Hello there, my name is Natasha. Iam new to SlowTwitch and to triathlon. I am an overweight compulsive overeater who is trying to become a triathlete. 
I have been training all summer for the Title 9 Women’s Tri in September, and decided to start a blog to chronicle my journey and to garner support since I can’t find a training buddy. If you have time to check it out, the site it at http://theunlikelytriathlete.blogspot.com/
Please feel free to leave comments and to follow me on blogger or facebook, I really appreciate all of the support. Thanks so much for taking the time to read this!
First, welcome to Slowtwitch, and to triathlon in general.
I don’t comment on very many threads, but after taking a quick look at your blog, thought I would comment on yours. I have used (fairly successfully) the sport of triathlon as a motivation to lose weight, and in general live a healthy lifestyle. I used to be one of those fit guys who ran sub 6 minute miles, and easily rode up mountains on my bike. I even managed to win a few races here and there. However, life changed, and before I knew it, I had put on a good 60 plus pounds. A couple of years ago I decided to start racing again, and knowing I would be frustrated with how slow I was in a bike or running race, I decided to give triathlon a shot. I can’t say I have lost all of that weight, but most of it, and I am much happier and in better shape than I have been in several years. You will probably find lots of others out there in the triathlon community with very similar stories.
A few things to know along the way:
- Triathlon is a lot of fun. Don’t ever forget that was part of your motivation. You probably won’t realize just how fun until after your first race.
- Running hurts. Especially at first. It is different from swimming and biking, in that your are often having to absorb forces much higher than your body weight as you are running. That is going to hurt. It is going to hurt a lot at first. You will have to walk some, but run when you can.
- Running eventually gets easier, but it takes weeks. I hear the number 6-8 weeks tossed around a lot.
- Make changes slowly. You can’t just completely change your lifestyle in one day. You didn’t get where you are in one day, you won’t change in one day. Make small changes, get used to those, then make more small changes. I wrote them down. Basically, I started at where I wanted to be, and worked backwards from there, identifying the small steps that would eventually get me there. Then I would make a small change, get used to that, then make another. I would never have stuck to a wholesale change in my lifestyle, but I do have to say that my lifestyle now 3 years later, is wholly different from where it was when I started.
Good luck in your journey. If it is truly what you want, you can get there. It seems that we as society don’t really make changes until the burden of staying the same becomes worse than the burden of changing. It sounds like you have embraced the burden of changing for now, so keep the burden of staying the same close in your mind, and take motivation from that.