The people who kicked Madelyn Sheaffer out of a Missouri water park were looking at the wrong profile of her, she says.
Had they looked beyond the scantily clad woman (and isn’t that the definition a bikini-wearer anyway?), they would have seen someone who overcame obesity and adversity to become a role model, she said.
“I am a person who at one time wore clothes that covered my arms and legs completely,” said Sheaffer. “I am not someone who would wear something that was revealing or inappropriate.”
The idea that it was even suggested by employees at Adventure Oasis, caught the 42-year-old mom off guard. She said she couldn’t believe they were telling her she was not dressed appropriately for the water park — and then booted her from the premises.
Sheaffer, in fact, is proud of her body and the hard work that she has done over the last seven years to lose weight and keep it off.
Beginning at 255 pounds, she shed 30 before she even felt comfortable working out in front of the mirrors in the weight room.
Now weighing in at 170, she has found confidence in herself and her body. If the incident at the water park had happened years before, she said, the normally shy woman may not have had the courage to stick up for herself. But she knew she had to take a stand.
Her banishment by the water park management, she said — especially when other women also were wearing bikinis — is age discrimination, pure and simple.
“I am comfortable in my bikini. I am happy with who I am. My first reaction was why are you singling me out? They said that my bottoms were inappropriate. That was funny to me because they are full-size bottoms. I felt it had more to do with my top because I am large-busted,” she said.
Sheaffer said she knows her body is not perfect.
“I was embarrassed for a second, and then it was no, no way. My body is different than the young girls that were walking around in their bikinis, but why should I be made ashamed of my body?” she asked.
It has been a long process for the Odessa, Mo., woman to achieve her goal of losing weight.
“Sitting in a chair and laboring to breathe is no existence,” she said.
But even that and a fall in her bathtub weren’t enough initially to motivate her. Sheaffer said she was suffering from a compressed disc in her back when she fell in the tub and was unable to get out — for three days.
Emergency workers tried to help, but she was in too much pain and requested that they leave her there.
“That should have been the first sign for me that I needed to lose weight, but it took me another year before I made the decision to do something,” said Sheaffer.
It took her two years to lose 100 pounds and she maintained the weight loss for five years. Today, at 170 pounds, Sheaffer’s happy with the results.
“My body is strong and healthy. Body-building empowers women to be secure and self confident,” she said.
Sheaffer’s descent into obesity began when she was about 9 and her father was suffering from cancer. She ate to cope with the stress of losing her dad. Then, during her teenage years, she discovered the program Body Shaping with Cory Everson.
“It helped me to lose about 20 pounds.”
The body-building workout and the discipline of exercise from her earlier years came back to her when she decided to be serious as an adult about losing weight.
“I went to the gym twice a day. I began reading books on nutrition and began lifting weights. Weights are my passion,” said Shaeffer. “I started out small, lifting about 5 to 7 pounds … Today, I can do hammer curls with 35- to 40-pound weights.”
Her workouts consist of a minimum of 35 minutes of cardio and then 45 minutes to an hour of weights.
Sheaffer never imagined that her two minutes of fame would come from her slimmed-down physique.
“I have a hundred and one messages for women,” she said. “My top message to women would be to say don’t let anyone tell you that you are not good enough. Take time to honor yourself. Women should be comfortable in their skin and be comfortable with they way they look. Imperfections are what makes us all beautiful.”
Next week, she said, she will leave the Midwest behind for Hawaii and hopes to call one of the islands there her home.
“I have always wanted to live near an ocean where I can swim and leave cold weather behind. It has always been a dream of mine to live there,” she said.
Good thing she’s got that bikini.
