Alejandra and Salvador met in 2008. He lived two hours away from her and one December night he called her on the phone and asked, “What if we get married?”
“It was the best decision of my life,” Alejandra says. “But we aren’t too proud of our wedding pictures, because we don’t look how we should have looked.”
At the end of March 2014, Salvador was diagnosed with pre-diabetes, and Alejandra was diagnosed with diabetes in mid-April. “That’s when we knew we had to act,” Alejandra remembers, “This was the wake-up call that we couldn’t ignore.”
Alejandra was never a “skinny girl.” As a freshman, she was a size 16, but she liked her curves. Salvador’s weight had always fluctuated. “My weight was always up and down,” says Salvador, “but in the past few years, I got too heavy and I just couldn’t get back to a weight I liked.”
Before trying Noom, Alejandra tried another app and was able to lose 20 lbs. but quickly gained it back. “After 20 lbs. I stopped using the app. It didn’t give me the motivation I needed to keep going.” Alejandra began using Noom and when she saw how easy the app was to use, she recommended the app to Salvador. Since starting Noom, Alejandra and Salvador have both lost more than 50 lbs.
“It really hit me when I reached the weight on my driver’s license,” says Alejandra. “I was 18 years old when I got it and I lied about my weight. I said I weighed 220 lbs. When I reached that weight, I was so happy.”
The most rewarding part for Salvador has been buying new clothes. But he won’t let Alejandra get rid of one pair of his size 40 jeans. “I love looking at those pants and knowing how much smaller I am,” he says. Salvador says he didn’t know a lot about nutrition when he first started using Noom but the coach educated him through food logging and articles. “I relearned to eat — from what foods to choose to how to get the best out of my meal. I became conscious of what I was putting in my body and this new lifestyle began to feel natural to me.”
Alejandra and Salvador have also seen a giant change in their health. Alejandra has been able to get her diabetes under control and has lowered her blood pressure medication. She also began using a Couch to 5K app to up her fitness. “Running is fun!” she says, adding, “I never thought I would hear those words come out of my mouth.” She also used to deal with persistent ankle pain. “I don’t have any pain anymore. I no longer have to wear inserts.”
Salvador was previously on blood pressure and acid reflux medication. “I used to wake up several times in the middle of the night because my acid reflux was so bad. I haven’t had one of those nights in months. I now know that I can live longer with a better quality of life.” Salvador has now said goodbye to acid reflux and is also on a lower dosage of his blood pressure medication.
Alejandra says she believes the hardest part is starting. “The hardest part is losing that first pound. But once you lose the 2nd pound, you get the encouragement you need to keep going.” She says at first, it was difficult to change her lifestyle, but once she did, it became natural. “You don’t realize how easy it can be. Don’t deprive yourself — just make better choices. If you want a burger, you can have it. But there is a difference between satisfying a craving and overeating. I didn’t realize how easy getting healthy could be, especially when you aren’t doing it alone. This has been a team effort between my husband and I.”
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