My showcasee for December is a dear friend of mine. We have stayed good friends since we met during freshman orientation in college. We have stood by each other and called each other out over the years. Her story is one of patience with the work that needed to be done on the inside in order to bear fruit externally. In addition, God in her life clearly illustrates that He is faithful and the journey of a thousand miles always begin with a first step. Be Inspired!
"I want acceptance. I want to
belong. I desire to amount to something."
These were Kelly Burlingame's thoughts
and desires when she started out at Winona
State University (WSU)
in Winona, Minnesota. However at five feet and three
inches, Kelly weighed 230 pounds and felt like garbage.
Years of emotional and physical abuse had
led her to seek comfort in food. The abuse started when Kelly was nine and
continued until she left for college in LaCrosse, Wisconsin just before her nineteenth
birthday. "I was told for many years that I was a mistake, and I should
never have been born. I was told that I was fat, ugly and would never find
anyone who would truly love me. When you spend parts of your childhood and all
your teenage years hearing these lies, there is a place inside of you that
believes it whether it is true or not," Kelly said.
To ignore the pain, Kelly ate and the
pounds crept in. Her dad was not in her life. Abuse was a constant
from when she turned nine. A seed of rejection was planted, it took
root and grew.
I met Kelly in 2002 at WSU during freshman
orientation week. Kelly was, and is still, a fireball of excitement. Her joyous
spirit caught my attention, unbeknownst to everyone including myself, we were
watching an act.
"I was shy and withdrawn in high
school, but I wanted to be accepted. I
did not want to be the girl who was abused at home and teased at school. I
decided that when I came to Winona
I would makeover myself, because no one knew me here." she said.
For Kelly, her makeover was to be loud,
obnoxious and in charge. “My goal was if someone did not hear me, I would be
loud and obnoxious. I would speak out loud and make sure they heard me."
Her new personality was a brave front to hide all the pain she was feeling.
Kelly was in Lacrosse for a year, before
she moved to Winona.
While she was there, she prayed to God. "I asked him for a home, where I
could be loved and accepted."
God answered her request in the form of a
Christian Campus Ministry called Chi Alpha (I met Kelly at a by Chi Alpha event). It was at Chi Alpha that Kelly began to
feel like she had a place; however it was hard for her to accept it. "I was loved by these people and they felt like home,
but I assumed that everyone was pretending. It felt new. Years of hearing that
you are a mistake makes it hard to believe that anyone really would want you.”
Kelly also had a problem believing that
God loved her. In her head she knew, but in her heart, she concluded he was lying. Her experience with
rejection and abuse tainted her knowledge of God “I felt like my biological
father rejected me. He got my mother pregnant and left. He did not stay to
protect me. I felt God must be lying."
However, God used Kelly's first semester and her years at Chi Alpha
to lay a foundation of his love, and in her second semester he began to address
her eating habits and her weight. At a Christian conference in
January 2003 and for the first time, she felt God impress upon her heart her addiction to food. Prior
to that, Kelly never felt full. She did not understand the concept of eating
and walking away when she was full. She would eat until she felt stuffed and
could not bear another bite. After the conference , she became personally aware of when she had had enough to eat.
That was when Kelly began to see the pounds drop, her pants were looser and at
the end of that year, she weighed 200 pounds.
But by 2009, six years after, she had
gained the weight back and weighed 225 pounds.
In November of 2009, God was ready to move Kelly out of the rut she had let
herself get into. A friend she had met in the summer called her out on her
weight. He told her he was concerned for her and her weight. "We were
talking about dating. The next thing I thought was “Here goes another guy
rejecting me, because I am fat”. I told him that yes, I am fat, but does that
mean you do not want to date me?" In response, he told her that her weight
was not a deciding factor in their friendship moving into a relationship, but
he was more concerned for her health. Kelly felt something inside of her break;
she started to cry uncontrollably and hung up the phone.
