Friend of Julie: Hidden Rewards

There are many rewards to this weight loss program, some more obvious than others. One hidden reward for me: going to a 40th high school reunion and not focusing on how much weight I want to lose before the reunion.

Friday night reunion with some of the girls I went to school with for 12 years.
This is not my favorite photo, but it's the only I have right now.

This weekend I went to my 40th high school class reunion and I had a blast. I worried all summer about what I would wear, but in the end I was happy with the outfits I wore (there were three events over the weekend). What I didn't worry about was losing weight for the reunion. No crash diets leading up to this weekend, as I've been on this program for 19 months and none of the weight I've lost was for this weekend; it's for the rest of my life. I'm so happy that I didn't have to obsess over what I weigh or what size I am.

For the big reunion event I wore a beautiful blue sleeveless dress that was just above the knees, low cut, with lots of bling around the neckline. Earlier this week I had an opportunity to wear the dress one evening while I was at a conference in Boston (where I won an iPad 3 BTW). I was so nervous about wearing such a revealing dress that I took a photo of myself in the dress in my hotel room and sent it to a few of my friends and asked "do I dare go out in this dress?" My friends wrote back wonderful compliments and friends at the reunion complimented me as well. It's a whole new style of dress for me, but I have to say I felt great!

At the reunion, we shared memories of our youth and our lives over the past 40 years. Many of us did not stay in touch after high school, heck some of us weren't in touch in high school, but there is a common thread that we all shared and it was nice to connect in new ways. I spent twelve years with most of those people, some I knew well, others I never talked to because I was too shy. Last night I pushed away the shy young girl and I had meaningful conversations with a handful of people, including a guy I had a mad crush on who I never talked to in school.

I posted this on our class reunion Facebook a few minutes ago:
I've had a smile on my face all day from reunion weekend. I'm heading for bed and I'm still smiling. I'm thinking I'll be smiling all week. :)

Saturday night with friends from all 12 years in school.