3 Fat Chicks on a Diet Weight Loss Community - I finally made it!!! 182 down with pics and a little about my journey:)

Thanks so much for the support. I have removed the images I posted because I heard that people are stealing others weightloss before and afters and sharing other places...

I am officially going to say that I have reached my goal. I just weighed 198 on the scale (I am 6'2" so my BMI is 25.4). I am content for now with maintaining and seeing if this is where my body wants to be. I am so excited!!! I just had to share these pics I took today in my "fat pants"!! I can't believe how far I have come! Yay!! Thank you all for all of your support over the past year. It has been such an amazing support system for me! Good luck to everyone else on reaching your goals too!

PS. A little about my journey. I looked into surgery last spring and realized that I would not be covered by insurance. I then decided to just take the plunge and do it without the surgery. I calorie counted the whole way down. I have found that my struggle with my weight has been one of the most frustrating things that I have dealt with thus far in life. I definitely faced many days throughout my weight-loss journey that I wanted to give up. I think the beginning is the absolute hardest part. For me, I had so much weight to lose that it actually took about 50 lbs before anyone really noticed and before I went down in sizes. That was very disheartening. I kept it up every day, however, because I knew that if I didn't my health problems would just get worse and worse. I was dealing with high blood pressure and had severe sleep apnea. I woke up every morning with a headache because I had stopped breathing so many times during the night. I didn't yet have diabetes, but my father has it. I knew that it was just a matter of time before I started suffering with that as well. After I lost the first 20 lbs, I started to notice a difference in my energy levels. That gave me another little push. I then got to 50 lbs lost and people started to make comments and noticed the weight loss. Also, I was finally able to get some smaller clothes (just one size smaller but that was still a great incentive). I set some mini goals for myself and made sure to reward myself with non-food rewards as I met those goals (10 lbs lost, 10% lost, 50 lbs down,100 lbs down, 150 lbs down etc.). For every 10 lbs I lost I gave myself a little reward as well. I found that celebrating the little losses helped keep me motivated and alleviated some of the pressure I felt over the massive amount of weight I had to lose. I knew that I couldn't lose 180 lbs, but I COULD lose 10 lbs 18 times. :) Breaking it up into those smaller increments made it much, much more manageable. When I reached the point where I had lost more weight than I still had to lose, I was super excited! I had done it once and I could do it again. As I neared the completion of my weight-loss the changes came much quicker. 5 lbs lost in the end made as big of a difference in my appearance and in the way my clothes fit as 30-40 lbs made in the beginning. I have now lost 182 lbs. It is kind of crazy knowing that I am done! I started this journey last July and stuck to my plan super strictly. It has NOT been fun or easy at all, but it has all been worth it. I have never had a healthy relationship with food. It feels great to finally know that I am eating for my health and am eating in a life giving way. When I started a year ago I found this quote and put it up in my room, "A year from now you'll be glad you started today." I can honestly say that I am SO happy that I finally started a year ago. My life is so different today. I feel more confident and so much happier in my own skin.