Women 200lb+, Let's Amaze Ourselves This April!!!
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Readjust
Got on the scale today and put two feet flat. I know I can have a habit of " the lean", not sure if anyone else can relate. But in the spirit of transparency and accountability need to readjust to 213.6 not 209.8.
Psychologically the little tilt helps me see a number that I feel good about however in the long run doesn't normalize this process that is so much healthier. Was hoping to be down to 205 by May 1 but will be happy if I reach 208
Does anyone else do "the lean"?
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@VickyEltonGreen Er, no. I crave accurate data, so however bad I fear it might be, I'm straight up the whole way. Same reason for logging accurately, really - it's all about the numbers. But then, I only weigh once a week.3
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Arralethe, thanks for the reply. I am accurate about the logging of the food and exercise. Think the scale has been more mentally challenging, probably from 50 years of unhealthy focus on weight loss. Hopeful last wall to tear down. Excited that this is the year for lasting change. Was glad I was able to adjust it by the 4 pounds. One big step forward.7
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Never consistent overtime with MyFitnessPal before. Want to start to be. I'll weigh myself tomorrow morning and the check in again.7
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@VickyEltonGreen It is indeed a big step. My excuse has always been that I'll weigh myself when I'm actively trying to lose, and avoid the scale whenever I inevitably part ways from my efforts!
My method to break the habit is to lose for 12 week periods at a time, and I'm on my first scheduled break now... BUT I still weighed myself this morning, so big steps for both of us!5 -
I am new here and am only on day 2. My starting weight is 289.2 and I’m 5’2. I’ve always been overweight but have felt much worse since having my first child 10 months ago. I feel like I can’t wear anything but leggings and dresses to work. I want to be healthier so I can have more energy to spend time with my daughter! I’m already feeling discouraged so any advice or encouragement would be great!!11
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@jbutle5 Welcome! This is such a great group! Congratulations on the little one. ❤️ What has you feeling discouraged?1
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@VickyEltonGreen I don’t do the Lean (because my scale is too smart for me) but I do exhale all the air in my lungs before stepping on the scale 😂 I figure as long as I consistently do the same thing every day, my progress is still progress?5
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@misplacedmama I had a hard day at work and it was hard not to turn to eating my stress away. I also have a hectic life and I don’t know how to keep up all of the meal preparations and such. It’s just all overwhelming.7
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@jbutle5 Oh, man! I feel you there. I'm so sorry about the rough day at work.
Is there a certain plan you're following that requires meal prep?
I've tried all sorts of plans over the last decade to lose the pregnancy weight from my youngest (gaining it all back and then some each time), and I've gone into this time with a mindset of (1) losing weight and getting healthy is not a race - it's going to take as long as it will take - and (2) I'm going to do what is sustainable for me for life. (Because what it takes to get there will be pretty much what it takes to stay there.) For me, that's ruled out things like meal prep, eating on a strict regimen, cutting out food groups, or super low calorie. I'm also discovering that as much as I like exercise, I can't go back to spending 2-4 hours in the gym 6 days a week like I was doing before I had my youngest. (Tried it for a couple of weeks, and it just killed me both mentally and physically!)
I'm also actively combating the all-or-nothing mentality that has been undercutting me over the years - the idea that if I don't do things perfectly, I'll fail and all of my previous effort was wasted. I legit took last week off from both exercise and logging food because I hit a wall mentally. Even with my flexible plan, it's still a dramatic change from how I've been living before. It's going to take time to master this new lifestyle. I'm going to have days when it feels like it's too much. It's like learning anything - learning to walk, learning a foreign language, etc. - and I'm going to stumble through it. Eventually, it'll become less and less hard until it no longer feels like I'm battling up Mt. Everest. But again, it's going to take time. I remind myself that so long as I get back up and keep trying, I haven't failed.
One of my new favorite quotes is: "Be patient when becoming someone you haven't been before." (Tanya Markul)
I don't know if any of this helps! But you're definitely among friends here. We've all been there! *hugs*12 -
@misplacedmama what an absolutely amazing post. So true. A resounding YES 👏
What a wonderful way to start my day.
