Fit Mama Friday – Meet Jenica

 

Meet Jenica

photo source: Lemondrops Photography

I’m so excited to introduce you to Jenica Lemmons on Fit Mama Friday this week. Jenica is a full-time wedding and family photographer at her own business, Lemondrops Photography in Kelso, Washington. Married for 12 years to her husband Derrick, Jenica is a proud mama to three beautiful children, Miss K, 11 years old, Tinker, 7 years old and Mr. D, 5 years old. I reached out to Jenica after a photographer friend of mine suggested her as a potential Fit Mama Friday subject. My friend had met her years ago on a photography forum and recently saw a very raw and real photo Jenica had shared on her business Facebook page, a photo which quickly went viral (over 65,000 ‘likes’ alone!). I was thrilled when Jenica agreed to be featured – she is an inspiring Fit Mama.

photo source: Lemondrops Photography

Judging from the recent photos of you working out, you are in amazing shape! What’s your background in fitness? Has it always been part of your life?

Growing up I was always into some sport or activity. I was enrolled into gymnastics when I was three after I kept climbing all over the counters and my poor parents had to find some sort of outlet to keep me occupied. I played several sports throughout my childhood; gymnastics, softball, basketball, track, cross-country and dance. In high school I spent weekends skiing up at the mountain. I’ve always enjoyed people and being on teams was my favorite part about playing sports.

You’ve been married 12 years and you have three gorgeous children. Did you continue working out once you were an adult and through your pregnancies?

My husband and I married very young and we had our first child at 20. I didn’t work out during any of my pregnancies. I attempted getting fit after having each of my kids but it was a constant struggle to get myself to the gym with three little ones.

So something must have changed fairly recently, since your youngest is just 5 years old – what was the impetus for you to get back into shape?

Two years ago I got asked three times in one month, “When are you due?” Since my youngest was three at the time and we were done having kids, it was a huge slap in my face as to how out of shape I’d gotten.

What did you do to get back into shape?

I joined a “boot camp” at my local gym and dropped 17 pounds. A year ago our gym opened up a CrossFit box and I decided to see if it was something I’d like. I’ve been going five days a week since it opened up!

When I first started working out, it was purely to lose weight. I feared that my business would struggle the more time I spent at the gym. To my surprise, the opposite effect happened. My business boomed more than ever before and my creativity significantly increased. I had more energy than I’d ever had and I didn’t get completely wiped out after shooting a full wedding. In fact now, I can do two weddings in one weekend and still bounce back the day after!

photo source: Lemondrops Photography

That might be my favorite effect of exercise – that even as you expend energy to workout, you’re gaining energy in the long run. 🙂 Tell me what your workout at your CrossFit box is like.

A typical workout at CrossFit is about an hour. We do 15-20 minute warms ups, a “conditioning exercise” and then our WOD (workout of the day). I absolutely love it because I have not only accountability, but every single day we have a completely different workout. I don’t get bored and I’m the fittest I’ve ever been in my life. Granted, I still have weight to lose and don’t feel like I’m “there” yet but the journey has been rewarding!

photo source: Lemondrops Photography

What has the change been like in terms of your family life? You have more energy now – has that spilled over into mama-hood as well?

Yes, I have way more patience than I ever did before. My kids used to see “grouchy mom” way more often than I’d like to admit. They absolutely love that I can pick them all up at the same time and carry them around. We play together and I take them on fun new adventures constantly. I honestly can’t imagine going back to the way we did things before with me not staying fit. If I go a few days without going to the gym I get super cranky and just want to sleep all day instead of getting my stuff done.

At first my husband wasn’t too thrilled about the idea of me joining a gym and losing weight. He wanted me to know that he loved me “just as I was.” I appreciated his sentiments but I had stopped feeling like myself and wanted to be happy in my own skin. I had gotten to a point where I was so disconnected with my body I hid it under baggy clothes. I wanted to feel strong and fit again.

