In 1996 I moved back to Pennsylvania after finishing my degree at Augsburg College in Minneapolis. I grew up in Minnesota and lived there until 1991 when the wrong husband and I moved to Clarion, PA. We were divorced in 1994 and that's when I hooked up with the guy I told you about in the Photos 1991-1994 page. In 1996 I met the right husband and we're still married today.

This photo is when my sister and I graduated from Augsburg. It was a pretty proud day for us and especially for our parents. Can you tell I had a MAJOR hangover in this photo? My other sister, Debbie, made me drink lots of wine the night before (OK, so she didn't have to twist my arm). I think I pulled it off well the next day. I weighed 190 pounds here. This was a few months after the awful, terrible, don't-wish-the-pain-on-my-worst-enemy breakup with before-mentioned younger man. The weight gain was due to many reasons, partly the booze, partly the food, and partly a physical reason that I cannot disclose here. Just trust me.

When I met the right husband after I moved back to PA in 1996, we started dating and gee, he wasn't an asshole! This is me at the first party he took me to so I could meet his friends. I weighed 175-180 here. I lost some weight, not intentionally, when I got back to PA. It probably had something to do with the fact that I had a job that paid me only $13,000 a year - I was a journalist for our local paper and they paid crap because we weren't union. Raising two teenagers on that salary ain't easy, folks.

And then we got engaged in June 1998. We used this photo from our trip with my girls to Niagara Falls in May to put the announcement in the paper. Heck, I worked there so why not put my mug in there, too? I weighed a little more than I did in the other photo, about 185. The extra pounds really didn't bother me yet. I was finally happy again, Larry was awesome and life was good. I know, I know, I should've watched those pounds.

We got married in October 1998, 5 months after that last photo was taken. I had gained another 10 pounds or so. I weighed between 190-200. I wasn't weighing myself at that time so that's a guess. I was starting to feel the effects - sluggish, tired, and I didn't like how I looked. I HATED feeling self-conscious. I had really low self-esteem at that time anyway (still recovering from that breakup actually, but it took me years to figure all that out). But we had a really lovely wedding and a totally blow-out party afterwards. People still talk about it.

Doesn't he have the prettiest eyes? I just love that man. He had already changed out of his suit by that time, so don't get the idea he got married in a flannel shirt. We might live in Podunkville, but we aren't too redneck.