Thank you for sharing💪🏼❤️
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@misplacedmama what a great attitude! I lost 50 lbs using MFP a few years ago and was really gung ho into it. Then life got in the way and I gained back 70 lbs. I went from an all to nothing attitude. It will be nice to get to a place where “this is just my life”. 🙂6
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@misplacedmama I had a hard day at work and it was hard not to turn to eating my stress away. I also have a hectic life and I don’t know how to keep up all of the meal preparations and such. It’s just all overwhelming.
@jbutle5 I completely understand what you are going through (except I went through it pre COVID). It is ROUGH to have a newborn and at 10 months old you feel like you should have a handle on it but they are crawling and almost walking and it just seems worse. It does get better, it truly will. The easiest thing I did to help (I also stress eat) was to increase my water and flavored water, anything sugar and caffeine free, up to 100+ oz. I have a 24oz water bottle that I drink quickly multiple times a day. For me the feeling of a full stomach give me the relaxation (it's not actually the food itself, it's the STUFFED stomach). I still binge eat, like yesterday, but having 24oz of water in my stomach only leaves room for so much food.
You got this and you can make it.5 -
April weight
Name: Jessica
Age: 38
Height: 5' 6"
SW: 238.4 (5/10/16)
GW: 190
April GW: 226
Weight tracking:
Start Apr 1: 235.8
WK 1 Apr 5: 234.9 (-0.9)
WK 2 Apr 12: 231.4 (-3.5)
WK 3 Apr 19:
WK 4 Apr 27:
Finish Apr 30:
April goals:
WK 1 & 2:
- drink 100oz of water a day
- stick to a 16:8 IF schedule (during the weekdays)
- Take two 10 min breaks during work to stretch/yoga
First full week back on MFP. I had a good week, but it was also easier with the kids being at their grandparents (fully vaccinated) for the week. This week is going to be harder. I've decided to stick with the same goals as last week. The worked well for me and since I'm adding the kids back in and now cooking more kids friendly food I figure that is enough of a challenge
In a strange way I missed MFP when on Noom. They don't have groups like this. The community that is here just isn't there. The old chat thred that used to be really active when I lost the weight the first time had gone dead. So Thanks everyone for being here. I feel like I have a new great support group.
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misplacedmama wrote: »One of my new favorite quotes is: "Be patient when becoming someone you haven't been before." (Tanya Markul)
Oh wow, that's a really good way to put it.
I've always been a fat person. I have never had a "normal" BMI as an adult, or even as a kid/teen for that matter. I have no idea what it is like to be a person who is not fat. This journey I'm on now, I'm aiming for 2021 to be the last year that I am the person I've been up to this point, making the kinds of choices that have kept me the way I am for so long. GW for this year is 196lbs, that'll be 52 lbs lost in 52 weeks from January 1, and then the plan is to basically do that again next year. My lowest adult weight was 169lbs, for like five minutes in 2012. In 2022, in going from 196lbs to 144lbs, I will complete my transformation into an entirely new person with new habits, and a new body that will move through the world differently than the one I have now does. I will become someone I haven't been before. I'm not getting my body back, since I never had it to begin with. But, like a caterpillar completely rebuilds itself on a cellular level to become a butterfly, I'm becoming that person. I've always been drawn to butterfly imagery and it just keeps getting more and more apropos.14 -
Totally thinking of this as a whole lifestyle transformation, educating myself on how to eat and exercise but also trying to believe in myself. You see I wasn't always fat, but I believed I was and my dad always told me I was fat so obviously you believe that but in reality I didn't get fat until after the birth of my 4th child when my whole life virtually changed overnight and I had to give up my job. I then got very depressed and the comfort eating went to new levels, every time I was stressed or upset I would eat and because I believed I had always been fat I didn't think the eating could possibly make things worse. I've spent the last few years cutting the toxic people out of my life and I rarely speak to my dad now because he's never happier than when he's putting someone down to make himself feel better. I'm in a much better mindset and I'm learning to control food instead of letting it control me. I'm ready to be the old me again and this time I'm surrounded by positivity and people who lift me up instead of dragging me down. So this is definitely the year of transformation for me where I try to have a positive mental attitude and not to sweat the small stuff. It's taken me a long time to speak up for myself because I've always tried to please other people but now it's time to focus on me for a change and I can't wait to see what this next chapter brings.9
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Name: Marilyn
Age: 68
Height: 5'2
SW: 252 (2016)
CW: 213
GW: 150
I've been here for awhile, but when I hit 252 I got totally serious. In a year and a half I lost 90lbs. Then my mom was diagnosed with cancer. Life took a different turn and I gained again. Long story short, she passed January 24 and I vowed to get it back off again.
