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Before: 256 lbs
After: 149 lbs

Leanna Reiling, a 32-year-old project manager from Beaverton, Oregon, rarely ate fresh fruits and veggies as a teen, preferring comfort foods like cheeseburgers and beef stroganoff. As she entered her 20s, her waistline only grew. “It was a downward spiral,” she says. After a long day on the job, she’d plop onto the couch with a bowl of cheesy pasta and watch TV until she fell asleep. By age 29, Leanna, at 5’0?, weighed over 250 pounds.

The Change
Leanna’s mother died at age 47 due to complications from obesity. Leanna was devastated and feared she’d face the same fate if she continued her ways. But it was only after she gave birth to her son in April 2011 that her diet and exercise routine got a real kick-start. As Leanna sat with her infant son watching an episode of Extreme Weight Loss, she cried as she related to the overweight women on the show. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was bound to miss out on important moments in her son’s life. “I just looked at him and thought, It’s time,” she says.

The Lifestyle
Instead of deleting entire food groups, Leanna paid attention to portions and measured what she ate. She also bought an elliptical machine and logged 15 minutes of cardio each day. “I tried strength circuits I found online, too,” she says. “I fell in love with kettlebells!” It took her about a year to shed 50 pounds, but once she got under the 200-pound mark, there was no going back. Leanna hit the kitchen to whip up breakfast smoothies and healthy salad dressings. She starting walking and then—slowly—running outside. “You could hardly call it a run back then,” she says. By January 2013, she’d lost another 25 pounds. She upped her speed and distance each week and soon found herself cruising through sub-eight-minute miles. When her weight loss plateaued, she changed up her routine with calorie-torching hot yoga or a cycling class. By July 2013, Leanna’s total pounds lost hit the triple digits.

The Reward
“I celebrated losing 100 pounds with designer jeans—in a size 4!” says Leanna. She loves her new body, but what she loves even more is challenging it in races—to date, Leanna has run more than 20. “It’s such an amazing release,” she says. Now she likes to run up tough hills while pushing her son in a stroller. “I did all of this for me and my son,” she says.

Leanna’s Tips
See it. “I update a vision board every month with motivational quotes and pictures from magazines [including this very page!]. It helps me stay focused on my dreams.”
Know your shape. “I’ll always be heavier on the bottom. I just do more squats and lunges so it’s shaped nicely.”
Read before you eat. “Sometimes I reach for a convenience-store muffin, but then I look at the calorie count, and it deters me from doing something I’d regret later.”

More from Women’s Health:
I Overhauled My Eating Habits and Lost More Than 150 Pounds
10 Alternatives for Healthy Weight-Loss Foods You Hate
9 Weight-Loss Tips for Crazy-Busy People