myjourney

My Journey:

At age 30, I was lost within my own body. I dreamed of climbing
mountains but the only thing that went up was my weight -- to
about 360 pounds.

During one New Year's Eve, it all changed when I wrote down
what wanted to do instead of how many pounds I wanted to lose.
I decided to look at weight loss as a lifelong journey and I got
moving. I resolved to climb mountains.

My path led me back to the terrain of my childhood, and I climbed
to the top of Camel’s Hump and Vermont’s highest peak, Mount
Mansfield. I've also been to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and
back up again. Recently I conquered Africa’s highest peak—
Mount Kilimanjaro—the tallest freestanding mountain in the world
as a fund raiser for AIDS orphans.

Mountain hiking and the path to wellness have a lot in common.
They require tenacity, faith and a lot of hard work.

My 120-pound weight loss has inspired me to help others on their
weight loss journeys through my Web site, publications, coaching
services and speaking engagements. It has also inspired my Save
the World Workout initiative, encouraging others to take on
physical challenges for charity as fitness goals. I am taking on an
event for charity -- from a 5K to a 220-mile bike ride, and of course
mountain climb -- each month of 2009.

My book Fat Woman on the Mountain: How I Lost Half of Myself and
Gained Happiness, a memoir recounting my journey up mountains
and down the scale will be out Sept. 14. I am now working with
Emmy-award winning producer Denise Cramsey and Director Scott
Farquharson on an upcoming celebrity Kilimanjaro trek for
charity, which will be developed into a television series.

I also founded www.savetheworldworkout.com, a website
designed to encourage people to get active with their bodies and
in their community. I am now writing Save the World Workout :
How You Can Get Healthy and Help the World.

I have been a newspaper journalist for a decade. My story of
conquering Camel's Hump a decade after it had left me winded and
beaten was featured in Self magazine. I grew up in South
Burlington, Vt. and am a member of the Green Mountain Club and
the American Hiking Society.

I live in New Jersey with my husband and daughter. We recently
moved from Short Hills to Summit. (Really).

Rock Bottom: It took a train to get me
to the base of this mountain in
Switzerland! December '96 -- 360 lbs

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the
essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and
not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."
-- Henry David Thoreau