April 6, 2014

*** This is an open-letter to Sara. The mother I met in Kansas City, Missouri ***

Dear Sara,

Thank you for inviting me into your home and allowing me to follow your tasks throughout the day. I hadn’t read any of your criticisms about me prior to Nightline requesting that I meet you and Dionna Ford, the blogger behind the “We don’t need an excuse” campaign. I was initially apprehensive of this meeting because I didn’t want to rehash a controversial discussion. In fact, when they approached me about this meeting, Nightline was at the tail end of filming nearly two days of my life in Sacramento. The last thing I wanted to do was turn a positive story on how I manage work, family and fitness while growing an incredible No Excuse Mom Movement, into another body war campaign.

Of course, as we both know. That’s exactly what happened.

I know viewers will never see us greeting each other with a big hug in your grandmother’s kitchen or hear our 2 hour discussion about eating disorders, hormonal issues, cultural pressures, accountability ...

March 29, 2014 I just interviewed with ABC Nightline. They followed me for nearly two days while I prepared a potluck dish for my father’s birthday party, cooked my boy’s breakfast (in my sponge rollers!) before dropping my eldest to pre-k. They filmed as I checked in on my elderly care home, taped a live […]

February 27, 2014 Patience is a virtue but it isn’t my best virtue. When my husband and I first became pregnant I wanted to purchase a home. After all, creating a residential nest egg was an instinctual desire as a mother. While we were financially capable of purchasing a humble property, we decided instead, to […]

January 28, 2014 Exactly ten years ago I was featured in Oxygen magazine’s “Future of Fitness” section. I had just won Miss Bikini California and placed top five in two national fitness competitions. At my very last contest in 2003, I was slated to do 3 photo shoots with published photographers in Los Angeles. As […]

December 31, 2013 I received a painful email tonight from a couple moms featured in my 2014 No Excuse Fit Mom Swimsuit Calendar.  I felt their words as they described hurtful comments people made on their courageous swimsuit pictures. I wanted to tell them to not take it personally, to focus on the positive and […]

December 20, 2013 I’ve shared my life online for nearly 9 years. People have read as I transparently talked about my battle with Bulimia, my courage in quitting my corporate job, my struggle in finding my fitness passion and my anxiety when I first met my soon-to-be husband. I spoke openly about the challenges in […]

November 25, 2013 There are not many things I’m sorry about in life, but recently I’ve been feeling a deep sense of sadness within me. After being blocked on Facebook and reading the Yahoo article explaining the ban, I feel completely misunderstood. While I speak strongly about making one’s health a priority, the very last […]