21 Day Fix...The Beginning | Tucson Boudoir Photography
The History
One of the most common excuses for not doing a boudoir shoot is that "I need to lose <insert number> pounds." I totally disagree with this excuse, but I can understand where you are coming from. 2 years ago (Aug 2012) I was roughly 30 lbs overweight (from what I deemed as my ideal weight) and had kind of stopped exercising for the most part. I decided to do something nuts and train for a marathon. In addition, I went crazy with tracking and logging damn near everything that went in my mouth using MyFitnessPal. And it worked. And I realized how anal I could be about minuscule stuff. By May 2013 I ran my first marathon (a slightly crazy, non-flat course at that) and had lost 35 lbs. It was about that time that I discovered my love of lingerie and now I felt like I actually looked good in it. I looked good before - my husband knew that - but I didn't always believe it.
I continued to track my calories and maintained my weight until about Nov 2013 when I fell off the wagon. Over the past 10 or so months I've put back about 10 unwanted pounds. Now I'm working a full-time job, trying to get my photography business (hi everyone!) off the ground and dancing 2.5 times a week (2-1 hr class and 1-30 min class). I've been doing 20-30 min ballet focused workouts on the days I don't dance but sadly it just isn't enough. Not that I eat poorly per say, but I could probably be smarter about what I eat. Plus....beer! :-)
Anyway...if you're still with me, the owner of the studio I dance (Pointe of Grace for those of you on the NW side) at is a Beach Body Coach and is starting a 21 Day Fix Challenge today. I've decided to give it a shot. I actually am not expecting a huge amount of results; Beach Body certainly won't be using me as a "Look at these amazing results" spokesperson. But I'm hoping for a bit of a kickstart for myself and a way to get my booty off the couch.
Well if "I need to lose 10 lbs" isn't a good excuse..then why are you losing 10lbs?
Keep in mind I actually started doing boudoir selfies for my husband BEFORE I lost the weight. Both of us still love those first prints I did for him....even though I weighed more and wasn't in as great of shape. The weight loss did give confidence in myself, but the weight re-gain didn't take that confidence away, it just forced me to a new perspective: I could go back to where I was in Aug 2012 (and I really wasn't happy), or I could make some changes (simple, relatively easy changes at that) and work back to May 2013.
So here's the thing I want to people to be able to take away from seeing my progress over the next 3 weeks (before pictures below...I'm putting it out there for you!) - everyone is beautiful. I still think "I need to lose 10 lbs" is a bogus excuse for not scheduling a boudoir session. You're still beautiful and I can show you that. This is about personal happiness. I knew I was still beautiful in August 2012, but I wasn't happy or satisfied with myself. That's where I am now, I'm still the same Krista as I was in 2012 and when I finished that marathon in 2013, but those few extra pounds would not be stopping me from doing a session for myself if I wanted one but I know I can do better. So I'm going to.
If you're happy with yourself, that's fantastic and I encourage you to enjoy it and if you want to document that awesomeness, then contact me for a session. If you're not happy, then I encourage you to make some changes in your life. You don't need to run a marathon and you don't need to buy into what people will argue amounts to a fad diet. Set a goal and then set a whole bunch of little goals in between. Set up a reward system (I'll talk about that in a future post) and find some people to keep you accountable (that's what I'm using this 21 days for). You can do it. Small changes equal big results.
Day 1 (Well technically the day before Day 1...but I'm not gonna change that much overnight). Oh and I pinky swear the only photoshopping I did was to balance the exposure and clone out a fly on my leg.