Fifty Pounds.

About 5 and a half months ago I told myself that I was not allowed to write this blog post until I reached a very large goal I set for myself. There have been so many days in those 5 and a half months where I was so discouraged that I thought I'd never get to write these words. Those days, however, were greatly outnumbered by the days where I was so determined, nothing could stop me. Because of those days I get to say I lost 50 pounds. I am writing this only minutes after having gotten on the scale to find this out and am still in a bit of denial. In the last 4 years or so, I had basically just resigned myself to being fat for the rest of my life. When I went away to college, I gained A LOT of weight. Most gained the Freshman Fifteen. Let's just say I gained a lot more than that. From ages 17-20, I don't think I even stepped one foot near a scale, so I have no idea what I was at. I do know that my senior prom dress is now too big, though. That's about my only point of reference for that. Even though I have lost 50 pounds, I still have quite awhile to go before I am at a healthy weight. It's incredibly embarrassing to say that I even let myself get to a weight where losing this much is a possibility, but it's also incredibly exciting to be able to say that I've accomplished this. I have never been at a point in my life where I love myself and my body this much. The respect you start to have for your body when it takes hell from you and starts improving and doing things you never thought possible is incredible.

I chose to keep quiet about this from the beginning and only tell basically one friend and then family members because, honestly, I was too afraid of failure. I was afraid that once I told everyone I would fail and then I'd be stuck looking like an idiot. That's why I made this deal to myself. When I first started I said "You can tell the whole wide world if you want to, but you have to lost 50 pounds first." This never seemed like a possibility. I did not believe in myself at all. But all it took was for one person to believe in me and to start seeing changes, and suddenly I believed in me too. The support I have gotten from my family has been out of this world, and I realize I am incredibly fortunate to have that support system. 

When people find out or see that I've lost weight (like co-workers or extended family members), without fail the very first thing they ask will be "So what are you doing? What diet are you following?" Let me let you in on a secret: There is no secret to weight loss. All you do is eat right (fruits, vegetables, whole, fresh, or raw foods) and get active. That's it. And, yes, have some chocolate and wine too ;)

I am so proud of myself and honestly feel like the only way I can go now is up (except where the scale is concerned, lol). Every day it starts over and not every day is easy. So many days I wake up and say "Ugh, I don't want to pay attention to everything I put in my mouth today" or "Ugh, I don't want to go to the gym today". But you know what? I do it anyway. And I'm so glad I do, because I am so, so happy to be able to write this blog post today. I cried a profuse amount of tears after getting off the scale tonight. It's pretty easy to say that this is the largest accomplishment of my life thus far, and I am so, so happy. 

Below I'm going to include a few pictures. It is taking a lot of confidence to post these pictures and I am incredibly nervous about it. I guess I like to feel like I live in this internet world where I control how the  internet people get to see me, and I tried my hardest to make sure they never knew how overweight I was. Yet, here I am in all my glory. 

On the left is me at what was probably my heaviest, on the right is me about 2 minutes ago.

This is the only before/during picture I have that doesn't involve me in my bra and panties (sorry, blog-type friends lol). On the left is me in January at my 21st birthday (just about the starting point of all of this) and on the right is me about 2 months and 20 pounds ago. I don't have a decent mirror to do a during picture right this very moment, but just subtract 20 more pounds from the girl on the right and you have an idea :)

This is a more recent picture. Left: January 8, 2012, Right: June 1,  2012