Lost almost 40 lbs. (Pictures - )

I was always a chubby kid. When I was about ten I started putting on a little extra weight. By the time I was 12 years old I was a whopping 161 pounds. I was tall for my age, but definitely not tall enough to weigh that much... My mom and sister were both very thin, but since I was a kid it never seemed to bother me too much that I was so much bigger than them. When I started approaching my teen years I started to get a little self conscious about my weight. I noticed other kids my age were much smaller than me, and it began to bother me. My parents noticed that it was bugging me, and told me I could NOT go on a diet, but if I wanted to cut out eating junk food and drinking pop that they would give me 10 dollars per pound that I lost (upto 20 pounds)... That was a huge motivation to me, and I began to cut out sweets, etc. and only eat 3 healthy meals a day. The weight came off slowly, but after 4 months (on my 13th birthday) I had lost exactly 20 lbs. I had reached the height of 5'6", so I was finally in my weight category... After that I began to exercise, etc. and within a year or two lost some additional weight. I leveled out around 125 lbs and have stayed about that weight for several years. I'm still 5'6" and I am 20 years old. I just recently got married this year to the guy that I have liked since I was 14 years old. I'm so glad that my parents helped me conquer my weight issues at such a young age so that I wouldn't struggle as an adult. Here are my before and afters...


I'm the girl in the white shirt. I was about 12 years old.


This is me, June 2011, at my wedding. I had lost a few pounds due to wedding week craziness. Weighed about 121 here. (So, exactly 40 pounds down from my starting weight.


September 2011 before an awards ceremony.



My husband admiring my dress.