I weigh myself daily and keep a monthly tab going. I don't worry about the daily ups and downs since I know that I had too much salt the day before, or I didn't drink enough water, or maybe I didn't have a bowel movement. I only worry what my first and last day of the month read. So far each month has been a loss. Maybe a pound or two, but still a loss. I know I will get there and there is no rush.8 -
@goal06082021 @kelMee2 Oh, wow! Reading your posts was so powerful. Thank you both so much for sharing!
Even though I used to be "fit" before I had my youngest, I'm still working on becoming someone I've never been before. Like @kelMee2 I wasn't fat growing up, but I thought I was. Between growing up in the 80's and 90's where rail-thin super models were worshiped as the ideal all females should attain and my mother and sister being effortlessly very slender, I looked at my naturally athletic build as "fat." After having a few kids, athletic looks started gaining more traction, and I decided that was attainable for me. But here's the thing: my goals were purely aesthically based. I had no concept that these super fit ladies I aspired to be like spent years building their physiques. I had no concept that they did these photoshoots right after a bikini/figure show or that they dieted down for it - that they didn't look that level of "cut" all the time. I tried to follow the strict nutrition of body building gurus like Bill Phillips. (Oh, but I got to have one "cheat" meal a week, so it was totally "flexible"!)
So, I spent hours in the gym (2 to 4, six days a week - because exercise was the super easy, doable part for me) and kept "falling off the wagon" with food. It didn't matter that I was a healthy weight with a healthy body fat percentage (it just wasn't as low as the fitness models). It didn't matter that I could do full push-ups, I could run a 5k, and do a bazillion other things with my healthy body. It didn't matter that I looked nice, had a flat stomach - even after having four kids, then five kids - or that clothes looked great on me. I still wasn't good enough. I have "before" photos from that time for some 12 week challenge I was doing, and you can see how angry I was at myself for still being in such "bad" shape. Yeah, I was "softer" than the super fit ladies in Oxygen magazine, but I looked great! And yet, the horrible things I would say to myself for not meeting this impossible ideal in my head! I even flirted with anorexia on purpose for a time in desperation to drop more "fat." I even once tried to make myself throw-up after eating something "bad." I wept in frustration when it didn't work. (I'm so grateful for the moment, when looking at my daughters, I realized that I couldn't model such toxic behavior. I loved them too much to teach them by example to hate themselves.) I dialed back the craziest stuff, but I still suffered from an all-or-nothing mentality. And, I'm learning now, I definitely still suffered from compulsive exercise and body dysmorphia.
And so, while I have been "fit" physically before, I've never been fit emotionally or mentally when it comes to my body. I'm learning to love myself no matter what size or shape I am. I'm learning to have a healthy relationship with both food and exercise. Yes, I want to lose weight (being 44 and 90 lbs overweight puts me at higher risk for for health issues I don't want). Yes, I want to be able to do things like full push-ups again. But I want to reach my goals and actually be happy. I think that means learning to be happy now.
Sorry this post got so long!14 -
@misplaced_mama Wow, thank you for sharing this. I'm sorry you had such a rough time.
I was fat growing up - my mother is a feeder, I was bullied at school and comfort for me was hiding away alone with books and snacks.
I got to university, the first time I really had control over my life, and promptly became anorexic for 18 months (and reached a low weight of around 98lbs) , then bulimic for another 2 years.
