One Year Later!

July 7th, 2014 marks one year when I decided I had enough of being fat - I was tired of being tired... didn't want chest pains anymore.  I wanted to feel healthy again.  I had a goal - #BikiniBy30.  It wasn't a desire to be a gorgeous beach babe in a bikini... but a bikini to me would mean "health."  It would mean I made better choices in my life.  It wasn't how I would look (well, ok, maybe I wanted to look better - who doesn't... but the main thing was that it would mean I took control of my life.)  What a year it has been.  I am down 35.5 pounds in one year! I ran two 5ks! I wobbled a little a few pounds but I am still on the downward spiral!

Started at 240... now down to 204.5!

The next few pictures are a little off because I started weighing in on the Publix Higi machine in August but here are the "official" computer results:

My weight loss - you can see where I plateaued a few times (mainly around Thanksgiving/Christmas... then went up a little when I started having some dinner dates - the old saying is true - when you start dating somebody, you gain weight! Never again (will I gain when dating lol.) This is probably my favorite graph of all time lol

BMI - still "obese" but closer to "overweight" 

Blood pressure... it is usually always normal.

Pulse - all over the place

Transformation! WAHOO!!!

I have purchased my bikini top - in a size 12!  It is a gorgeous coral color.  I saw it in Bealls in the fall.. and it was on sale this weekend so I went and snagged it up before it was sold out (like the bottoms were :(  )  Now I am working on getting my white belly tanned up so that it will be ready for public beaches sometime in my 30th year :)  Going to keep fighting!  Thank you to all who have asked me what was up when they had not seen an update in a while!  Thank you to all who have messaged me to ask what I was doing and wanted my help.  I'm glad I could help give you some advice on your journey.  Please don't hesitate to ask or if you need a little bump in motivation!  YOU CAN DO THIS!!!

"No matter how slow you go, you are still lapping everybody on the couch." - Unknown

Dating and Purging

I am now down 36 pounds, in a size 14 and had an amazing, hot date last week! OW OWWWW!  Many of you know that I have been "online dating" - but not seriously.  I have had profiles up for years because it is pretty comical the messages I get - like disgusting comical.  I post all the great ones on my Instagram.  Anywho, so I don't want to get too far into it, only because it's new and I don't want to get my hopes up... but the date was great and he told me how pretty and cute I was and how attracted to me he was (this was a 6 hour date, by the way... after 3 weeks of messaging/texting/one phone call.)  I play it off to be confident... but I'm getting used to the "new me."  I wonder in the back of my head "Is he really attracted to me? Am I good looking? Is my body attractive? Or is he after one thing?"   Right now I am getting close to how I looked in college - where men did hit on me - so I'm thinking maybe this is for real.  It is hard to tell - and I'm not going to let my curious mind show what is going on in the back of my head.  I just enjoy the compliments and the PDA - yes, PDA!!  Here I am, with this ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS man walking hand-in-hand, arm-in-arm, little kisses in a very popular place in town and I AM LOVING IT.  Like he is showing me off and not afraid to show people who he is out with.  (Seriously, his online pics do not do him justice - even my guy friends were with me when we met the first time and had a man crush on him that they admitted to me later haha... so I got their approval.)  Actually, now that I'm thinking about it - this may be the first real PDA I've had.  With other guys, it was private.  Newbie and I were walking down the street and we would look at each other and smile and he would say, "We just had a moment"  and "We just had another moment."  -- talk about making a girl melt holy moly!  There is your little tidbit about my date - hoping for another one soon... which better happen.  We're still talking so there is hope lol.

Here are some updated pics!  The first one is with my friend Bryan back in July 2012 - YIKES.  I actually just sold that dress this week!

Bryan and me, July 2012

March 20, 2014

This was the dress I ended up wearing for me and newbie's first date! Speaking of clothes - a few weeks ago I had a little bit of an emotional/anxiety moment.  I went to try on some clothes from my bags of "skinny clothes" and one after one, they were fitting.  I had a pile on my bed of all these new clothes that fit me and I had no idea where to put them.  I left them on the floor... managed to find spaces for a few of them... until yesterday.  I finally got the urge to go through my drawers and put clothes that were too big in a garbage bag to sell.  Filled the bag to the tippity top and took it right away to Clothes Mentor and sold 6 items.  Made $19.40.  I just had anxiety over getting rid of these bigger clothes thinking one day I would need them again.  I finally said NO, I AM DONE WITH THESE.  It was a huge step. HUGE step for me to do this.  A friend at school told me to keep them for when I get preggo one day... I just don't want to see them again... though It was a good idea but NO that leaves it there for me to fall back so I couldn't.  BOO YAAAAA.  

Hope to have another update soon!  Keep working hard my friends!  THIS IS POSSIBLE!!!!!!!  AND I'M 14 POUNDS AWAY FROM MY HALFWAY POINT! YEEEEEEEEEEAH BOOOOOOOOOOYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!

OH OH OH! BEFORE I FORGET!!!  I DID MY 2ND 5K LAST WEEKEND!!!!!!!!!!  Didn't take it seriously - went with a group of friends.  It was the Color Vibe 5k and we walked a lot of it and talked - but we did jog a nice bit of it, too!  Two 5ks down!!! 

March 22, 2014

"Eating crappy food isn't a reward -- it's a punishment." -- Drew Carey