Just curious what did it for you ? My thing is how I feel I am tired and snappy all the time and very uncomfortable

Michelle, I felt snappy and uncomfortable too. I would try to do things with my family and was always the first to want to go back to the car. I felt too like since I was fat I had to "overcompensate" in other ways. My house had to be MORE than clean, my make-up had to be done flawlessly, my kids had to be the best-dressed and I had to donate more time, money and energy than anyone else around me. It clearly WASN'T working. I looked to my inside and started taking care of me. I wanted to lose the weight yes, but I wanted to make good choices for a healthier life first and foremost. I wanted (for a change) to make it all about ME.

For me, I just wanted to look as good on the outside as I felt on the inside. It is so nice not to have all those little aches and pains now, and have so much more energy. And to look better!

I have told this story before in a more detailed version, but I can't find it, So I'll give you a shortened version of it.

One day I had the worst panic attack I had ever had and I thought I was having a stroke and was very sure I was going to die right then and there. The thought of the local mortician making fun of my huge obese body and needing to call in extra help to prepare me for burial was the straw that broke the camels back. (Seriously) Many thoughts ran through my head regarding my death. I know it sounds morbid, and it is, but it is all it took to turn on that magic switch in my brain. I am forever grateful for that panic attack.

I was 22 and broke my ankle. I lived alone and had surgery and was stuck on my couch. I knew that that was the turning point. I was either going to quicken the pace on my current path of gaining weight or I was going to figure it out once and for all and lose weight. So I did. I hit the point where I had simply had enough.

You've had great success and you look great! Thanks for being yet another inspiration for me!

I used to be a dancer. I haven't danced in over a decade, and I miss it terribly. Plus, I'm getting older (I'm 36), and my body is starting to feel like it now. I want to be able to dance again, even if it's just for fun rather than for a career. And, I want to be able to look in the mirror and actually like what I see.

For me, there was no epiphany. There was no attitude shift, I've been trying desperately most of my life to lose weight. I care much less about weight loss now than I ever have in my life. Finally I got tired of the desperation, and the fact that dieting essentially only ever made me fatter (when I stopped dieting, I stopped gaining weight - and I wish I had never been put on a diet when I was 5. Maybe if I'd never dieted, I would have never been morbidly obese - I will never know that for sure).

It was an accident that gave me hope. My husband lost his job, I became unable to work and we moved to a cheaper area of the country. At my first checkup several months after we moved, I learned that I had lost 20 lbs. I've never in my life lost weight without trying so I started wondering if there were other ways that I could change the environment, rather than changing me. Maybe there was nothing wrong with me, maybe it was things outside of me that were the problem - and with a lot of trial and error I found that to be true.

By changing my birth control and switching to a low carb diet, I learned that I cannot eat simple and short chain carbohydrates - sugars and starchy food (even if they're "healthy" ones) without becoming extremely hungry for more carbs. Very low carb diets aren't for me, and I'm still struggling with finding the "right" carb level and avoiding the most addictive carbs. I keep trying to convince myself that I can eat a little piece of chocolate without overeating the rest of the day (and I keep proving myself wrong). Still, even making a lot of mistakes the weight is coming off slowly, but with virtually none of the effort I associate with weight loss in the past (which is good, because I don't have the patience or energy for that kind of stress anymore).

My motivation, determination, and willingness to make sacrifices is at it's lowest point ever in my life. I wish that instead of trying to change and blaming myself most of my life, I would have looked for the factors outside of myself that I needed to change. As it turns out, all I needed was two tools that I wasn't aware of (or hadn't been able to convince doctors to allow me access to). 1. stacking the bc, and 2. the low carb diet.

If I'd had those tools in my early 20's, when I weighed about 250, I think I would have soon reached a healthy weight or at the very least saved me the next nearly 150 lbs.

I in all honesty don't even know. It was the most strange thing to ever happen to me. I have tried this over and over in the past and every time failed. It was literally like one day I woke up and had all the motivation in the world, said this has got to stop, I vow to never give up or let myself fail and theres no going back.

It sounds extremly cheesy but it was almost like a first day of the rest of your life type thing.

another thing that happened to me was i just realized i was way to young to hate myself for the rest of my life. im a married housewife, business owner, mom of 3 but im 22 dang it! i want to live life to the fullest and be totally happy with myself- inside and out.

Thank you for making my day

One day last summer I said, "This is not my body." It was the weirdest feeling, like I was in a sci-fi movie where I woke up inside someone else's body. And I was just ready to do what I had to in order to make changes!

For me it was moving to Portland, OR after a very unhealthy few years in TX and NY, and deciding that I was going to tie the new city to a new lifestyle in my head. So where "living in Dallas" meant "driving everywhere and eating fries with every meal" to me, "living in Portland" means "walking everywhere and keeping track of calories". That's just how it is there, no arguing with it.

In the bigger picture, though, it was realizing that I'm finally feeling ready to start a family with my husband, something he's been looking forward to for years.... and that I was running out of time to make myself a healthy person before that happens.