00:00At my heaviest, I was over 350.
00:03I had to be eating over 5,000 calories on a bad day.
00:07I would eat until I physically felt sick.
00:10I was classified as morbidly obese.
00:12I wanted to feel good about myself.
00:14I wanted to go put on a dress and not feel like,
00:16what are people going to think?
00:17They're just going to think I'm this fat, disgusting blob.
00:23It took me about four years to lose the 200 pounds.
00:26I went from not being able to walk a mile
00:30to trying on skirts and dresses in a size four.
00:34I never thought in my wildest dreams I'd be that size.
00:41I've always been a bigger girl.
00:42Ever since I was a kid, I was always like, you know,
00:44my nickname was gordita, which means like little chunky girl.
00:47And it's kind of like in the term of endearment.
00:50I was always a little bit thicker, you know, a little bit bigger.
00:52And I guess subconsciously I believed that
00:55because I looked a certain way.
00:57I was ugly. I was a big girl.
00:59I had double chin, belly everywhere.
01:02I was always the life of the party,
01:04but I felt like I had to be that loud, funny person
01:07because if not, they'd be looking at my weight.
01:09At least if I was like the butt of the joke,
01:11I wasn't getting laughed at.
01:13I had to be eating over 5,000 calories on a bad day.
01:17I was trying to fill a void.
01:19I would eat until I couldn't, until I physically felt sick.
01:23My favorite was Wienerschnitzel and Taco Bell.
01:27And anything fast food, anything fried, anything sweet,
01:31it was hard. Your self-worth, it takes a toll.
01:34I didn't love myself at that time.
01:36I wanted to make myself feel better, even if it was for that moment,
01:39even if that scoop of ice cream made me feel better at that moment.
01:42I couldn't control anything else but what I put in my body.
01:45When I went to the doctor, just, you know, annual follow-up,
01:48the doctor did tell me I was becoming morbidly obese.
01:52My weight gain was very rapid, and I needed to do something about it
01:55if I didn't want to die.
02:00These are the clothes I used to wear.
02:02It's a 3X. Look at that.
02:05It's like a little tent.
02:07I hated going shopping. It was a horrible experience.
02:10All my friends were trying on these amazing clothes
02:13that were trendy and cute and beautiful,
02:16and I had to go in the back where my grandma would shop.
02:19I would avoid anything that was bright-colored, really.
02:22This is the brightest I would wear.
02:24I would wear a lot of black because it was slimming,
02:26at least in my delusional head.
02:28I think the turning point for me was one night
02:31I thought I was having a heart attack
02:33and ended up going to the hospital,
02:35and I was having an anxiety attack with panic attack.
02:38I'm so young. I should be living my best life,
02:41and I'm here thinking I'm having a heart attack.
02:43That's not how anybody should be living.
02:45I wanted to feel good about myself.
02:47I wanted to go put on a dress and not feel like,
02:50does this hide my fatness?
02:52Does this hide my roles?
02:54What are people going to think when I first meet them?
02:56They're just going to think I'm this fat,
02:58disgusting blob of a person.
03:00I have tried to lose weight various times.
03:03I've tried every pill, magic quick fix.
03:06What made it different this time is that I stuck to it,
03:09and I had an amazing support system.
03:12Hey! Damn!
03:14My friends were all encouraging,
03:16and once you know you start losing a little bit of weight
03:18in every cycle, you look great.
03:20That kind of gives you fuel.
03:25Good. Good.
03:27Hold, and then out.
03:31At my heaviest, I was over 350.
03:35It took me about four years to lose the 200 pounds.
03:39Right now, I weigh 148.
03:46Bo, my trainer, was key in my transformation
03:48because he was very patient.
03:50When I met Bo, I couldn't do a single body squat without falling.
03:53Man, remember that first time you came in,
03:56all we could do was bench squats.
03:58Now look at you.
03:59I've been training Denisa for about four years now,
04:01and it's been great to see her progress.
04:03We took it nice and slow.
04:05What do you think you'll handle for 10?
04:07I'm not sure.
04:09And then progressively, we started adding more and more weight to it
04:13and doing different exercises.
04:15I call Bo my fitness father
04:17because he pretty much introduced me to working out.
04:21So when I started my weight loss journey,
04:23I could see the excess skin on my legs, on my arms.
04:26I have it on my face.
04:28I ended up having the excess skin removal.
04:30It went all the way under my chest,
04:33in between my breasts, all the way down.
04:35You can see the scars side to side.
04:38I had a lot of complications from the wounds,
04:40but you know what?
04:42I would do it all over again. I don't care.
04:44When I had my skin surgery,
04:47I went from a size 24 to a size 4.
04:51And I had ordered this gorgeous pink leather Versace skirt online,
04:56and it fit!
05:05I had a whole crying moment.
05:07I was like, okay.
05:08So I found whatever fat clothes I had.
05:10I went outside on that dirt lot and I torched them.
05:13It was like a phoenix uprising.
05:16I rose from the flames.
05:18Today I feel confident.
05:20I love myself.
05:21I feel like people see me for me,
05:23and not just a big girl.
05:25I feel really proud of my accomplishments
05:28and the way I look now
05:29because I worked very hard to get where I'm at.
05:31If I inspire at least one person,
05:34I know that I did some good in the world.
05:36Where you're at now is not where you're going to be forever.
05:39You are the only person standing in the way of what you want.
05:42If you want it bad enough, go get it.
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