Rene's Story

I am the daughter of an extremely controlling and narcissistic father.  No matter how hard I tried I was never good enough.  Constantly told, "It's a good thing you're smart because you're fat and you aren't very pretty."  I have spent my entire life struggling with my weight, my self worth and finding my own identity.  

As a young child I focused so much on being who my father expected me to be in order to avoid his wrath that my relationship with my mother became non-existent.  After my parents divorced my mother and I repaired what we had lost.....or so I thought.

3 years ago she died under hospice care in my home from cancer.  When my father found out he completely disowned me saying I had "finally chosen her" over him.  `2 years went by without so much as a word spoken between us.  I then received a phone call that they had found his body in a hotel and that he had committed suicide.  

Since then I have found out a lot of deep dark family secrets. They made a lot of things about my life make sense but also made me realize my entire life as I knew it was a lie.  I was left questioning even more so than before WHO AM I???  

The greatest thing I have realized in fighting through the anger is that I am a product of their pain.  They projected the consequences of their own lies, secrets and misery on me and I soaked it all up like a sponge just wanting to feel loved.

At one point in time I weighed 310lbs.  Realizing I was not only killing myself but was also repeating the cycle of projecting my pain on my children by wallowing in my past I decided to change the future.  I lost more than half my body weight, became a personal trainer and nutrition coach and have spent the last 10 years trying to help others reach their goals and feel good about themselves.  All the while still struggling to reach my own goals.

Since the death of my parents I have realized that as close as I get to my personal physical goals I continually sabotage myself because I start feeling like I don't deserve it.  I have since started focusing more on loving myself and trying to heal mentally.  It has not only helped ME but it has made me better for my clients as I encourage them to do the same.  We have to love ourselves no matter where we are in our journey.  If we don't we will still struggle to be happy even when we reach our destination.

My favorite piece of Beautiful Disaster clothing is my "Hating me won't make you pretty" sweatshirt.  I refuse to allow others to make me feel bad about myself by projecting their pain and misery onto me any longer.

This picture can be found on my personal instagram @eastinrene as well as on my @graceglutesgrind account that I finally had the courage to start. 

Grace because none of us are perfect and we must learn to love ourselves! Glutes because movement is a blessing and we need to start thinking of our bodies as the temples they are.  Grind because we all have different struggles we fight through and it's okay to talk about them!!  

I love the attitude of Beautiful Disaster!  We all have a story.  If we could stop comparing our covers and really listen to the words we would find that we are all connected.  Finding unity through our struggles is healing!!