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 Kendra Klassen, 31, of "X-Weighted," gained back all the weight she lost on the weight-loss show. |
Kendra Klassen is looking to redeem herself – one pound at a time.
The 31-year-old ex-Calgarian is ashamed to admit that she gained back all the weight she lost on the Canadian weight-loss reality TV show X-Weighted.
And then some.
“After the show, when the cameras stopped rolling, I stopped working out and I stopped doing my part,” she reveals. “It’s very embarrassing.”
Klassen, a self-confessed binge-eating mom of three, dropped 41 pounds on the first season of the popular show.
With help from the show’s experts — including Edmonton-based personal trainer Paul Plakas — the five-foot-three Klassen dipped from 194 pounds to 153.
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That was nearly four years ago.
But after splitting from her unsupportive husband, Klassen found solace in food and her weight soared to 235 pounds.
“I was going through a lot of turmoil in my relationship,” she explains. “I was very lonely, very sad and when I ate, it numbed all my feelings. I said on the show food was my lover. It was because that was the only thing that was comforting and non-judgmental.”
Klassen, who relocated with her kids from Calgary to a small town outside the city, says she has since regained control of her eating by addressing the issues at the core of her emotional binges.
Food, it seems, no longer exerts a gravitational-like pull on her. As a result, she has lost about 20 pounds on her own since topping out at 235.
But Klassen knows she still has a long way to go — about 60 pounds to return to where she was at the end of her X-Weighted stint.
So, to help keep her motivated, Klassen has entered X-Weighted’s national challenge, a six-month weight-loss competition open to all Canadians that kicked off last month.
“This time is different because it isn’t for the show. It’s 100% for me,” she says. “I want to prove to myself I can do it.”
One of the big keys for Klassen is portion control. She now uses a child’s plate that has built-in partitions. She fills the largest part with vegetables, another part with a deck of cards-sized piece of protein and the remaining part is carbs – potatoes, rice or some pasta.
The busy mom holds down two jobs, including one as a waitress, which helps her burn calories. “I’m on my feet, it’s fast-paced and I’m go, go, go,” she says, adding she also got a Wii Fit Plus for Christmas.
“I was contemplating getting a gym membership and then I was like, ‘Maybe I should just go outside walking.’ I get that excusitis where it’s too cold, it’s too this, it’s too that.
“So I make a habit of plugging the Wii Fit in every day and I do at least half an hour of the running and the aerobics. It’s so much fun.”
The weight is coming off more slowly this time. And that’s fine with Klassen, who calls her time on X-Weighted an “eye-opening” life experience.
“Darn Paul (Plakas) because he said on the show, ‘I’ll bet my reputation on it that she (Klassen) won’t be able to keep this up,’” she recalls.
“And he was right. I can’t keep up eating 800 calories a day. That was just ridiculous for me to think that.
“I lost a lot of weight in four months, but it was too fast ... This time it’s going to be a lot more steady, but I know those pounds will never come back because I’m doing it the right way.”
Visit xweighted.ca for more on the national challenge.
Cary Castagna is a certified personal trainer through Can-Fit-Pro. Visit the Keeping Fit blog at http://blogs.canoe.ca/keepingfit