Employee Loses Weight, Gains Confidence
By Roishina C. Henderson

Jan Lister traded in the chocolate treats for carrot sticks and rice cakes. And because she made such healthy decisions, she’s 20 pounds lighter and has a significantly lower cholesterol level.

Her new eating habits paid off in a few months after she joined Hartsfield-Jackson’s 2008 Health & Wellness campaign. The theme was “Keeping Balance -- One Step at a Time.”

“It got to the point that I wasn’t feeling comfortable, and my clothes weren’t feeling right,” said Lister, Landside Operations’ Customer Service administrator. “This health campaign came at the right time, because I had been complaining about myself for too long. Here was the opportunity to do something, and my incentive was to win that money. So, I walked.”
Now, Lister is two dress sizes smaller – and $225 richer.

The annual campaign, which lasted from January to May, was filled with activities. They included a health fair, walking contest (pedometers were distributed to participants) and aerobic “happy hour” sessions, where Department of Aviation employees exercised for about an hour two days a week.

An awards luncheon was the culminating event, where Lister won the top monetary prize for having lost the most weight among the 54 participants in the Weight Loss Challenge.

“I walked all [six] concourses every day at work, and then I started walking my two dogs on the weekends,” she said.

Along with becoming more active, Lister stored diet food in the break room refrigerator to help maintain her calorie intake. Before she knew it, her physique began to shrink and her pockets grew from the money saved she normally spent on lunch.

“I feel great, and I feel healthier and look better,” said Lister, who recently bought new clothes for the first time in about a year and joined a gym. “Next step is tone up and work the abs.”