Give or take 148 pounds - with pics

I'm 5'9", a few weeks shy of 50 and I weigh 171 pounds. For some of you this would be a starting point. For me, it's a dream come true.

I've been obese my entire life. I was a pudgy toddler, a chubby kid, and an obese adult. I went straight from "husky" kids clothes to what they used to call "womens" sizes. I remember in 6th grade they lined us all up down the hallway and weighed us on one of those big white scales in front of all our peers and all the 6th grade teachers. I weighed over 225 lbs. I've never been below that weight since - until last fall.

This was me. I weighed 319 pounds the day this picture was taken. It's the only one I could find of me at that weight because I wouldn't allow anyone to take pictures of me for years - I have decades of my life with no photos of me. It was taken during a brief stint at Jenny Craig before I decided I couldn't afford it, and they had to print it out on an inkjet printer because they couldn't give me a file.



And this is a lot less of me, taken last week. Yeah, it feels pretty good.