Celebrity News
Sherri Shepherd has always been an open book when it comes to the struggles and the triumphs of her life.
The former The View co-host has shared the details of her tumultuous and litigious marriages, custody disagreements, and now she is sharing the day-to-day lifestyle change she decided to make in order to get her health back on track. Shepherd has been making efforts towards a healthier lifestyle, especially after being diagnosed as prediabetic some years ago. Although she wrote a book in 2013 called Plan D: How to Lose Weight and Beat Diabetes (Even If You Don't Have It), she still found herself struggling with her first true love: sugar.
The comedian revealed earlier this summer that she has officially cut sugar from her diet. Being that sugar is in almost everything, we can imagine that not only is this a difficult tradition but also a major lifestyle change. Sherri is documenting the whole experience on Instagram. The 51-year-old has been gushing about going sugar-free for over 180 days, losing over 30 pounds, and now being able to show her arms and tuck in her shirts—something she never did in the past. In a post earlier this summer, she says that even though she isn't where she wants to be, she feels "AMAZING!" She writes:
"It's been a long journey full of prayer, self-encouragement, wanting food, craving sugar … forgiveness when I fall, cajoling myself into the gym & onto a jump rope…thankful for the love & encouragement along the way of friends & some beautiful people I met on IG … at 168.4 lbs, I am still not where I want to be but I feel AMAZING!"
She says there are days where she wants to "crawl back inside my #peachcobbler but I want to live."
According to the American Diabetes Association, 13.2% of all African Americans aged 20 years or older have diagnosed diabetes. African Americans are also 1.7 times more likely to have diabetes as non Hispanic whites. Type 2 diabetes is also associated with an increased risk for a number of serious, sometimes life-threatening complications, which makes it all the more necessary as a community to find ways to combat this incurable yet preventable diagnosis.
In a 2013 interview with USA Today, Sherri revealed that one of the reasons why she decided to make a real lifestyle change was because of the horror of imagining the loss of a limb or the inability to take care of her son, Jeffrey. She says:
"She said [her doctor] 'Sherri, you love wearing those shoes, don't you?' I said, 'Yes, I do.' She said, 'You won't be wearing them with your foot cut off, because if you keep eating the way you are eating, that's where you're headed.'"
The Trial & Error star recently sat down with Wendy Williams to discuss her sugar-free journey and detailed why it has been such and up and down battle for her. She revealed that the new sugar-free diet was once again inspired by her son Jeffrey and that a conversation with him in the car ultimately forced her to stop numbing herself with sugar and to make a real change. She said:
"Sometimes you go through stuff and you want to just grab something sweet. Ex-husbands, things like that. And I was doing that and Jeffrey was in the backseat, Wendy, and I was eating something I wasn't supposed to. He said, 'Mommy, if you die, who's going to be my bodyguard?' I said, 'What are you talking about?' 'Who's going to watch me?' And literally I said, 'Sherri, you've got to do something different.'"
We all have our guilty pleasures, but when they start to affect our health and/or well-being, the next course of action is to make a concerted and disciplined change: mind, body and soul. We only get on life and one body: let's treat our bodies like the temples they really are.
Keep going, Sherri! We're rooting for you!
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