Washington Sports Clubs’ member, Heidi Ecker, shared her moving story on Extreme Makeover (ABC, Monday July 9). Heidi joined WSC and dropped over 100 pounds in less than a year.

Today, Heidi and Washington Sports Clubs have created the Heidi Ecker Scholarship that enables 200 obese children to work out and receive proper instruction on how to get in shape.
 
Here’s Heidi’s story, in her own words:
If you saw me on the street today shaking my single digit sized hiney, you'd think, "Hate her. Must be nice." But what you don't know, is I am half the woman I used to be thanks to my Washington Sports Club: In less than a year, I went from a size 24 to a single digit size losing over 6 feet of fat: it was magic. And ever since then, I have been on the coolest magic carpet ride.
 
Sound great? Good, because it wasn't pretty. Five a.m. curtain calls at the gym, eating enough eggs to lay one, and being so sore from working out even sitting on the toilet feels like the Ironman. That's right baby. Humiliating. Curious. The eighth wonder.
 
At 33, I realized I had been packing on weight year by year. My size 24 hiney could have competed as a heavy weight champion at over 270 pounds. After 30 some odd years of unsuccessful dieting, why would I have a reason to believe I should be anything but fat? I have family members who are overweight. You can't compete with family genes.

I danced with chocolate cake, championed happy hours and girls nights, ignored the existance of evil scales, saw gym goers as "overachievers" and conveniently prioritized career advancement over personal health and fitness. My career was on track, I had good friends and I was good time charlie. What else does a girl need?
 
I was sad about my weight. But I always failed. I didn't know where to start. Why set myself up for failure? I'd lived with weight loss failure before and decided I could handle one more time. And on October 4, 2004 I decided to give it one last try and attack. I called my friends and family to tell them this was the year I would win. And it was.
 
On that day, I launched a program to learn about my body, metabolism, exercise, weight loss strategies and prioritizing me over everything else in life. It was the hardest thing I have ever done, but best thing I have ever done. And while it's awesome to feel "free" from being overweight, I received an amazing gift: things I never even thought about.
 
There's a lot of power when you beat the one thing that has taunted you in your life. I was trying to change my lifestyle and lose a few pounds, and in return I found new pieces of an improved me. The me who has been stifled all these years. I don’t despise my "enemy", in fact I embrace her, because I truly cherish who I have been all of these years. It’s just that its time to celebrate the new sheriff in town – my heroine – who reminds me the sky is the limit and I can have anything I want to go after. Honestly, I always thought this total horse do-do, but now I truly believe there isn't anything I can't handle, do or defeat.
 
If you had told me that I could learn amazing new exciting things I never thought possible about myself if I lost a hundred pounds, I would have said please who cares about that stuff. Let me just lose the weight! But what I found is that under those extra hundred pounds, was the real me. I wasn’t living life as the true me, I was living the life I thought I was destined to be.
 
I learned that even though you think you know yourself after even 30 years, there are so many things lurking in the corners of your mind that you don’t realize. And if you open your mind, body and heart to them, you just might get more than you bargained for – and love it.