A verbose first post

Hello from Korea!

When Natalie first started on this journey, I remember how excited I was for her, but at the time I just didn't feel like it was for me. I'm a fairly stubborn person, and it takes me a lot of time to make up my mind about something.

There has been a lot of change in my life since adolescence, but throughout it all there have remained two constants: The first one is my overweight build. I can't even remember ever being a normal size. I don't ever think I was under 200 pounds in high school. Some of my earliest memories throughout elementary school were of being ridiculed for my size. The second constant has been the state of being on a diet. Another memory I don't have is of ever feeling like I could eat anything I wanted. However, this didn't stop me.

At my heaviest, 329 pounds, almost three years ago, was when I made a vow to myself to embrace a healthier lifestyle. I joined a gym, stopped eating so much, stopped drinking so much beer, and discovered I had a thyroid problem. Within a year I had dropped about forty pounds and developed a little more self-esteem. However, after I lost my motivation, I gained a little weight back as I moved to another city to finish school and started drinking more.

When I regained my motivation, I lost everything I had gained back plus about ten more. I lost the motivation again, and then, more recently, in the months before I moved to Korea, I hired a personal trainer and lost about twenty more.

My first couple of months here in Korea were difficult. Initially losing weight from all of the walking and the healthy cuisine, once I moved to my new apartment, I began to frequent the nearby bakery in order to help assuage my feelings of loneliness. Finally, I had to snap myself out of it. Here I am, 27 years old, and have never even fit into a size 12. Size 12 has always been my goal. There's always been something magical about it. My first goal is to be healthier. My second goal is to fit into a 12, which losing fifty pounds should accomplish...but don't worry, I don't plan on stopping there. For the record, I was wearing a 2o when I came to Korea, and a friend of mine who is leaving was giving away most of her clothes, and I am now wearing her size 16 trousers. So I'm close!

So, here I am...I have joined a local gym which specializes in quick bursts of exercise and weight lifting in order to pump up the fat burning. I spend the weekends hiking or exploring new neighborhoods, so I stay quite active. Each workout at the new gym, I feel like I'm going to die, but it is amazing how much stronger I am getting, and I love they way that feels. I've been going for about a month now and have dropped a few pounds, so I wish I had started the 50 in 50 challenge earlier, but there's no time like the present.

I have been quite active over the past several years, so I know that my main problem is my calorie intake, so I am taking control by writing down everything that I eat.

I weighed myself at the gym yesterday and I am 107.5 kg (damn metric system,) so that equals out to a starting weight of about 237 pounds...I can't believe I'm posting this in the internet. My initial goal is to go for the 50 in 50. I know I need to lose more than that, but I want to start off with 50 and see where it takes me.

Here I go!