Weight-Loss Diaries

Lora and Jason Brys

Jason before: 346 lbs.
Jason after: 221 lbs.
Pounds lost: 125

Lora Before: 200 lbs.
Lora After: 167 lbs.
Pounds lost: 33

Lora Brys says she was never model-thin—nor did she want to be. But when she and Jason got engaged in May 2006, she started worrying about how she’d look for her wedding. “I knew I didn’t want to be a big white meringue of a bride,” she admits. In the first flurry of engagement excitement, the pair made the rounds of family. “We ate out a lot, and we both gained even more weight,” Lora says. By August of that year, with eight months to go until their April wedding, Lora told Jason she wanted to take off some weight; he suggested they drop pounds together.

Getting with the program: Lora and Jason settled on the Nutrisystem diet. “It looked like it would be easy since the portion control is done for you, and both of us are bad at that.” Knowing that sweets and chips were her downfall, Lora cleared the kitchen of anything salty, crispy, sweet and gooey. That’s not to say that the couple had an easy time of it. “When we got the first shipment of food from Nutrisystem, we thought, ‘are you kidding?’ It didn’t look like enough, and it was hard to adjust. But we actually found that we weren’t hungry, because on the diet you’re eating three regular meals and two snacks, and the meals were ‘regular’ food, like lasagna or burgers, that we’d have with green salads and fat-free dressing.”

Food habits makeover: “Eating this way got us into thinking about nutrition and health in a way we never had before. When we went food shopping, we starting checking out vegetables we’d never tried and looking carefully at labels.” One useful trick: food shopping as a team. “That way, if one of us was tempted by potato chips, the other could steer the cart down a different aisle,” says Lora. “It also helped that we lived in a pretty rural area. The market was a half-hour away, so it was easier to avoid junk-food runs.” The couple also began taking nightly walks after dinner—a mile at least, sometimes two or three—using the time to hammer out wedding plans. On weekends, they’d drive into Washington, D.C. “and just spend the whole day walking around the city.”

The dress: When Lora went for her fitting on a wedding dress she’d bought early in the engagement, she’d already lost 25 lbs. “But that meant a loss of three dress sizes! My seamstress actually told me I could ‘only’ lose another 5 lbs., or the alterations would end up being too complicated and expensive. That was a little deflating, but it was still great to know that the whole bodice had to be redone.” On her wedding day, Lora zipped up her A-line gown and thought, “I don’t look like a meringue.” The real surprise was Jason: He lost a whopping 125 lbs.

The aftermath: The Bryses spent their honeymoon on the Caribbean island of Antigua and agreed to temporarily suspend their diet. “Still, we only gained back a couple of pounds each.” Back home, they incorporated leftover Nutrisystem food into their meals until it was gone—then went off on their own. Turns out, the habits they forged while dieting have stuck with them. “We don’t keep junk food in the house, and we know what a healthy portion size is. We cook together and try new recipes. It’s become part of our married life.”

Lora’s Tips

• End every meal with a glass of water. If you’re too full to drink it all, you'll know you've eaten too much.
• Go for daily walks with your fiancé. You'll be getting exercise and you can plan your wedding while you walk.
• To learn what a serving size really is, use a kitchen scale or measuring cups for accuracy.

Photography: Randall Studios