Just this last February my husband changed his diet and has since lost 25 pounds. Then very recently he joined my CrossFit box and we’ve been working out together every day. It’s like a dream come true to have my best friend at my side working out with me. We make healthy meals together and teach our kids healthy eating habits. It feels so strange since for so many years we were the family ordering pizza twice a week and stuffing our faces!

photo source: Lemondrops Photography

Any challenges for you to workout? It seems like the change has been totally positive.

The biggest challenge is that it’s often hard to dedicate time to workout. There are so many days I just want to skip a workout and take a nap instead. I’m fortunate to have many friends I work out with that will message me and see if I’m coming. Having that support system with my workout friends has been huge.

It’s so awesome to hear a story like yours where your decision to become healthy has positively impacted your whole family. Now, let’s get to the picture you posted that had such a huge response online. Tell me about it.

So, a few months ago on my business page I posted this photo of my bare belly (complete with horrible stretch marks):

photo source: Lemondrops Photography on Facebook

To accompany the photo, I wrote the following:

I’ve debated all day about posting this on my business page because it’s so raw and personal. After an amazing and wonderful response from my friends I’m going to share on here. Normally I only post beautiful photos and everyone looks their absolute best. All of the profile pictures I post of myself I look my very best. So it’s scary to me to share and I hope I don’t lose any of my fans. So here goes anyway…

Warning: This is ugly to societies standards. I do not mean to offend anyone.

My main reason for posting this is because for the last 11 years I’ve been absolutely dreadfully ashamed of my body. I’ve birthed three beautiful children and will never have a hot bikini body. In fact I practically wear a swim dress to cover everything up.

99% of women HATE their bodies. We’re too fat, too thin, dark skin, dark hair, under-eye circles, wrinkles, fat ankles, funky toes, weird nose, bad teeth, etc, etc, etc. I hear it all from clients on a daily basis and I feel it all personally as well. I struggle with weight and self esteem issues constantly. I photograph people for a living and there’s rarely a time when someone comes in front of my camera completely confident of who they are and what they look like. Typically those that do are men.

I know this will offend some people. I know I will get nasty comments. I just want to share to my friends/family that you are all absolutely gorgeous. Be proud of who you are and how you were made.

These are my tiger stripes and I earned them.

This photo got over 1 million views,  65,000 likes and over 9,000 comments. I had NO IDEA so many women felt the same way. It was just a part of my own journey to say, “Here is my body. It has flaws but I love it anyway.” I thought for sure I’d lose most of my fan base and people would ridicule me. Sure, there were some mean, nasty comments, but almost all the people who commented said how brave I was for posting. I certainly wasn’t brave at the moment I posted it. I was scared out of my mind that people would think I was a lunatic!!

Why do you think this one photo resonated so much? 

Every woman I know seems to feel this way in one way, shape or form. We nitpick ourselves to death and don’t feel ‘good enough.’ It’s an absolute tragedy so many feel this way.  I still struggle with insecurities about my body even though I’m happier than I ever was. Its easy to get it stuck in my brain that I should work on the last 15 pounds or I should get botox to fix the wrinkles or “oh man I wish I had the money to get a tummy tuck to get rid of the flabby skin that won’t go away.”

It’s HORRIBLE to degrade myself this way. It’s horrible that I’m one of millions of women who think these thoughts on a regular basis. What does this teach our daughters about our worth? Should it be based on our looks? Our clothes? How skinny we are? I shudder at the thought of my own daughter thinking she’s anything less than perfect.

Being a fit mom isn’t about being a super skinny hot mom. For me, being a fit mom is taking care of my body so I can do all the things in life that I want to do. I may never arrive at my “perfect fitness” but honestly I don’t care one bit. I’m proud of how far I’ve come physically and emotionally. My kids deserve a happy mom. 🙂

photo source: Lemondrops Photography

Jenica, you’re awesome. 🙂 Thank you so much for being part of Fit Mama Friday.

 Do you want to be featured on Fit Mama Friday? Or do you know someone you’d like to see featured? Please contact me for details!