I met my first goal.....*with pics*

So this has been long awaited and asked for by my wonderful friends who have been so encouraging and such an inspiration on this journey we are all on. As of 12/9/11 I have 28.6 lbs and have gone past (lower) my first goal of reaching my pre-baby weight of 170. I'm 5'4" tall!!

The journey actually started when I was pregnant. I am not one of those cute little pregnant women. I'm a house. 2 weeks before I was due I measured in at a little over 54" around and I stood up in a wedding (I warned her!!).



At my heaviest during my pregnancy I was between 212 and 215. I'm short torsoed and my babies were both 8lbs 8oz!!! This pic is from my due date and I went to my friend's bridal shower (my daughter was born 2 days later)!!



I'm lucky....with both of my pregnancies I lost 1/2 of the weight that was gained just by delivering and I hovered around 191-195 for the next 15 months. I thought I was eating healthy and just not understanding why I wasn't losing weight. And the one time I did drop weight I dropped too many calories at a time and lost some of my milk supply (then spent the next 5 months trying to hold on to it long enough for my daughter to get to 1 year).

When Anneliese was 15 months old I got asked by a friend at church if I was expecting again and that was humiliating. I knew I needed to lose weight but didn't know how to do it. Then 2 of my closest friends from college told me about this site and even though I had always been against calorie counting (due to many many fad diets as a teenager that my mom subjected me too) I decided to try it. And I realized I was stupid!!! I didn't know what was healthy, I didn't know how many calories were in things, and I didn't know how much I was really putting in my body!!! Some of my favorite meals at restaurants were 900-1300 calories.....and I thought those were the healthy choices!!!

So I started on here. I go back and forth between losing 2 lbs/wk (1200 calories) and 1 lb/wk (1480 calories). I've done the 30 DS and some of 6 week 6 pack. I've recently fallen off of the exercise bandwagon and a lot of it is because I need to do Christmas/grocery shopping between work and picking up the kids which is my workout time!!! I do plan to going back to exercising so I'm watching my diet more closely and I'm still losing. I started this leg of the journey at 197 lbs and I officially weighed in yesterday at 168.8. And looking at pics I'm finally able to see the difference. I also just bought a size 12 pair of pants and a L shirt (which is difficult with the "girls" measuring in at a 38F). I carry a lot more in my tummy due to the sheer size I was all in front during my pregnancies but it's shrinking and I know there are options out there to help me if I need it in the future. Hopefully I can be an encouragement to someone else as I have been sooooo encouraged by the other success stories out there!!! Here are my pics!!!



And a shameless one of me today (12/10) by our Christmas tree.


So that's part of my story, be kind and I hope that I can inspire someone else like I've been inspired. Hope the pics work right!!!