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The Swimmer: Nothing Keeps Her Down

Vivian Stancil's friends used to call her Big Mama. Now she's 119 pounds lighter and credits her weight loss to swimming lessons, "a sound food plan," and a scare from her doctor.

By Laurie Herr

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Six years ago, at five feet and one inch tall, Vivian Stancil weighed 320 pounds and wore a size 24. "I was not happy with the world," the former kindergarten teacher says. She'd tried many diets—even had her jaw wired shut—but she couldn't lose the weight.

These days, Vivian wears a size 12 and weighs 201 pounds, with another 32 pounds to go. That shouldn't take much longer, as she's steadily watching her weight drop week by week. What's more, according to recent tests which measure body fat, most of Vivian's current weight is pure muscle. "And muscle," she says proudly, "is a very good thing."

It took a serious scare to get Vivian into shape. "I was 54, and I went to my doctor for a checkup," she says. "He told me, ‘You are not going to live to see your 60th birthday.'" Those words were the jump start she needed. Even though she was at first afraid of dunking her head under water, she began taking swimming lessons near her home in Riverside, Calif. "My instructor flipped me over in the water like a hamburger," she laughs. "I was petrified! But he promised me that he wouldn't let me drown."

The lessons paid off. Vivian now competes in local Senior Games, as well as the national Senior Olympics and the Masters swimming program. Because she is mostly blind (she has retinitis pigmentosa, a genetic disease that causes progressive vision loss), Vivian's husband Turner (pictured with Vivian above) stands at the pool's edge, banging an old tambourine to guide her. When she first started swimming, Vivian had wanted to quit, but Turner wouldn't let her. "I wanted to cuss him so bad!" she laughs.

"A sound food plan" (Vivian hates the word "diet") has been the basis for her transformation, she says. A nutritionist helps her count calories; she keeps a food diary, too. And Vivian came up with her own unorthodox menus: a big salad and cooked spinach or greens for breakfast, followed by smaller meals throughout the day.

"One morning I might have a salad and a chicken breast," she says, explaining that she makes food choices based on what "fulfills what I need in my body." She constantly tweaks her plan. For instance, she recently started eating oatmeal to help keep her cholesterol low, and she now passes on fruit juices because of their high sugar content.

Bacon and sausage were the hardest to give up. But Vivian doesn't give in—even when friends tempt her. "They'll want me to go to the Sizzler or some other all-you-can-eat place," she says. But that's not for her. "You need to take authority over what you eat," she says firmly.

She adds with another generous laugh, "They don't call me Big Mama anymore."

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