REAL LIFE

A BETTER MOMMY

By: Maria Kang

Heidy Champagne stopped the endless dieting cycle and changed her lifestyle for good.

Heidy Champagne of Layton, Utah, will adamantly claim she was “born and bred to worry about the weight on scale.” She’s experienced almost every diet in her 31 years of living. So just like the majority of people in January 2009, she decided to make a resolution to lose weight. She put herself on a strict diet of one shake for lunch, another for dinner, then a meal at dinner. One week into the diet plan however, she was already starving! While she lost eight pounds that week, she had a “failure’s mentality” and knew that while this diet provided short-term weight loss, eventually she would fail herself once again if she stayed with this unrealistic meal plan.

Like many dieters, Heidy wasn’t dieting to change her lifestyle. She dieted to lose weight. After a few months of following a strict diet and achieving significant weight loss, she would continue her old eating habits and gain everything back. In addition to having a “failure’s mentality” and not permanently changing her lifestyle, like many people who struggle with unhealthy habits, she was also an emotional eater and food addict.

When Heidy married at 19, she weighed 150 pounds, a good size for her 5-foot-6 frame. However, after the birth of her first child she weighed 220 pounds and continued to gain and lose 45 pounds with each of her four children now ages 10, 7, 6 and 4. She didn’t work out, she lived on McDonald’s drive through and had an outrageous sweet tooth.

Overcome by her declining health, Heidy struggled with depression and hopelessness and often refused to eat in public. “I knew I had an issue, and I wanted to deal with it, but I’d complain to my husband and he would tell me to have will power but I couldn’t stop eating. … How do you break the cycle? It’s not like today I will have will power … NO! It didn’t work like that for me.”

Two things made Heidy’s 2009 fitness resolutions a success. First, she got sick on January 1. When she went to the doctor to treat her strep throat, she stepped on the scale and was astonished at the 250 pound mark staring back at her. Second, her husband brought home a Max Muscle magazine he found at Gold’s gym. Inside the pages was 2007 MaxFormation winner, Dawn Thomas. Inspired by Dawn’s success story, Heidy decided to call on Heather Johnson of Max Muscle Layton and join the MaxFormation challenge on January 8.

“We immediately got Heidy started on Max Muscle’s Core 4 program: protein, glutamine, multi-vitamin and EFA’s,” said Heather. “Once her nutrition and exercise were in place, we added other products such as fat burners.” Heidy also began eating breakfast and incorporating a protein and carbohydrate at every meal, six times a day. Working with Heather at Max Muscle gave Heidy the emotional, professional and personal support she needed yet never received in the past. Heidy met with Heather every week to take measurements and discuss her challenges and progress.

Tracking her measurements was an important part of her personal challenge as she was used to calculating her success by how many pounds she lost. “It was very frustrating because I was losing weight very slowly,” says Heidy. “I had to focus on the percentage and not the pounds. My diet program was very different this time.”

In addition to eating small meals and taking her supplements, she began training on the treadmill, and eventually started taking spin classes and kickboxing. At the end of the MaxFormation challenge in June she had lost a proud 50 pounds! Not only was she excited to become a Top 10 MaxFormation finalist, but most importantly, she was excited to be role model for her four children. “In the past, my kids ate what I ate. Now my kids love that I can play with them … even my 7-year-old even likes to work out with me!” she said. MS&F