Ten Years Later (4 page)

“I’ve done Weight Watchers, the cabbage soup diet, I did Atkins for a while, I did
just exercise and diet pills, I did the Zone Diet, I did Nutrisystem, I did prescription
appetite suppression pills,” she says. “Fat people are the smartest people when it
comes to dieting because we have read every book, we have been on every diet, we have
tried every pill; so fat people are super smart when it comes to dieting. We know
what to do. We know what we’re supposed to eat; we know what we’re not supposed to
eat. We know we’re supposed to eat lean proteins and healthy carbs and lots of veggies,
lots of water, but people don’t address the root cause as to why they’re fat in the
first place. So, I knew what to do as far as what I was supposed to do physically.
But going to counseling at that time was key, because it was addressing the root cause
as to why I used food as an addiction. Most people use alcohol or drugs, but most
people don’t recognize food as an addiction like crack or alcohol.”

Amy knew she needed to develop a sound eating plan that she could follow the rest
of her life.

“I just kind of incorporated all the diets I liked,” she says. “I wanted it to be
sustainable. And then, ninety-eight percent of it was portion control.”

Amy knew she also needed to sweat. At 490 pounds, she was embarrassed to begin working
out in a gym. She decided to start moving to Billy Blanks Tae Bo fitness VHS tapes
in her living room, and to walk around the block. Once. Amy literally took it one
step at a time.

I ask her how long it took before exercise felt a bit easier.

“Oh, my God. Ha! Probably six months. The first week I went three times around the
block, so each week I had a new goal. I would either walk two times around or I would
go one time around, but it had to be faster than the week prior. So, if it took me
an hour the first week, the next had to be under fifty-nine minutes. Every week there
was a goal for either duration or time. Even with Tae Bo, I would only add a minute.
It wasn’t like,
Oh, I’m feeling great this week, I’m gonna do twenty minutes
. I set realistic goals.”

In nine months, Amy lost a hundred pounds. She rewarded herself with a membership
to the Anoka YMCA, undeterred by judging eyes.

“Sometimes people would look,” she says, “but people stared at me when I was five
hundred pounds, so people staring at me now was not any different.”

Amy focused on using the Nautilus and cardio machines but avoided the group fitness
classes. She drew the line there for bravery.

“You’re freaked out. You’re way too scared to do that in front of everybody.”

Amy continued working on her health and working at the software company that had taken
a chance on her. She was also busy raising Marcus and Terrell. As sore as her body
was, Amy says the tougher challenge was mental.

“There are just days that suck going to the gym. You’ve had a long day at work, you’re
tired, you have stuff to do, there are groceries to get, the house is dirty, and so
there are always roadblocks. You can use every excuse in the book not to go. So I
think for me, it was more mental—mentally getting through the excuses.”

Excited for her fresh start, Amy’s coworkers took it upon themselves to create online
profiles for her on two dating websites. In
March 2006, Amy met a man named Daryl Barnes over the Internet. He lived in Virginia
and worked in Washington, D.C. She admits now that it was too soon, but Amy moved
her family from Minnesota to Virginia to live with Daryl after knowing him for just
three months. She loved the idea of a new beginning.

“I was starting from scratch—from the gym, to people, to my job, to everything.”

Before she moved, she landed a job in D.C. with the Gates Foundation, supporting directors
involved with improving education in the United States. She also joined Gold’s Gym.
She and Daryl were married in June 2007 and amicably divorced in July 2008. She kept
his last name and calls him a good man. They both simply moved forward too quickly.

Amy’s quest for fitness and health continued. She now weighed 240 pounds and began
to experiment with equipment that would reshape her body.

“I was using free weights and doing group fitness classes, because they helped with
the weight loss and there was a sense of accountability. Gold’s Gym is more of a muscle-head
gym, so that was my first taste of seeing bodybuilders and people in the fitness industry
work out,” she explains. “That’s when I was like,
Yep, that’s what I want to do; that’s how I want to look
. And, even though I was heavier, I worked out on the free weights and nobody ever
questioned it or made me feel uncomfortable. Sometimes, someone would ask me, and
I’d say, ‘I want to be a bodybuilder,’ and there I was at 220 pounds, and they would
just say, ‘Okay, good for you.’ ”

Amy worked out at four thirty in the morning before heading to the office. She always
saw a fellow early bird there named Allen Thompson, who worked at the Pentagon. They
shared an interest in health and fitness, and eventually began dating.

“Here was this person who was strong, and driven, and passionate about everything,”
says Allen. “She was passionate about the way she
cooks, and passionate about her dogs, passionate about her kids, and I liked that.”

When her weight dropped to two hundred pounds, Amy studied for and received certification
as a personal trainer. She added to that a certification in nutrition. More and more,
Amy realized her interest and passion lay in sharing all she’d learned about domestic
violence and overall health. Amy quit her job at the Gates Foundation and established
her own health and fitness company. In November 2009, she and Allen competed in an
international fitness competition in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Over four years, she
had lost an astounding 325 pounds.

“I actually took a picture on my phone,” she says. “I weighed in at that competition
at one-sixty-nine.”

(In case you’re wondering, I asked Amy why she doesn’t have issues with excess skin,
which can be a side effect from extensive weight loss. She says she does have extra
skin, but in bodybuilding photos,
she wears sheer pants or a wrap to cover her legs and belly area. She says there are
other factors that reduced her extra-skin issue.

“For me, it’s because of good genetics. Secondly, I was in my early to midthirties
when I was at my heaviest. Thirdly, it’s because I lost the weight slowly, and because
I lifted weights. Even when I was heavy, I lifted weights the whole time.”)

