Book Review : After (the before & after) by Karen C.L. Anderson

Karen’s story will be familiar to many of you. After losing 55 pounds and featuring in a magazine as a successful “Before & After” story, she starting putting some of the weight back on and found herself confused about why she couldn’t lose what she regained.

Her book isn’t another book about what to do and what not to do, how to lose weight or how to never diet again, it’s about her journey of self discovery. If you’re interested in what it is like to go from dieting to trusting your body and loving yourself then this book is for you. It is honest, open-hearted, and raw and doesn’t shy away from the bad as well as the good. There are no magic pills, no fairy tales endings, just a sense of learning and growing.

I applaud Karen for her courage in revealing all of herself in the pages of this book — the successes and the failures. I was often nodding my head thinking “that’s what I used to think” and “that’s what I think now.” As in all good books, it made me feel like I wasn’t alone, that there was someone who had been through things similar to me.

I recommend “After” as a great read. If you are already living a life fuelled by self-love and acceptance then you’ll like this book because it will affirm the things you already know. If you are on the path, then this is required reading; the kind of book I wish I had when I gave up dieting.

Reading this book was truly refreshing. I have grown so tired of weight loss stories that imply that once the weight is lost, life is perfect. But that’s not reality; not only do most people gain the weight back, but in the process they find that weight is more a symptom of the problem than the actual problem itself. Karen C. L. Anderson isn’t afraid to examine this issue in the context of her own life, and she does it with a voice that is both honest and authentic. Her story of true and total acceptance is inspirational. ~ Katie McLaughlin

Click here to get a preview of the book.

Click here to read more about Karen.