I am a 27 year old female from Canada.

For most of my life, I was underweight. I was born premature. It took me until the age of 16 to reach 100 lbs. I am short (5 ft. 2), so when I gained a few more pounds over the next few years and reached 110 lbs, that was about perfect for me.

I maintained that weight for a long time. Then, slowly the weight started to creep on. I moved in with my boyfriend's family, who love to eat out, order pizza, and just plain love to ...

I am a 27 year old female from Canada.

For most of my life, I was underweight. I was born premature. It took me until the age of 16 to reach 100 lbs. I am short (5 ft. 2), so when I gained a few more pounds over the next few years and reached 110 lbs, that was about perfect for me.

I maintained that weight for a long time. Then, slowly the weight started to creep on. I moved in with my boyfriend's family, who love to eat out, order pizza, and just plain love to eat! That, combined with stress, really packed on the pounds. I used to be able to keep a chocolate bar on my desk for at least a week, eating a small piece daily......now...YEAH RIGHT! I'm lucky if I can make it last 10 minutes. I found myself becoming a stress eater and basically just eating whatever I want, whenever I want. Over about 3 years, I put on 50 lbs. It feels SO foreign to me, as I have never had excess weight on me before.

Finally, my doctor said something. And I am SO glad that she did. I have been working on losing weight since June 2010, and although it has been a slow process with lots of bumps, I have lost 20 lbs! I have 30 more to go. My doctor and a dietician I saw both think 110 lbs is a good weight for me. I felt just right at that weight.

I have been working hard on my eating - I weigh and measure, I read labels, I track on SP, and I try to make healthy choices. I'm really proud of my exercise efforts. I exercise 5-6 days per week. I do strength training 3x/week and cardio 5-6x/week. I enjoy doing Leslie Sansone's Walk at Home DVDs and Turbo Jam for cardio, and Jari Love or Jillian Michaels for strength. I am always excited to try new DVDs too.

I feel SO much better...I can't wait to see what the next 20 + lbs of loss will bring!