In 2009, Amy also became a contractor with the Department of Labor and began working
with kids enrolled in the Job Corps program. Her role was to head up the Health and
Wellness program, but it was also a chance for Amy to encourage underprivileged kids
and to share with them what she’d learned by living through domestic violence.

“The weight loss to me is the most secondary part of my life,” she says, “in comparison
to everything else my kids and I have been through.”

Allen has heard some but not all of what Amy endured during her years with Robert.
He says she takes responsibility for her role in the situation and has been extremely
open about the rawness of the abuse.

“It’s hard. It makes me angry, but at the same time, it puts the day-to-day stuff
into perspective. I thought
I
had baggage; I don’t have any baggage. I thought
I
had some drama; I haven’t been through anything,” he says. “It changes your outlook
on life. The guys at work ask me all the time, ‘Why are you so, like, ‘It’s getting
better, just take baby steps,’ and I just say, ‘Because I live with somebody who has
survived the unimaginable, and then figured out a way to get her kids back, and raised
two kids who are great young men.’ It’s humbling.”

Amy exposes the Job Corps kids she works with to opportunities in the fitness industry
and encourages them to excel. Many have neglectful parents and live in broken homes.

“To them, domestic violence is normal. I see these kids and I just want to rescue
every single one of them. These kids have never had anybody believe in them. It’s
sad, because that’s all they know; they wouldn’t know a healthy relationship if it
bit ’em in the ass. My kids could have turned out like these Job Corps kids, but they
didn’t. They are straight-A students; they are part of the football team. Everything
they’ve been through has somehow made them better kids, and better human beings, and
more accepting of people and adversity. They get being poor, they get not having anything,
they get being teased because you’re fat or you’re a mixed race. The adversity could
have turned them to drugs and to being hoodlums, but they have turned out to be law-abiding
citizens and the coolest kids you’ll ever meet.” She starts to cry. “Because they
are strong and they are kind. My kids and I have a very special relationship. I want
them to be proud of me and they want me to be proud of them. And Allen has been a
strong male role model for them now for four years.”

From the start, Amy told Allen she wanted him to influence her sons in a positive
way and to be involved in disciplining them. As you might imagine, that took some
finesse.

“There were a few times when Marcus would come to protect his brother because he thought
that I was going to do something to him,” says Allen, “that I was going to hurt him
because I was yelling at him about his grades. It just took a while for them to realize
that I was in a position that I wanted them to be great, just like their mom. Once
we got to the understanding that I wasn’t gonna put my hands on them and hurt them,
we were great. It wasn’t hard, we just needed time.”

Marcus and Terrell watched closely how Allen treated Amy.

“Marcus would do the same thing with his mom; he’d come check on her. Once they were
able to see that we could have a disagreement and still be okay, and no one was physically
harmed, and that we could have disagreements as adults, then they could trust me.”

By 2010, work and home life for Amy were busy and productive, but it was time for
another move. The D.C. area was too expensive and warm days were too rare. Amy, her
sons, and Allen headed for the sunny South.

In July 2011, with fifteen hundred miles and ten years between Amy and the day she
met Robert, a new chapter began for her in Orlando, Florida. Marcus and Terrell, fifteen
and thirteen, settled into school and joined the track and football teams. Allen found
work similar to his role at the Pentagon, but in the private sector. Amy took a job
at a women’s fitness studio as a weight-loss consultant and manager but decided a
year later to work fewer hours and for herself. In March 2012, she started a new venture,
creating custom weight-loss programs for clients.

At thirty-eight, Amy is tanned and pretty. All totaled, she wears five rings on her
fingers, which are tipped with a French manicure. Her built arms are a testament to
her dedication in the gym. Amy’s shoulder-length hair is dark, her eyes are hazel,
and she is open, funny, and straightforward. A typical day for her begins before sunrise.

“Our alarm goes off every morning at four thirty, we both start with a protein shake,
and we share a cup of coffee on the way to the gym,” she says, referring to Allen.
“We work out at the gym upwards of an hour and a half to two hours. We lift a particular
body part, we usually do some kind of boxing circuit, and then we’ll do cardio for
thirty or forty-five minutes. Then, I come home and I eat breakfast, which usually
consists of egg whites and oatmeal, and then my day starts.”

Amy prepacks her lunch, usually lean protein and veggies, nothing
with enriched white flour. She eats every two to three hours—perhaps brown rice or
a sweet potato, sometimes vegetables. In the middle of the day, she fixes another
protein shake. Some days she works as a consultant at doctors’ offices, other days
she spends time answering e-mails, marketing her company, or writing articles for
two fitness magazines.

“My days usually end at four o’clock, because I go and pick up my kids from school.”
She adds, “I have to say, as old as they are, could they walk home? Sure.”

But Amy says that’s why she started her own business. The flexibility adds to her
quality of life.

“I get to pick them up from school, and I get to go to their track meets and their
football games, and to me, that’s more important than having to work seventy hours
a week just to pay the bills.”

The brothers are close. Marcus is a junior in high school, is a European history buff,
and plays center on the varsity football team. Terrell is in eighth grade and runs
the mile in track.

Evenings mean cooking dinner, taking care of the dogs, helping with homework, and
doing laundry.

“There are some times,” she says, laughing, “I’ll look at Allen and say, ‘Is it too
early to go to bed?’ And he’s like, ‘Honey, it’s six forty-five.’ We’re typically
in bed by eight thirty or nine o’clock.”