So I'm feeling kind of good about myself...

...and I thought I'd share with you!!

A little bit of background: I've never been tiny. When I was a child/pre-teen I was, but when I hit puberty a number of things happened:

1. One of my closest friends died suddenly
2. I had to quit doing most all physical activity I enjoyed because my legs were built incorrectly (the bones in my legs --namely my lower legs-- were longer than my calf/achilles cord could physically stretch...like a rubber band pulled too tightly)
3. My mother lost her battle with MS

Eating my feelings/puberty and new womanly curves/inability to do much physical activity beyond walking equaled a lot of weight gain very very fast. This is me my senior year of high school:



So I went to college and really worked on stretching out that calf/achilles as best I could. I got to the point where I could serve/waitress and competitively ballroom dance and lost a little bit of the weight!

But as things often do...my feet came back with a vengeance. I saw my foot doctor and he said that we were going to have to go through with the surgery that they had wanted to do on me since I was 14 or 15 or else my incredibly high arches would collapse. So I got bilateral gastroc lengthening in January of 2011...which basically means they tore my achilles on purpose and put it back together...both at the same time.

I wasn't an ideal patient, and I tend to...not accept help very easily, so this was emotionally and physically draining. My German grandparents, bless them, took me in and took care of me...with their meat and potatoes too. I gained a lot of weight from that.

After three or four months of not walking at all, I began to undergo physical therapy. I was allowed 5 or 6 minutes on the elliptical and then we would do strengthening exercises. I didn't drive until March, and I wasn't supposed to walk more than a mile per day TOTAL (that includes trips to the bathroom and to the fridge). I believe in September of last year I was officially discharged and could /begin/ a slow walking program. I was also told that by a year/year and a half out I should be able to begin running/jumping/climbing trees. I had never been allowed to run before so in May of this year I started my lifestyle change in earnest. I had been watching what I ate a lot longer than that, but now I could exercise.

Fast forward to today:

It is a weigh in day. As of today I am 13 pounds down from when I started MFP post-surgery last year (not a lot, I know, but the whole "no exercising" thing really was hard) and 22 down from my heaviest:



Also, about an hour ago, I finished a 1.62 mile run!! I didn't do it quickly, and this is not a lot. Before surgery, though, I would never have been able to go 60 seconds much less 20 minutes.

So I'm done telling you my sort-of sob story and boasting about myself....tell me, why do /you/ feel good about yourself today?

EDIT: And if anyone is curious, I am 5'2"