How Many Days Does It Take?

alisiaendris

I will be 32 years old at the end of July. I have birthed 2 beautiful children and have the body changes to prove it. I cannot blame my weight issues on any of that though. I struggled with my weight since I was a pre-teen. Favoring sedentary activities and a poor childhood diet started my on the road to obesity. I got to the point where I hated my body so much that I would do anything to lose weight. I became anorexic in college. The harder I was on my body, the sicker I got, the harder I pushed myself to lose more. I went from 210 to 115 pounds in less than 6 months. I turned things around when I met my husband and it dawned on me that if I continued on this road, I would die before I got to know this wonderful man I would later marry. I slowly gained the weight back until I was at 209 pounds. The difference was that I was ok with it. I had learned to love my body regardless of its size. About this time my doctor had the health talk with me. "Do you want to live to see your kids graduate?" I cried, went home, and looked in the mirror. Of course I wanted to see my kids graduate. I had to make a change, but I was so afraid of returning to anorexia. I set up some support with friends and lost 7 pounds in a month. Then I found MFP. I decided to give it a try and never looked back. I have lost nearly 80 pounds. I did the first 70 in 7 months time. I did it the healthy way! No starving myself. I made good food choices and found exercises I liked (some I may even love!). I have been maintaining the last 3 months. I feel healthy, I have more energy, my vitals are great, I am no longer considered pre-diabetic, and I still LOVE my body (maybe even more now that there is less of me to love). I am so proud of what I have achieved both mentally and physically. MFP has helped me get here. It has helped me understand what my body needs and why. I will never go back to obesity again. Thank you MFP and ALL the supporters on here.

Hanfordrose

I will be 32 years old at the end of July. I have birthed 2 beautiful children and have the body changes to prove it.
...I turned things around when I met my husband and it dawned on me that if I continued on this road, I would die before I got to know this wonderful man I would later marry.
...I did the first 70 in 7 months time. I did it the healthy way! No starving myself. I made good food choices and found exercises I liked (some I may even love!). I have been maintaining the last 3 months.
...I feel healthy, I have more energy, my vitals are great, I am no longer considered pre-diabetic,
...and I still LOVE my body (maybe even more now that there is less of me to love). I am so proud of what I have achieved both mentally and physically. MFP has helped me get here. It has helped me understand what my body needs and why. I will never go back to obesity again. Thank you MFP and ALL the supporters on here.

This is a real success story, and you have all the best rewards acknowledged. You will be a blessing to your children, your hubbie and your MFP friends for years to come. Thanks for sharing, Sis.

deksgrl

I joined here November 15, 2011. 608 days. 1 year, 8 months.

I wasn't really happy about my weight, or how my clothes were fitting. It was past the time where I should have bought the next size up, I was bulging out of my jeans and they were becoming soooo uncomfortable, but I refused to buy the bigger size. I didn't really have any plan to lose weight the weight, but I looked at this site when I saw someone mention it in another forum I frequented. My weight has gone up and down +/- 35 pounds through the years so I knew I could do it, but getting older, it seems to be a little harder.

So, my first day logging I had McDonalds for breakfast, 700 calories. Lunch was a 300 calorie "cup o sodium" soup cup out of the vending machine. Dinner was a normal 3 course dinner with fish so that only came in at 580 calories. Plus 400 calories afternoon vending machine snacks because the soup cup didn't go far. I didn't feel like I was eating very much, but as you can see, it was high cals for small volume of food.

I started changing my food habits and that helped. But I never liked to exercise. I liked to do fun things involving movement, but not if it was specifically for the purpose of exercise or typically called exercise. But with a full time job, and a lot of responsibilities with a volunteer organization, who has time for "play"? Gradually I started adding exercise in. This was harder for me than the eating, overcoming my mental blocks about exercise.

Eventually my goals changed, the actual number on the scale became less important to me and I started to focus on size and lowering body fat % instead. 5 months ago I started lifting heavy weights to try to reach that lower body fat % goal. Since I am rapidly approaching menopause, now I am more concerned about preserving lean body mass and strength so I can still ride my Harley in my 70's.

How many days does it take? It will take me the rest of my life to keep strong and healthy, and finally I'm okay with that. No more "I'm there now so I can stop".

MasterKat

"Today, I am 68 years, 5 months and 7 days old. That is 24,994 days of life. It has only taken me a brief 233 days to lose 57.5 pounds; but it has taken me a lifetime to love myself like I do now. "

This I love! Looking at it this way.... wow I have been over weight for 5,123 (+/-) days out of my 12,468 days on this earth. How short of a time will it take me to lose this weight? No one knows. I'm shooting for another 105 days. That's nothing comparing it to 5,123 days!

Lalasharni

Firstly, let me congratulate you on your outstanding achievement. You are a credit to and a motivation to everyone here.
I too am in my 60's - 65 to be exact. I too have been "chubby" for most of my life.
When I was 62, my doctor finally gave in and let me have knee surgery at 260 lbs. It wasn't ideal and he told me that I would probably wear it out prematurely because of my weight, but I was in such pain with a totally collapsed knee that there was no real alternative, other than to dump me into a wheelchair and forget about me.
So I had the surgery, which was painful, but successful. In January this year, I came to the sudden conclusion that I HAD to do something about my weight, otherwise, revision surgery was on the near horizon, and that's when I joined MFP. I have lost nearly 70 lbs since then and I now work out regularly and have just joined a gym, as well as taking up Nordic Walking. My trainer says that I will get stronger and fitter, and as my weight decreases, the knee will have more chance of lasting its prescribed 15 years.
So yes - I identify with everything you have posted here. It IS worth it, and it WILL happen, so long as you commit, exercise and take full advantage of the tremendous support on this site.

Good luck on your journey, and I hope that the new knee(s) are successful for you as they have been for me.

wideeyedla

Why are you reposting your blog entries on the regular forums? I appreciate your blogs, but why? Do you really need to reach out to everyone?

I am glad she did
Might not have met her otherwise, or been inspired on an unhappy scale day:noway: