Cartina lost 26 pounds

Weight Loss Journey: Cartina lost 26 pounds. She shared with us about the ups and downs of her weight loss journey.

Hello Ladies, My name is Cartina Harris. I’m 42 years old and I will turn 43 in August. I knew I needed to change because diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease run in my family. I lost my mother at the age of 50 due to her having diabetes and heart problems. I decided that it was a time for a lifestyle change and I did it for me.

My heaviest weight was 225 pounds at 5’1″ tall. I started the change last year and my journey went pretty well. I got down to 179 pounds but then I gave up when it got cold. Later, I woke up one day and said to myself you did all that hard work and motivated other people to do right. I had to ask myself, “How are you going to throw in the towel like that?” That’s when I got myself out of bed, got on the scale and saw that I was back to 200 plus pounds. I told myself, “No ma’am!”

I jumped back on the bandwagon and got to moving. I stopped eating red meat. I grew up eating baked and broiled food with my mom so I went back to that. I said no to fried food, sugar, sodas and junk food. I also go to the gym everyday for an hour. I love do cardio with light strength training. My goal is to get down to 145 pounds by the end of the year or sometime next year.

My advice to others: All I say is eat clean. That means change your eat habits, eat small portions and drink plenty of water with all your meals. Also, make sure you eat breakfast. For exercise, try doing 30 minutes to 1 hour of cardio three times a week with strength training.