I grew up on a farm in Arkansas where my family grew their own vegetables and butchered their own meat. Chicken, beef, pork, rabbit, we butchered and ate it. My mother, God rest her soul, would put pork lard in everything she made us for breakfast, lunch and dinner. She would fry eggs in pork fat, she would put several tablespoons of pork lard into the veggies as she boiled them on the stove, "to add flavor" she said. I can remember that if I didn't want to eat anything my mom made for any of the meals, I would get a big piece of cake. Morning, noon and night, if I wanted cake I would get it. Yea, I was spoiled. Looking back on my life, and what I ate then, I'm surprised I didn't have a weight problem as a child. But, I was alot more active then. Helping around the farm, walking a couple of blocks to a friends house or even walking to the local cemetary which was a little over a mile from where we lived, and all this was a daily habit.
I got out of putting lard in my foods when I moved in with my husband. My weight problem didn't start until I got pregnant the first time and my metabolism went down the toilet and I never got it back. I gained 80 pounds with my first pregnancy. Four months later, I was told I was pregnant again, I still haven't lost any weight from the first one so the doctor put me on a strict diet and activity plan which I followed to the letter. Still I gained weight, by the time my third child was born, I weighed 300 pounds. :( I even went as far as taking ballet classes in college when my children were little. Can you imagine a 300 pound woman taking ballet? But I really didn't feel all that bad. Besides the instructor, who looked like she had a major eating disorder and was stick thin, I was actually the skinniest woman in class.
I still try to do alot of the excercises we did in that class and I'm eating alot healthier now. Instead of putting tablespoons of sugar in my cereal I now put fresh fruit instead, and realized that I like the natural sweetness of the fruit over the taste of sugar. I still have a weight problem, but I'm not letting it get me down, I'm not depressed or ashamed of who I am. This is a fixable problem. It's going to be a long, hard road but I know in my heart I can do it. I have to push past the pain in my knees and keep saying to myself "once I lose the weight they won't hurt as bad."