Allow myself to introduce... myself

Hi! My name is Carrie. I've been struggling with my weight since I was a small child. I've always been overweight. Not terribly so, but enough to not feel comfortable with myself in my own skin. I always wanted to lose weight but never really tried to until the beginning of my Senior year in High School. The way I chose to lose the weight was to eat and drink nothing but strawberry Slimfast shakes with the occasional chip here or there. I did lose weight but of course I didn't feel much better. As I got older I learned how to do things the right way, but since then I have had 2 children, have had 3 pregnancies and dealing with a blood transfusion after my first child was born. So after that I didn't want to move so much. I was always in pain. After about a year of not working out or doing anything productive to make a change, I bought an Elliptical. At first I was not prepared at all to use it for effectiveness. But eventually I was using it a lot more than I had planned. So I've been going up and down my whole life. After having baby number two, 8 months and a day ago, I have been struggling even more than ever. I got a new Elliptical a couple months ago but have yet to gain real use out of it.

I've been battling depression and PPD and it's proven to make becoming healthy a very hard task. I no longer feel like myself. I don't want to go out in public. I'm tired of feeling ashamed of myself, so it's time to make a change. I am 5'2", and weigh 170lbs. My normal weight is usually in between 130-145. I don't want to bounce back and forth anymore. Looking forward to the future. I'm trying to find the motivation to get this done. My 27th birthday is July 20th so I'd like to get back to ME beforehand. Nice to meet everyone!