My name is Kelly Newell, and the point of this blog is to track my new, healthy lifestyle, which will help me lose weight and live longer. My husband Craig, who is also 35, along with our daughter Hannah (almost 6) and Nicholas (almost 3), and I live just east of Toronto, and we're in this together.

I recently found out that I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesteral. I'm only 35, and i'm now taking more pills than I ever thought possible.

About a month ago, I heard that there was a production company looking for a family with young children who would like to better their eating habits, get more active, and generally change their lives for the better. I thought that this was an excellent opportunity for our family, and emailed right away a description of our family. I described that we are a family of four with very poor eating habits, and very little activity done as a family.

We went for an audition, and they chose us!! The show will be called "Tosca", and it is based on her Eat Clean Diet. Tosca's written many books about eating clean, and we, as a family, are up for the task. We met Tosca today, and filmed our first meeting where she went through our kitchen and threw out our "unclean" foods (filling one HUGE garbage bag), and she went over what we will be doing, what kinds of food we will eat etc. She also listened to our stories of our childhood through to adulthood, and how far back our weight problems went.

Mine started during puberty. I went through puberty at an early age, and I believe I used food to deal with my emotions of being teased by the other kids (boys always tease girls, but it was the teasing from other girls that hurt the most). I promptly learned to put on a happy face, even if I wasn't feeling it on the inside. I knew that food was always there for me, and thus, my pattern of binge eating started.

I have tried many diets, from Weight Watchers to the Cabbage Soup Diet. Weight Watchers did work, but it was combined with doing intense spinning classes 5 days a week. Now, with two small children, life is pretty hectic to head off to the gym to hop on a bike. So Tosca said to start slow, with a half an hour of exercise per day. Not too much to ask. AND the whole family must be involved. So, after Tosca left, we went for a walk and played in the park. We did get a nice workout in, and the best part of it all was Hannah saying it was the BEST day ever! As much as i'm doing this for me, i'm also doing this for my children. Hannah is quickly following in our poor eating footsteps, and she is now considered overweight. I CANNOT let her be unhealthy...it leads to being unhappy. Already she has mentioned that she would like to be skinny like her brother. That just breaks my heart.

So, with that all said, we start our clean eating today.....leading to our new, healthy, happier life!