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We’re almost through the first month of the year, which means that the resolution you made to get fit is either going really well or, more likely, not at all. And if you’re sitting here, thinking “man, I really need to get ahold of myself” and looking for a little bit of motivation, then you’ve got to meet Hayley Westoby, a 25-year-old Australian woman who shed 140 pounds after a cruel remark by an ex.
Westoby, who told The Daily Mail that she’d always been athletic pre-college, said that she started gaining weight when she got to university. She gained the dreaded ‘Freshman 15’ and then just kept going. Where before she was making healthy choices about food, at university she started eating junk and not watching how her body was responding. Before she knew it, Westoby says, her weight had spiraled out of control, and her scaled showed that she weighed 260 pounds.
And then, her boyfriend said something cruel.
…it wasn’t until a row with an ex-partner that Ms Westoby realised she’d gained so much weight. And she said the the heat of the moment comment, which wasn’t meant maliciously, gave her the push she needed.
She said: ‘We were arguing about something silly, when at the end he told me to ‘lose some weight.’
‘Deep down I knew he wasn’t being nasty. It was a slip of the tongue that had revealed he had genuine concerns about my size.
After the argument, Westoby weighed herself and found that she was the heaviest she’d ever been. The former runner just hadn’t really realized that all the junk and booze had gotten her to a place where she was really unhealthy, and now that she knew, she vowed to change it.
First she dropped the boyfriend, then she gave herself a tangible goal: lose 20 pounds.
How’d she achieve this task? Westoby cut out all the junk and the drinking. She exchanged all her drinks for sparkling water with lime and the weight fell off. Quickly, she’d achieved her first goal. So she set a goal for another 20 pounds. And then another. And after all the sweat had dried, Westoby had slimmed down to 120 pounds, dropping 140 pounds in the process.
While cutting out the junk was imperative, Westoby — who now favors a diet high in protein — also hit the gym to get her body back into fighting weight. She varied her exercises, did strength and cardio, and now her body is in top condition. She hits the gym at 5:30 in the morning every day, and she’s perfected the art of portion control.
“The anxiety we feel about our bodies is real and sometimes I still look at myself hear those words: ‘You need to lose weight,” Westoby told The Daily Mail. “But I use it as motivation to get myself to the gym and have even started helping other women I’ve met through social media by sharing my recipes and tips.”
Westoby is proud of her transformation and hopes to change the lives of others, people who struggled like her, by sharing her journey. As to whether she bears the ex any ill will, Westoby says she’s actually grateful. If it hadn’t been for him, she told The Daily Mail, she may never have gotten to where she is today.
