Returning troops often look forward to the things they’ll be gaining when they come home; things like family, friends and home-cooked meals.
For Army Spc. Larry Shaffer, who returned home to North Carolina after a year in Afghanistan, the biggest surprise may not have been what he gained, but what his wife had lost. Specifically, his wife, Misty, had secretly shed more than 100 pounds since he last saw her.
According to CNN, the transformation took Misty a full 12 months, during which time she says she swapped junk food for vegetables, cut the soda, and started keeping an eye on her portions.
Misty Shaffer’s amazing transformation. (Image courtesy of CNN)
“I would eat when I was bored,” Misty told CNN of her former habits. “I’d eat three huge meals a day, and then snack in between. Sad or happy, I’d turn to food for everything.”
Misty says keeping her progress a secret was as simple as keeping pictures off Facebook. “When [other people] took pictures they would either edit them to where it was just shoulder up or didn’t post them or either they blocked him to where he couldn’t see it,” she told ABC News.
“It’s just the icing on the cake,” Larry told NBC local outlet WECT, reflecting on his wife’s weight loss. “I’ve been happy with the way she’s looked since day one.”
Misty’s total weight loss ranges from 100 to 150 pounds, depending on which starting weight is used. At her heaviest, reports WECT, she weighed more than 300 pounds. But she weighed around 260 pounds when Larry left.
Though Larry returned from Afghanistan back in 2013, the story has gained new traction, after CNN revisited the Shaffers as part of its “Weekly Weigh-In” series.
WATCH the CNN video, below: