My name is Mitzie. I'm 32, and I'm a single mother of 2. I'm at that age where my body is starting to change, for the worse. I began noticing a few years ago that my body was a lot more sensitive to what I was eating. I couldn't eat junk food like I used to in my teens and twenties. That old line about things going "straight to my hips" was beginning to come true for me, and I didn't like it. Dealing with weight is not a new thing for me, but at this point in my life it's harder than ever before to deal with it.

When I was a little girl, I didn't have any problems with my weight. But when I got into my teen years, I started going through a lot of emotional problems. Like a lot of girls, the way that I chose to deal with it was by eating. It wasn't a voluntary thing, I didn't want to binge on food and gain weight or anything, but it just kind of happened. I was always comfortable when I was eating my favourite foods. The thing is, over time I was becoming more mature and I was increasingly unhappy and frustrated with what I was doing to myself. When I was around 17 or 18 I decided it was time to really do something about it. With college coming up, I wanted to look and feel my best, and I wanted to build some kind of self-discipline. I was able to tackle the problem simply by eating less and doing some exercise. I felt great, because I had been challenged by something, and I got over it all by myself. It wasn't so hard, because I had a young and healthy body.

Nowadays, things aren't as easy. My body takes longer to catch up. I started gaining weight again a few years ago because of a combination of things -- I was sliding a little on my eating and exercise habits, and my metabolism was changing. I was able to get through having children without keeping any major weight gains by working hard and keeping control of my lifestyle. But now, with kids to take care of, I didn't quite have the time to treat myself as well as I used to.

But a while ago I discovered my secret weapon in my weight battle -- fruit smoothies. I saw on tv a great recipe for smoothies. You can just use whatever fruits you like, and add in tofu, and you get a great tasting and creamy drink. The thing I really liked about this recipe was that there's no real measuring involved -- I just put in however much of whatever fruits I want. The other thing is that it only takes a few minutes to make. So what I did was replace my old breakfast -- usually something with eggs -- with fruit smoothies. It's great because I love the taste, and it still fills me up. I get all kinds of lasting energy from the fruit. I also bring some to work and use it as a snack throughout the day. For dinner, I'm careful about the proteins I eat. I grill a lot of fish and chicken dishes, and use tofu now and then as well. Lots of grilled veggies. I'm still able to have great meals, and keep it healthy.

Okay, the success part -- I've been on my diet of smoothies and other healthy things for about 6 months now, and I've already lost 35 pounds! I'm really happy, and I feel like it's a healthy, consistent, and lasting loss in weight. No fad diets here.