What gave you that final push to start this journey?

When I weighed myself and was 198 :sad: , the highest I've ever been :noway: , I hated avoiding pictures too; always throwing someone in front of me or standing behind the crowd... but I've lost almost 10 pounds since I started & is excited to lose more! have offically hit the 180's phew :bigsmile: I am going to continue till I hit my goal weight; not quite sure where I want to be, all I know it has to be below 150 with a health BMI.

Weight has been sneaking on for years, but after Christmas I hit 98 Kgs and thought I am NOT going to go ANY higher. I did not want to get to 100 kgs. (I am 167cm / 5'6 1/2).

I started using MFP properly (I joined a few months ago but just wasn't motivated) and now very happy that I am learning about managing my weight, and losing and it's not hard.

one day i was in the hospital for a check up and the nurse weighed me and told me i was almost 170 lbs (she said it in kgs first then translated for me!) and started discussing how to lose weight and how massive my BMI was. :noway:
so i vowed that the next time i go there i'll weigh at least 10lbs lighter. i go back on the 16th april and i've lost 9lbs already, so the new goal is 12lbs less. take THAT, skinny nurse. :smokin:

When approaching the option to buy a size 16 pant in 2010. Size 14 is something I'd approached before, not 16. So I cut out fried food and soda. Lost 5-10 pounds, fit back into my 14's again. Then I figured if I really watched what I ate I'd lose even more. I went from 190-165 without even exercising. Now I'm buying 8-10's and it's fun to shop again! Now, I'm a very healthy weight, with a new goal of 157 and killer legs. Let the squats begin...

My push was a week of unfortunate events. I have seven reasons and they are all equally as important

Day 1) My fiance showed me a video of tough mudder and said he wanted us to run the race together. I said, " ewww why would anyone think that looked fun." I did not think that I would be insulting him. After giving it a lot A LOT of thought, I decided I wanted to run the race with him. I NEED to run the race with him. I can't explain why, I just know it is super important. We even have a team set up now. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vh5HdPM_QuE

Day 2) I realized that I only had one pair of jeans that fir me. I have been living in my fiances work out clothes.

Day 3) I got called the sister with the personality AGAIN. I am so tired of being the "fat and funny" kind of girl.

Day 4) I saw pictures of myself when I was in Paris two years ago. I was about 45 lbs lighter then and looking back, I was really attractive, even though I thought I was super fat. I miss looking like that. ( Also on day 4 I started telling someone how to make something and it started with, " well, you take a stick of butter" and a joke was made about you know you are a big woman when...)

Day 5) I stepped on a scale and realized I have NEVER been this big in my life. NEVER. I started to think that my step mom was right by always berating me about food, and saying I was going to get fat. ( I was a size 12 then and in high school)

Day 6) My mom was who always fit was disabled in 2002 in a car accident. She told me that she wanted me to love myself and take care of myself. I want to be able to help take care of her, and I have to be fit to do that.

Day 7) After having a bad food day I took a shower. When I opened the curtain there was the fat women looking at me. She had stretch marks and a fat face. Her thighs were huge and she looked so miserable. ... I was looking in my mirror. I broke down crying. That COULDN'T be me, that SHOULDN'T be me, but it was. The I remembered my fiance saying, "You are one of the most self conscious people I know, but you don't do anything about it." I realized I had been making excuses for myself and that I had to do something, or I would never be able to run Tough Mudder, be the pretty sister, or take care of my mom. I want to feel good about myself again, so I am going too.

If you have made it this far, thanks for reading. :blushing: :flowerforyou:

My boyfriend of the time breaking up with me because I wasn't physically attractive.
Plus I didn't feel great, and couldn't buy cute clothes.
Now single and happiest I've beeen, look at me now haha

So glad you are no longer with that that loser!

what pushed me was I was sick of starting something and then slacking off..which I always do. I have been working on and off for a while now. I had enough of me doing that and I am now focused to do it and get this extra weight off and make myself feel better about myself and look better. I really want to get rid of my inner thighs and lower abs...=) I want to be back down to what I was when I first met my husband...I liked the way I was then..=)

Mine was a few different things. I am a former high school & college runner and also did racing as an adult. During my 3 years of law school I led a pretty sedentary life and didn't eat so well. Lots of other personal things have happened in the past year, and all the stress took a toll on my exercise and eating habits. I was out of shape and had trouble running even 2 miles (which for someone who used to run 20-30 miles a week or more is upsetting).

In October, I hit the very top of what my doctor calls my healthy weight range. The tipping point was when I had a co-worker tell me I was getting a tummy. In the beginning of November I signed up for a half-marathon which will occur on May 6. I started eating better, and then I started tracking my calories on MFP at the beginning of March.

My goal is to run a half-marathon and look great in a swimsuit at the end of May and also look great in a wedding I'm in at the end of June. And from there, it will be to maintain a healthy lifestyle of eating right and exercising regularly. Plus, I'd like to meet someone special at some point and look my best! :happy:

i have tried just about every diet known to man and nothing worked for very long. I don't consider myself on a diet know and maybe thats why im seeing results. i changed what i eat but i don't deny myself of what i want. i learned portion control and i limit myself. seeing the calories you put in really helps me. My motivation: I'M TIRED OF BEING THE FAT GIRL! I want to look HOT and feel great about myself.

It was kind of a bunch of things all coming together at once that crystallized it for me. I was 188 pounds, which was slightly more than my top pregnancy weight, and my baby is now 11. I wasn't feeling attractive at all. I'm not getting any younger, I'm over 40. I don't want to put off my dream of being attractive and fit any longer. I've always been a bit of a fashion fan and I was at the point where I was needing to consider buying "women's" sizes, and seeing my choices at the stores dwindle considerably. We'd also gone on a couple really spectacular vacations (Grand Canyon, Hawaii) which involved a lot of activity, and there were too many moments where I felt like I wasn't getting everything I could out of the experiences because I was either mortified by how I looked in shorts or a bathing suit, or physically incapable of keeping up. On the positive side, I'd had lifelong thyroid issues which were under control for the first time. I had a thyroidectomy and after that the medication I'd been on for 25 years finally started giving me the energy of a normal person!

My husband and I realized that despite having a wonderful, fresh, varied, mostly unprocessed diet that we were both getting fatter and fatter every year. We thought about what we could be doing wrong and what we could change. Step one, was portion sizes. We were eating way too much, even if they were mostly the right kinds of foods. We changed our portion sizes and since then the weight has slowly been coming off. He lost 25 pounds (he also gave up soda, I never had that habit), and I lost 12 without really trying. That was 2 years ago and I feel like that particular weight is gone forever.

That loss helped me see that I can make permanent changes for the positive in my life. I still need to lose about 30-35 more pounds, but I can see the path now.