One year ago today...

One year ago today, I started my weight loss journey. I suffer from a chronic auto-immune sinus condition and, at the urging of a friend, had decided to try a gluten free/dairy free diet to see if these foods might be triggering the auto-immune response. At the end of 2 months on this diet, I reintroduced gluten and then and dairy back into my diet. There was no change with gluten and very little with dairy so I went back to eating gluten (still do today) but limit dairy intake and my sinuses are still basically a mess. The upside to this little experiment though, was that I lost 10 pounds! About that time in November another friend told me about MFP and I thought "Hey, losing those 10 was pretty easy, maybe this is a way that I can keep the weight loss going! I could stand to lose about 25 more." Fast forward one year, and I am maintaining a 48 pound total weight loss and I have never felt better. My knees don't hurt anymore going up stairs, I'm wearing the smallest size I've worn since college, and I'm in the best shape I've ever been. I can't tell you what a thrill that is for someone that was once thin but thought "Now that I'm middle aged, I guess I'm just going to be overweight for the rest of my life." Continuing to maintain forever is going to be a challenge but it's one that I'm up for. Full speed ahead and I'm not looking back!