70 lbs down! With Pics!

My story:
I'm 5'10" and I tipped the scales at 305 lbs in Feb 2010 when I decided to give up fast food and pop for Lent. I quickly decided to take it further and wanted to get healthy because around that time my grandfather passed away (not from being unhealthy, but it was a wake up call for me that I was shaving years off of my life because I WAS unhealthy). Anyway, in about 5 months, I lost 43 lbs and was feeling great! I got a lot of compliments and thought I had a handle on the eating and had even exercised a little over the summer. But when school started up in the fall, I was completely caught off guard at how much harder grad school was than undergrad and I slipped into my old habits of stress eating fast food and desserts pretty much every day. I had also not gotten into a rhythm with the exercise and I thought it took too much time away from my homework, so that was one of the first things to go. Needless to say, I regained 10lbs I had lost and lost a lot of the confidence I had gained! So after the semester from hell, I rededicated myself to watching what I was eating and decided to get a trainer at the start of the new year (2011). Through the semester, I lost about 20 lbs with the trainer and watching what I was eating, but still hadn't really committed to any of it-- if I got stressed out, I was still slipping into bad habits. Until I found MFP and c25k. I started c25k in May and MFP June 1st and I honestly feel like a whole new person. I've realized that instead of going to food to treat stress, I can exercise and feel SO MUCH BETTER! I am now exercising 5ish days a week and graduated from c25k 2 weeks ago-- all while still taking summer classes!

Today, 8/1/11, I hit my halfway mark of losing 70lbs! It has been a long, arduous journey, and I still have a long way to go. I needed to take a moment to really be proud of how far I have come!