GMO's, GFO's, UFO's.....

Its all very confusing to me. What is a GMO? Why is it bad? Where does canola oil come from? Is there a canola plant?! First of all let me start with why I am here, what led me to these questions and how I made a decision to start living a clean and healthy lifestyle.
I was a chubby kid, and then when I hit puberty I shot up and lost all of that baby fat, I was always very active and on the go and then when I turned about 17 or 18 something happened, I got fat. I wasn't working out, I was eating horribly, my self confidence was non existent, at almost 22 now I have went from a skinny, athletic looking size 9 body in high school to a pudgy, overweight size 16 as a young adult. I know something has to change, which is what led up to this!
I know that working out will only get you so far, you have to completely change your life style. Going to the gym and busting your ass for 2 hours and then heading over to applebees for the 2 for $20 aint gonna cut it sister. All you are doing is spinning your wheels! For me I wanted to start with what was going into my body.
I have tried weight watchers, all kinds of 7 day fat burning diets, shakes, pills, but none of that is really going to work in the long haul, I wanted something that I could stick with life long and none of those systems are really teaching you anything about nutrition either. Sure, its about portion control, but do they really teach you to put down the doughnut and pick up an apple? Not really. Do they tell you why you should cut out the doritos and eat some veggies, besides the obvious carbs and fat? Nope. I was ready to inform myself about what was going into my body and why it should or shouldn't be there.
I met a friend who has really helped me through this journey (shout out to Shauna!) and she is a big advocate for reading ingredients, and I guess over time it has started to rub off on me. You would be AMAZED at the crap we put in our bodies every day! I mean have you ever read the ingredients of a diet coke? Something that is advertised as "diet" and "no fat" and is zero points on weight watchers? One of the biggest ingredients in it is aspartame, an artificial sweetener that has been linked to irritability, headaches, insomnia, hyperactivity, seizures, memory loss, migraines, depression, vision problems, and studies have linked it to cancer in rats. What?! And we consume this multiple times daily?! Weight watchers sure didn't teach me that.
Basically this blog is just me on a journey to losing weight and finding a life long solution to keeping it off and living a healthy lifestyle. I am going to chronicle my journey through this, and hopefully it will help inform and help other people on their journey to do the same thing!