My body serves as several reminders and stories of my life. Not all of them are good. But they are important, and they are part of what makes me, me.

One of the stories my body tells is the story of my children. Like many woman, my body holds the proof of children including tiger stripes and mommy pouch. However, for me it holds a bit more of a story from my daughter.

In 2011, a couple months into being engaged, Eric and I found out I was pregnant with Raelee. Both of us were excited, nervous, but excited. A couple months in, I started gaining weight, and I mean REALLY gaining weight. This made not sense to me as what I craved was salads, not "junk food". So I started to question my OB when I went in. This led to numerous glucose testing which always came back negative and clear of any problems, including gestational diabetes. I was confused, and quite unhappy. I had finally gotten to a weight I was happy with pre-pregnancy and now I was gaining like crazy. Over the next several months I ended up going from a very content 150lbs to over 300 lbs! Gaining over 150 lbs that no one could tell me why, only saying that it was hormonal and happens to some women. I was upset but I had a beautiful daughter. In the following 6 years I tried everything to get back to pre-baby body. I worked out for a year 3-4 days a week at the Y, I tried nutrisystem, Dr. put me on diet pills.... nothing, and I mean NOTHING worked. Then a friend of mine mentioned gastric sleeve. At this point I was ready to jump all in. I talked with hubby and explained my thoughts and concerns, which brought us to talking about baby #2. Up till this point due to Raelee's labor, we had said no more kiddos. However, I knew Eric always wanted two kiddos and I wasn't supper apposed to giving Raelee a brother or sister. I just hoped for a better pregnancy and labor then Raelee.

In Jan of 2017 we decided we were going to try for baby #2, and after I would look into what I needed to do to get fit again. That Mother's day we happily announced we were pregnant with Gage and on January 4th he made his way, rather easily into this world (thank god, lol). With Gage's pregnancy I worried about gaining even more weight as I was already at 290-300 lbs and the last thing I wanted was more weight. I feared for my health and wanted to be sure I would be around to see my children grow. So, 2 months later, after Gage arrived into the world I looked into Gastric Sleeve and started the 6 month process to getting healthy.

August of 2018 I had surgery, and months later I went from my "starting weight" of 288lbs to 180 lbs by May 3rd of 2019. I had lost 100lbs and was still loosing. Today, I went from a size 26-28 to a size 8-10!

Through this whole story, I gained a lot of loose skin, stretch marks from gaining and then loosing all the weight, a apron from my mommy pouch, as well as scars from my surgery . Where the stretch marks and scars don't bug me, I do worry about some of the other places. However, this is my body, my story, and I love it. I wouldn't have two amazing children without it.

What stories does your body tell?