Hey... I'm a newbie. :)

Hey Everyone,

My name is Mary and I am a 27 year old mother of 3 kiddos. I was born and raised in sunny California. I am married to a great guy who I have been with for 12 years (we are high school sweethearts) and we had our 10 year anniversary last August.

So, the reason I joined this site I'm sure is the same reason why everyone else has joined, to get healthy! I was tall and slim for the majority of my life, my height is 5'7" and I weighed between 120 and 125. After my first daughter, I had gained 60lbs, but by the time she was 2 months I was back to 125. I had my gall bladder removed and was warned about the weight gain that could follow if I wasn't careful. I clearly did not take the advice I was given, or else I would not be here. lol

I had my second daughter 2 yrs after my first and my last ob weigh in was 185... I quickly lost that weight as well and went down to 140 lbs. Here's where it gets crazy; There was a 5 year gap between my youngest daughter and my son. During the 5 years, I gained a TON of weight. I topped out at 216!!! I finally started to work out and I lost about 30 lbs, then stopped, so I pretty much stayed at that weight until after the birth of my son. I nursed my son, so I weighed about 180, that was 35lbs down from the last pregnancy weigh in.

Three years passed and I found myself weighing 212lbs, I was back in the 200's, again. I was sooo sick of my fluctuating weight, so I started doing 4.5 miles on the elliptical, 5 days a week. I weighed 212lbs in August 2011 and by Halloween, October 2011, I weighed 170 lbs. I completely changed my eating habits, did a lot of cardio and strength training, so it had definitely paid off. By November 2011, I started slacking with the holidays coming and my family and I were going out of state quite a bit, so it became hard to keep my routine. By the end of the holidays, the gym was not even in my mind anymore...

So here I am , in the 200's, AGAIN! (Ughhhh) I weighed myself in January of this year and I weighed 206. I joined MFP at that time, but I never used it, nor did I start exercising. On February 22nd, I was ready to change. I started doing a 4.8 mile walk, and eating clean. I'm done having kids and I'm working towards my BSN. So, there is really no excuse as to why I should be overweight, plus I want to be a trauma nurse, and being overweight would make that tough.

Wish me luck!