Post-baby #3 Weight Loss (2009)

Gabe was born on 1/22/09.  I gained 40 pounds during that pregnancy.  I was up to 220 pounds when he was born.  After Gabe was born, I REALLY wanted to get back into the game.  I actually started too quickly with working out (what harm could an exercise bike really do?), and I ended up being VERY sore in the ab region.  I guess there's a reason you're supposed to wait 6 weeks for exercise.  Oops. 
On March 19, I was down to 200 pounds.  By June 2009, I was down to 182 pounds, which was when I had my 10 year class reunion.  I was only up 22 pounds from my high school weight.  Not bad considering my heaviest was a lot more than that.  I was doing videos mostly at that time, and I used the 30 Day Shred for the first time. I think I lost 6 inches that month.

In June I decided I wanted to try something new, something I always envisioned myself doing...running.  I started out walking a few minutes then running a minute or two here and there.  I brought a pen along with me so I could write down my progress on my arm every run.  I would get back to my house and tell Pat how long I'd run.  The number kept going up for running and down for walking.  (Let me note here that it's important to have running shoes...new...to do this.)
Finally, one day in early August, I decided to just see how far I could run straight through.  To my surprise I made it 30 or so minutes.  Yeah!  I just kept adding time.  My friend, who'd run a marathon, convinced me to run an organized 5K race with her at the end of November.  That was motivation!
I remember my longest run up to that point being 5 miles in 55 minutes.  It was on Halloween.  It was cold and windy and difficult, but I did it!  I eventually got down to about  a 9-9:30 minute mile before my race.

(see next post for my race info)

I got down to 170 or so before school started this year, but here's a picture at the start of summer 2009.  I was about 180-185.