However, that conversation was the breaking point for Kelly. Everyone else had
always told her she was beautiful, but no one called her out on her weight. No
one had told her to get healthy. Kelly felt God was saying through him that
"I love you, but I am concerned for your health." She decided to make
working out a priority; she brought a treadmill. The weight gradually started
to come off, but a few months after using it almost nightly, the weight loss
hit a plateau. She then sold it and joined a gym, and the weight began to
melt off again.
Then God focused in on her choice of foods. "I loved my burgers. I loved
my fries. I could finish a bag of cookies in one sitting, but I knew I had to
change my eating habits.”
That was a huge challenge for Kelly. She
felt God whispering in her ears to come to him when she felt depressed and sad.
On days she would want to stop at McDonalds for a quick fix, she would hear
God speak gently to her heart “Kelly, you already had dinner.” or “Kelly, there
is food at home."
It was very difficult to go to God, but
she did it. Kelly gave up fast food and soda. She began eating smaller
portions, fresh food, vegetables and fruits. She gave up processed boxed meals
and frozen meals. She also gave up red meat for about a year and a half. Today, now two
years after her breaking point, Kelly has lost sixty pounds. She weighs 155
pounds and wears a size eight pants. A whooping 75 pounds less than she weighed
at her highest of 230 pounds and a size 22 jeans. This has not been an easy
journey, but for her it was worth the while. Her desire is to weigh an all time
low of 130-135 pounds.
With each triumph is the nagging voice of fear, but she finds the strength in
God through bible verses like Jeremiah 29:11. "For I know the plans I have
for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to
give you hope and a future."
As she continues on her journey, her biggest fears are that she is destroying
her body by running four to five times a week and that she would gain the
weight back. “God has given me peace that what I am doing to better my health is
good for me.” Going to God during her times of weakness has also established his love for
her and trust in him. It has worked an even bigger
miracle in her heart, “He has set me free from myself,” she joyfully proclaims,
but also quick to point out that this change was not based on her weight loss.
“The inner healing had to manifest on the outside. I had pain on the inside,
and it manifested on the outside in the form of addiction, food and weight. I
was healed over my father’s rejection and that manifested outwardly in me
choosing God over food. As I went to God, the reason I went to food was healed.
Two years ago, if someone rejected me, it would have taken me weeks to get over
it. Now, in a day or two, I am over it, because I know God would never leave
nor forsake me.”
Her greatest joy is running; if someone
told her three years ago that she would run and would love it, she would have
said "Shut up!" In two years, Kelly has ran a five kilometer, a ten
kilometer, one official half marathon and two unofficial half marathons. For
many people, who do not struggle with weight issues, we are unaware of the
daily activities that we achieve without stress, but Kelly was overjoyed to
announce that she could finally cross her legs just like a lady. A feat she had
not been able to achieve because of her weight. In addition, her self
perception is better and she is dreaming bigger, activities like white water
rafting and living in an African country as a missionary are paramount on her
list of things to do
Kelly is excited to share her story, a
messy story that God has turned into a message. She acknowledged that it was a
painful, hard and long journey. A
journey she hopes to share with other women. She advises that “you cannot
just lose the weight and expect everything to be good; the weight is just the
leaves and branches. In order to kill the tree completely, you need to dig up
the root. The root for me was not the pounds hanging on my sides or all the
food, it was rejection and not truly knowing that God loved me.”
The last time I saw Kelly was in May 2009, months before her breaking point. Two
years and seven months later, I saw Kelly again. In our usual style, we
screamed and ran to give each other an "I have missed you, and it is
really good to see you" hug. My dear friend has lost 60 pounds in the past
two years. She is still counting, and I am happily counting alongside her. The
journey was not one of joyful dropping of pounds and dress sizes. It was more
than a decade long journey that is culminating into joy unspeakable and a
deeper healing that far surpasses her sculpted booty and leaner cheeks.
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| BEFORE & AFTER |
