I made goal 20 lbs. lost with pics!

I started my journey on MFP the end of January this year at 145 lbs. The reality is I topped out at 159 lbs. a year before that and I'm only 5'4. We had recently moved away from friends and family and if truth be told I comfort ate to feel better about it. I rarely ate fruit even though I like most of them and veggies were eaten even less often. My 2-3 time a week Panera frozen mocha habit did not help. I exercised a little every now and then and at other times not at all. It wasn't until I hit 159 that I had a moment of panic. I hadn't weighed that much since I was pregnant and my youngest was 5 months old. It wasn't long after that my marriage hit a rough patch and I lost 15 lbs. due to stress putting me at 145. While that was better it certainly wasn't ideal for me. So after several months of exercise but not to maximum potential I realized something had to change because I wasn't getting results. In Jan. I stumbled across MFP and rest is history. I drank more water, ate more fruit and veggies and even tried some things that I never would have tried otherwise, like garbanzo beans..who knew! I exercised 5-6 days a week and sometimes twice a day. For me exercise has become my life line to sanity. It's time just for me with no one demanding more juice or a snack or complaining because someone isn't sharing. It took a few weeks to tweak my food and find what setting is ideal for me to lose. For me 1/2 lb. a week was a ideal (though I still lost a pound a week with exercise). It was slower moving that way but it worked for me. I still eat a lot of the same things but much smaller portions and more infrequently and try to make healthier choices. I don't stress about going over my calories as it will all even out in the end. I wanted to do this as something I can live with on a permanent basis.

At this point I'm pretty happy with results. I haven't moved to maintenance mode yet I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing until my body decides enough is enough. I will not get to the point of being too thin as I don't think this is appropriate for me. I turn 40 in September and my goal was to look my best by that point and I'm well on my way to being the best ME there is!

Trying to figure out how to do the pics..