Trying to ensure I didn't fall back into an eating disorder, I stopped weighing myself, watching my diet, or exercising. So I went right back to being fat by my mid-twenties.
I've successfully lost *some* weight previously, but it always came back with more pounds when I inevitably let life get in the way, or my depression came back, and I stopped bothering to think about what I was eating or how much.
For me, intuitive eating is never going to work. I am *always* going to have to meal plan and watch my portion sizes. I just have to work on accepting that, but also practising maintenance phases without a deficit, so that I know it's not an all or nothing game!8 -
For me, intuitive eating is never going to work. I am *always* going to have to meal plan and watch my portion sizes. I just have to work on accepting that, but also practising maintenance phases without a deficit, so that I know it's not an all or nothing game!
Right there with you. I wish i could eat intuitively, but doing that got me to 250+ lbs (i suspect my highest weight was around 265 or so), so clearly my intuition is off somehow. Maybe someday I'll have retrained my brain and my gut to eat intuitively, but that can't be the goal because i can't depend on that happening. I'll still be on this app and tracking maintenance in 2023, I'll never be "done" counting calories and meal prepping and all of it.6 -
@goal06082021 I hear you, I really do. I've likely got at least 2 years of on and off deficit ahead of me, and then a lifetime of plan, prep, weigh and track.
I simply can't trust myself - my inner child wants all the snack food, especially when I'm feeling low or tired.
Or there are times like today, when I'm struggling with my depression and can't be bothered to move enough to feed myself.... It's all a work in progress, smh.2 -
I have been struggling last month or Soto point even stopped logging my meals.
Work is not a fun place anymore since new ownership took over, and I am really struggling to stay.
We had our newly engaged daughter and her fiancé out for almost a week over Easter and that was fantastic.
Now it's time for me to start working on me. I need to get in better health and shape!
I weighed in January 1st at 265lbs and as of today I am 247lbs. I know in 3 1/2 months that isn't a lot, but at least it is a loss. I now need to start an exercise program to help enhance my weight loss.
I am going to be more consistent in this group to,so I can keep myself accountable.13 -
@misplacedmama
Wow very inspiring post. It's crazy how our minds are so against us when it comes to our body image. From such a young age we are told to look a certain way and it taints us for life. I remember my mom being the worst person when it came to my weight. She would always put me on diets and tell me when my clothes are too tight and always be the first one to mention that I've gained weight. It made my relationship with my body so negative.
@Arralethe
Wow what a journey for you. I'm sorry that you struggled with eating disorders. That must have been so tough!
I've always been fat. Ever since I was a kid. I started on mental health medications when I was 13 and they always make you gain weight so I just got chunkier and chunkier as I got older. I especially gained weight after high school when I stopped all my sports. I went on weight watchers and lost about 50 pounds but eventually gained it all back. It was hard switching everything to points all the time. I definitely like MFP way better. It's faster to track and it has a great database.
I'm trying to change the way I look at myself. It's hard, because every time I look in the mirror I see my weight and I see how clothes fit. Don't get me started when I have to put a bathing suit on. Ugh! But I think it's different this time. I've know I've said that before, but here we go.
I hope everyone has a kickass day.8 -
@angief05 GURL. That's over a pound per week. You're doing AMAZING right now, that is EXCELLENT progress and you should be proud of yourself.5
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Such wonderful, heartfelt and thought provoking posts! Thank you so much for sharing. One thing I that helped me on this current (and sustained) weight loss journey was learning to love and appreciate my imperfect body at every size. I think self acceptance and self love is so important to healing our bodies and our minds.
