145 pounds down and holding

WRLemmon

I started on my weight loss a little over two years ago. I had hit an all-time high of 325 pounds, and my doctor was asking me about funeral arrangements. I was taking several medications for hypertension and high blood pressure and another for cholesterol. I tried doing it on my own, with little success, over about 6 months I managed to go from 325 down to 280, but then saw myself going back up. Finally realized, it was time for some professional help. Made an appointment with a nutritionist, first one I saw as sort of helpful but was more about handing me some paper work and telling me to try and follow the guidelines they contained. It really did not provide the help I needed, went and saw a different nutritionist, who made a world of difference. Long talks about how to eat better tailored to me and my lifestyle, and an understanding that a diet was a sure fire way to gain weight more than loose it approach. I had to adopt a new life style, not just a temporary one, but one I could and had to learn to live with for the rest of my life. One of my hardest things was trying to learn to eat three balanced meals a day, rather I felt like it or not. To be honest before and most of my life I always skipped breakfast, and sometimes lunch ate a big dinner and then snacked until I went to bed. Then once I got the eating part headed in the right direction I figured it was time to get in shape, so off to the gym. Went for about two months, felt tired and worn out after each trip, but did not seem to be making much progress. I was averaging about 3 pounds a month at best, but figured that I could do better. So I finally broke down and talked to a personnel trainer that understood that I did not want to bulk up, just build and retain during my weight loss. She reviewed my work out that I had been doing for the past two months and more or less told me that that was not going to help me lose weight, just make me sore and tired. I had the right idea just the wrong approach. After getting me to switch from doing my cardio work out first to doing strength training first, then breaking my workup out over the week, working on specific parts each day, I noticed that after about a month I was not losing any weight. Went back to my nutritionist who asked me ok you have not lost any weight but how many inches off your waist have you lost, as your clothes don’t really fit very well. She when went on to explain that I was starting to loose fat but build muscle and the muscle weighed more that fat. Then she told me to just keep on and I would see a change soon. She was right started to drop an average of four pounds a week instead of a month. It has been two years now and I have lost a total of 145 pounds and have my weight at about 180 pounds give or take a few each week. I have been using Fitness pal since the first visit to the nutritionist and can say that it was worked very well for me. I use it more like a tally sheet, and have learned to balance each meal to provide proper nutrition thru out the day. I don’t count my exercise calories as a plus, in fact I have learned to divide any calories gained thru exercise by 100 and use that number. So if I do a two hour bike ride on the weekend, and burn 2200 calories, I show that I really only burned 22. This seems to have worked very well, and so far I’ve not had any issues doing it. The only real down side to this was that I had to pack up my entire closet full of clothes, drop them off at goodwill and go and buy all new clothes that fit the new me. I think in summing this up if you are serious about losing the weight and getting in shape, and you are having a hard time at it seek help from a professional that you can work with. You can do it but you have to understand the be willing to accept that this is not a temporary thing and that you can go back to how you were once you lose the weight, rather this is a new lifestyle and that this is how it has to be from now on.

vegan4lyfe2012

What an awesome testimony to your determination! Saying "Awesome job" just isn't enough! Congrats to you and all your hard work!

Um12tlwr

Massive congratulations! A very impressive story