on any medication at all. To her being thin was being healthy.

To me at that point, not being sick, was healthy.

To others healthy meant being able to run a marathon, or having rock hard abs, or to an elderly person with restricted movement being able to get out of a chair unaided.

In the world we're living in at the moment, it may mean being double vaccinated and never having caught Covid. Trust me as someone who's suffered from many chest / lunch infections like Whooping Cough and Pneumonia I am doing all I can to avoid it.

Back to the point.

I started being out on diets at about 7. Salads were for when you wanted to lose weight. Exercise was for when you wanted to lose weight. Junk food was a treat. Sugar helped you study.

By 12 I was at Jenny Craig or Weight Watchers - I can't remember what was first. Crazy thing is I look at the very few photos of me in those under 10 years, and I was a bit chubby, but I wasn't anything like I believed I was.

In high school I danced and sang about 18 hours a week. I swam long distance and did shot-put. I was still fat. I'd sit in the playground eating my restricted whatever, and play along with what I was trying to do. By the time I'd left school that day I was shovelling chocolate bars to get the energy to go to a 3 hour rehearsal.

This yo yo, didn't end. Disordered eating as it is referred to.

Up, down. 3-5 clothes sizes in my wardrobe at any one time.

Ironically I thought I was ok.

I got good work. I had partners and lovers. I looked great frocked up.

When I looked in the mirror, I looked passed the rolls and saw me.

I laugh now, but the issues were so great. I was paranoid I would die in a car crash and someone would go to my apartment and see the chocolate mousse remnants in the bin, so like an alcoholic I would put rubbish in other peoples bins when I left home. I was 95-140kgs for these years - people knew I was eating the chocolate mousse!!!

I partied hard, drank too much, took recreational drugs, toured shows, worked 18-20 hour days, did breakfast radio, recorded - didn't put any thought AT ALL into looking after myself, apart from the yoyo dieting (which is not looking after yourself) and the odd splurge on a Personal Trainer. One way road to problems.

When I got pregnant with my daughter I was 119kgs. I was a saint. When I had her I was 119kgs. Then I remembered people saying you could eat what you wanted when you breastfed (well it was what I heard), so by the time she was 1, I was about 130kgs.

What was I doing to myself?

You'd think the penny would have dropped by now. No. I could still keep up with her, run around parks etc, but the paranoia about breaking seats, or not fitting in a ride was always there.

Then disaster struck. Within 6 months my father died, my brother died and my mother came to live with my daughter and I. She'd suffered a massive stoke on the operating table having a knee replacement. She needed her knees done because of her weight and arthritis, and she'd had the clot because she needed to come off her blood thinners that she was on for her heart. Let's not forget the Type 2 Diabetes, cholesterol issues and more.

Within 18 months the penny had dropped. I couldn't do to my daughter what my mother had done to me. It was that simple. I was a walking time bomb. If I didn't do something, she would have to either care for me when I fell to pieces, arrange for care or I'd be dead. None of which I was willing to settle for.

It's funny what motivates you.

When I decided to have a Vertical Gastric Sleeve I was about 140kgs (I'd stopped weighing myself). My surgeon after all the tests said I was 'the healthiest morbidly obese patient' he had ever had. Put that on a T-shirt!

I'm now nearly 9 years post sleeve. I go between 80-85kgs, and am about 21% body fat (my aim is below 20%). I exercise at least an hour a day, from running to weights and yoga.

I have had all my excess skin removed, breast lift & reduction, bilateral brachiolplasty, bilateral thigh lift, corset abdominoplasty and bra line reduction. 21 days in hospital, 2 blood transfusions, 8 weeks on Endone, 3 months of restricted movement, hair loss and over $60k.

Had I known then what I know now, would I have gotten my health under control? I don't know. I needed rock solid motivation. I am also doing what I do in the world because of this journey. I know what it's like to be at the bottom. To feel so bad about yourself that you looked for solace in a block of Darrell Lea Milk Chocolate Rocklea Road (never found it by the way).

Yet in all of these weights, I had body confidence. That's a mind F for most people. So now I spend time helping people discover that confidence for themselves. It truly has NOTHING to do with a number on a scale or on a dress label.

I very rarely weigh myself anymore. I refuse to let that number that I chased every single day for decades have the power to start my day feeling like a legend or a failure.

I am on no medications, apart from ADHD meds, since being diagnosed a couple of months a go. I need iron infusions once or twice a year as iron absorption with a sleeve is very hard.

Touching wood as I type this, but I know, unless something catastrophic happens, my health will never make me a burden to anyone. I plan on living an Extraordinary life till 100, after which there will be a funeral celebration filled with people in black tie and waiters handing out champagne on silver platters.

Yes, I still drink sometimes. I eat chocolate, and don't hide the wrappers. I drink lots of water. I'm vegetarian when my daughter is with me (50/50 shared care). I sleep 7-8 hours a night. I meditate daily. I have my yearly workup with the GP. I see Mental Health Professionals, coaches, mentors.

I work on being the most Extraordinary me - Every Single Day.

I am healthy.

Whatever healthy means to you, I encourage you to put focus on it. We really do only have one body, don't stuff it up.