@Angief05 and anyone else who has dropped around 20 or 40 pounds so far - I encourage you to pick up a large package of dog food or kitty litter that weighs about as much as you lost so far and just try to carry it around in the store for a bit. Not only will you appreciate how much you lost, but also try to appreciate how strong your body is - that it was able to carry that weight around every day all day long. When we are fat, we often believe we are weak and out of shape. But really, we are so, so strong. Thank your body for doing this incredible work and then make a promise to it that you will lighten it's burden so it won't have to work so hard in the future.16 -
Today was hard, because I had a disappointment. And I did comfort eat. But it was a lot less calories than I used to comfort eat, and I am also proud of the fact that I was able to shed tears and say I was sad and mad and hurt, but mostly sad. I'm never going to access emotions with the ease of neurotypical people, but being able to recognize and verbalize them and then say, "It's okay if you want to eat a banana muffin because you feel sad about today," was actually much much healthier than some of my previous patterns have been. So I'm proud of that.14
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Tomorrow's my official weigh in day but I do weigh myself every other day and I must say I'm pleased with this week's progress. I was convinced the scale wouldn't move this week and I have had a couple of weeks where I've felt my loss definitely didn't reflect my effort but will update with my results tomorrow just incase there's any change from today.6
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April Challenge Weigh In Day
Age 44
Height 5'4"
SW 249 3/2020
CW 226
GW for Apr 223
UGW 145
4/1: 226 lbs
4/8: 226 lbs
4/15: 226 lbs – bunch of things, slacking on my water for sure
4/22:
4/29:
Total month loss:
Weekly goals:
-Continue logging on MFP
-Work out 5x per week – 3 cardio & 2 strength
-64 oz of water each day
This weight seems to be mental for me. Many things have been messing with me this week. My husband wanted to do dinner last night. Went to Applebee's as Baker's Square was closed. Did okay. No dessert as I already had that in the afternoon. I have a hard time turning husband down when he offers up getting the spinach dip. He didn't push dessert but probably would have had it if he did; but I easily let him have most of it. He at least knows I'll have about 2 bites maybe 4 and then leave the rest. But without having dessert I ended up grabbing something at home to push me over; so maybe should have had dessert. I had expected the scale to be higher this morning but grateful it wasn’t. It’s .2 down from last week and yesterday actually. Good news on that.
I keep reminding myself it's a lifetime for working on the weight. I just have to keep up with what I'm doing. I had the same reminder once I got my annual physical's results back too. Just have to keep doing what I'm doing.
@misplacedmama I really like the quote. My first time of weight loss getting down to what’s my current goal was a struggle. I had never been thin since I was like 5. So I didn’t know how to be at that weight and hated how everyone was around me – pushing food, not understanding my needs, fitting time to exercise & dating at the time, etc. It’s definitely no wonder I just stopped and slowly gained all back. Now I’ve at least been to that weight, just a different age and circumstances so it’ll still be different than before.
@speryj Yes the self-love I’ve been trying to work on myself more. Dog food/weight – That’s a good reminder. I still can’t imagine that I had the 20 lbs when in comparison.
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goal06082021 wrote: »misplacedmama wrote: »One of my new favorite quotes is: "Be patient when becoming someone you haven't been before." (Tanya Markul)
Oh wow, that's a really good way to put it.
I've always been a fat person. I have never had a "normal" BMI as an adult, or even as a kid/teen for that matter. I have no idea what it is like to be a person who is not fat. This journey I'm on now, I'm aiming for 2021 to be the last year that I am the person I've been up to this point, making the kinds of choices that have kept me the way I am for so long. GW for this year is 196lbs, that'll be 52 lbs lost in 52 weeks from January 1, and then the plan is to basically do that again next year. My lowest adult weight was 169lbs, for like five minutes in 2012. In 2022, in going from 196lbs to 144lbs, I will complete my transformation into an entirely new person with new habits, and a new body that will move through the world differently than the one I have now does. I will become someone I haven't been before. I'm not getting my body back, since I never had it to begin with. But, like a caterpillar completely rebuilds itself on a cellular level to become a butterfly, I'm becoming that person. I've always been drawn to butterfly imagery and it just keeps getting more and more apropos.
Wow @goal06082021 so inspiring!!! Keep up the great work!!1 -
I'm having some real issues with my hip flexibility. The yoga stuff recommended by (skinny) friends does a number on my knees. Anyone have a suggestion for ways to improve hip flexibility that doesnt require being on your knees to do side donkeys?!!3
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