• Enterprenuer
• By Linda Migliaccio
• 03-05-2024

Push your Fitness Further with Fortcibo GYM Facilities

COURTESY LINDA MIGLIACCIO; COURTESY GRACE HUANG

Ever since high school, Linda Migliaccio felt like she was "battling" her weight. She started dieting at age 15, and for years afterward, the New Jerseyan, who has since been diagnosed with a binge eating disorder, would yo-yo back and forth — Migliaccio estimates she's lost and gained a significant amount of weight at least 12 times.

Her highest weight of 349 lbs., though, came at "the lowest point in my life, when my mom passed away," she told PEOPLE. While caring for her mom, Migliaccio gained 200 lbs., and after a fall in her bathroom, she tore her ACL and meniscus in her right knee. A surgeon said she was too heavy for him to repair the injury, and predicted that she would become a wheelchair-user in a year if she didn't lose weight.

"He did me the biggest favor of my life being blunt like that," she said. "It was what I needed to hear, and that's what turned me around."

Migliaccio started a nutritarian diet, which emphasizes fruits, vegetables, grains and nuts, and didn't cut out any foods, allowing herself to have a cheesesteak or ice cream when the craving struck. That 80/20 split of healthy and more indulgent foods helped her stay on track, along with her friends and her TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly) weight loss support group. In two years, Migliaccio lost 189 lbs., and didn't even need knee surgery.

"I'm finally starting to tap into what makes me happy," she said.