Well, it has been a great summer so far. Zach went to Europe for 3 weeks and Hunter has been at Wellspring Adventure Camp in North Carolina for 6 weeks. I am so excited because I am going to pick him up this Saturday!!! He has lost 26 pounds as of this past Sunday...I am so very PROUD of him. In short, Wellspring has been a blessing for Hunter, but also for our entire family.
We found out about Wellspring a little over a year ago. Chuck was up late one night flipping channels and came across a show called Too Fat for Fifteen. The show took place at Wellspring Academy in North Carolina and followed the lives of several teens who were enrolled in Wellspring Academy and their quest to lose weight. Wellspring is not a diet, but a lifestyle change. Both of my boys are overweight to an extent. Zach has never had problems in school that were weight related , but Hunter endured a year of bullying in school this past year because of his weight. Now mid you, neither of my boys are grossly overweight, but they did need to lose some weight. Hunter became very interested in the program and followed their first season. We even checked into sending him to school there. This past December we had the opportunity for Hunter to apply to be on the show. He applied, but was not one of the few that were picked. We were offered a discount to let him attend the academy. It was still just too pricey to be able to afford. In January, we received information about Wellspring Camps. They have camps located all over the United States and in the UK. He decided to attend Wellspring Adventure Camp in the mountains of North Carolina for a 6 week program. Him attending camp, is what has gotten us to this point.
The Wellspring program involves getting active and cutting the fat out of your diet. As a family, we are now all "on program"!! We eat no more than 12 grams of fat a day and we get in a minimum of 10,000 steps a day. On a side note, I am not able to get in all of those steps because of my fused ankles, but I am building up my numbers, and I will get there! To be honest, I was scared of not being able to follow the program. I have been very surprised at how easy this program is to follow...to date I have even lost almost 10 pounds!! The biggest thing I have missed about taking the fat out of our diets is the eating out!! Let's face it..the eating out got us in this position to begin with. That and the lazy lifestyle!!
Overall, we are doing great. This has been an excellent change for our family. We had hoped to be able to send Hunter to the academy for this semester, but once again, I was just not able to make it work. I am a little nervous about bringing him home. The food portion is not the concern. It is the keeping active part that bothers me the most. That and going back to school. We have presented him with a couple of options, and we are looking at putting him in a local private school that will work with him to help keep him "on program". I also think the small class size will be a benefit. He will be in a 6th/7th grade combo class with 12 students. He will be in 7th grade this year. It was a difficult decision to take him out of our local middle school because we have a great school district, and he was placed on a great team for the coming school year. I just did not want to place him back in the environment that had the potential to derail his progress. HIs school was willing to work with us to get the "bullies" under control, but Hunter would not "rat" out the offenders.
That is all for now, but I will do another update soon to keep everyone up to date with how we are doing. What an exciting journey this will be!!
