Samantha Reese had always struggled with her weight. When she became pregnant at 15 years old, she became even more conscious of how big she was compared with other girls her age.

"I was around a size 18 and weighed almost 210 pounds by the age of 18," the now mother of two tells The Sun. "I hated my body and couldn't pull off the extra weight because I was so petite. But feeling miserable about the way I looked only made me want to eat more."

For years, Reese tried to ignore the situation, and for a while, she did so with success. According to Redbook, her diet revolved around pieces of toast with butter in the morning, chocolate, grilled cheese sandwiches with chips, greasy pizza, and soda or tea with sugar and milk. It was only when she stepped on a scale and discovered that she was morbidly obese did she realize how serious her condition was.

At first, Reese relied on quick-fix diet pills to lose the excess weight, but when that didn't work, she opted to change her whole lifestyle. One of the things she gave up was her love for sugary teas, trading them for unsweetened green ones instead.

Every day, Reese would drink one cup per hour, which totaled to 9 in all. Within a month, she lost nearly 15 pounds. "Obviously I'd been eating well and cutting out my milky teas had probably helped, but my metabolism must have sped up too and I was certainly snacking less," Reese reports. "I was amazed."

But just how effective is drinking green tea? According to Katherine Zeratsky, R.D.N., L.D., an instructor of nutrition at Mayo Clinic, green tea may have boosted Reese's metabolism, but what probably really helped with her weight loss was her low calorie intake.

Still, cheers to the mom of two for switching to a healthier lifestyle. Currently, she's down to 130 pounds, looking better than ever. "Now my cups of green tea get me through the day," she says. "For me, it's not a fad, it's a lifestyle."

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