Before & After & After Pics

This was from homecoming my Junior year. That is my husband David in the picture with me but I just didn't think he'd like me to post a bunch of pictures of him on here. He is in a couple pictures though.

This was my smallest, or close to it, I may have lost a little more weight into my Senior year (a couple pictures of me my senior year are in my guest post at EatTeachBlog) but this is where I wish I could get. About 130-135 lbs. Now, I realize that I will NOT look exactly like my 16 year old self ever again...but I can certainly aim for that weight again. Aren't I smokin'??? Well, at least my husband thought so. ; )

This was taken at David's Open house, so I was 18. Excuse my clothes...I was never very stylish and hardly ever looked put together...in fact, I'm still not.

I am 18-19 years old here. Look at that leg??? I WOULD date me!!! ; )

Then David and I moved in together and it was all downhill from there. We were living on our own, going to college full time, and both working at The Home Depot as many hours as we could. I would guess that I am around 160-170 lbs. here. You can definitely tell that I was starting to put on weight...look at that junk in the trunk!

This photo was taken on our honeymoon. I weighed around 185 lbs. when we got married. When I look at this picture now I don't think I look that bad...but I'm obviously self conscious...I have my arm wrapped over my stomach to try and mask the bulge.

Besides the obvious extra weight I really like this picture of me...which surprises me because I usually HATE any photos of me taken after 2003 (besides my wedding photos which I actually love). This was taken the Christmas after we got married in 2004. I'm not sure what I weigh here but I can tell I had gained even more judging by the size of my thighs and upper arms.

Then I started having babies and my weight just sky rocketed from there. This is the day I had my first child, Jacob. I weight 238 lbs.

 I did lose all but 10 lbs. or so of what I gained while pregnant with Jacob before I got pregnant with Nathan...but I was still bigger (non-pregnancy wise) than I had ever been before.

I shot back up to 238 lbs. by the time I delivered Nathan. He was almost 10 weeks early, so I can't even imagine how much more I would have gained had he been full term!

When I became pregnant in July of 2009 I still weighed around 238 lbs. I was very worried about the amount of weight that I would gain while pregnant. However, just shy of the 12 week mark I miscarried. I had what is called a blighted ovum (yoke sack, but no baby). At the time I thought I was dealing with it well and told myself it was because I hadn't 'really' lost a baby since there was never an embryo. I did however, decide shortly thereafter to really try to lose some weight. After four months of eating between 1000-1100 calories a day (I didn't exercise then) I had lost 40 lbs...but then I let life get in the way and I lost my resolve.

*I did recently find out that a medication that I was trying out for migraine prevention caused weight loss...as well as hair loss. I was on the medication for a little over 4 months during the time that I lost the weight and had quit taking it due to losing ALOT of hair shortly before I started to gain the weight back.

I was around 245 lbs. when Isabel was born and never lost more than a couple pounds which I then gained back plus two to put me at my all time high of 247 lbs.

When we asked a friend of mine to take our family portrait I was honestly shocked by how horrible I looked! I knew I needed to change...but kept putting it off. At that time my excuse was not wanting to try to lose weight during the upcoming holidays. So I stayed at 247 lbs. until the beginning of 2012 when I swore my New Year's Resolution would be to lose 100 lbs. and that I was actually going to follow through with my resolution for the first time EVER!

Now here I am 30 lbs. lighter. I know I'm not going to lose 100 lbs. by the end of the year...but I will hopefully be more than half way there!