August 28, 2014

julieworley376

For a topic of conversation today. I want to know you, I want to know what kind of program you are on to lose weight. Or are you at the point of gaining or losing nothing at all and why? Is it working for you? What else have you tried?

At the moment I am concentrating on lowering my calorie intake getting ready for the pre-op surgery diet as I have chosen to have lap band surgery. I believe after 50 years of dieting, from the age of 6, I have simply had it and need some extra help to achieve my goals and stay there.

Along the way I have been to several weight loss clubs multiple times, lost 90lbs and regained it and more 4 times over, never been to goal weight or maintained for a long period. Been on meal replacements, shakes, stuff that was supposed to fill you up before meals. Hollywood diet, Atkins Diet, Mayo Clinic Diet, Beverley Hills Diet, Grapefruit Diet, if you can name it I have probably done it at some time or another.

So what is your story? Let's get some conversation, support and ideas flowing.

Julie, Rockford, IL

mikesgirl4evr

My weight loss journey? Oh my. Here goes. My mother put me on my first "diet" when I was about 12. By the time I was 14, she had signed me up for Weight Watchers. At the time (not sure what the rule is now), you had to be 18 to join but I looked older than my age so she was able to get by with it. After that, I was convinced I was "fat" which didn't make things worse. My struggle with my self-esteem was going down hill fast. Over the next 26 years, I tried every diet and weight loss product out there in a desperate attempt to be "normal" and accepted. I have been up and down the scale so many times I've probably lost over 1000 pounds in my lifetime. When I made the decision to have RNY Gastric Bypass Surgery, I had to list all the ways I had tried to lose weight and the number of times. In 28 years (from the age of 12) I had been on a diet or tried a weight loss product a total of 73 times!!! And yet, I weighed in at 525. As I've told you all before, I got down to 250 after my WLS. Not quite goal, but I was feeling good. Then I gained 120 of that back because I hadn't dealt with the why's of my eating. I went back to listening to my pouch (small stomach), following the rules of WLS and went back to my WLS support group. I started losing again (MUCH slower this go round). Sometime after that, I found MFP and inconsistently started tracking what I ate and how much I exercised.. 142 days ago, I made the decision to use MFP to it's full extent and log every day, good or bad. Last October, after being robbed, I had the opportunity to start therapy so I have finally begun to deal with they why's. Right now I've been on a plateau for a very long time and am reassessing my calorie intake and exercise program. I am also in touch with the nutritionist at my bariatric surgeon's office. I'm hoping that helps me get past this plateau.

Dee in St. Louis

NorahCait

I remember feeling bigger than everyone even in kindergarten, so I don't really remember when I went from being bigger than average to being overweight/obese. My parents were always loving and supportive, but my mom was always trying to lose weight, and I definitely picked up some body hatred from that. She would do slimfast, buy "diet" foods, take dexatrim, all sorts of things. I don't think she ever had much luck. I first tried to lose weight (more than just wishing I could) the second semester of my senior year of high school. I severely restricted my calories, mostly just drank slimfast, and I was terribly unhealthy, but I lost weight. I was probably around 160 and a size 11/13? I remember going to my pediatrician and him showing me a chart of my weight, and saying, "If you had kept on the path you were on, you'd be at 200 right now, how does that sound?"

After high school, I did a year of AmeriCorps and I ballooned. I remember coming back from one project (we traveled around) and trying on a pair of pants I had left and running to my teammates and saying, "I f&%#ing exploded!" At some point during that year, I weight myself at 212 and I wrote it over and over on a notebook page like "oh my god, this is so awful."

Several years later, I was 244 and feeling totally hopeless. I ended up in the hospital for depression for a few days last fall, finally got on some medication that helped, and by April I was feeling human again. I started tracking calories and exercising. I started out walking more, then I added the gym for Couch to 5k, and strength training. The past month has been rough, both anticipating returning to school (a major anxiety/depression trigger for me) and having less sunlight, getting sick with an awful lingering cold, and traveling a lot. I've fallen off track with everything except walking -- I've been doing 20k+ steps a day almost every day. I haven't lost any weight over the past few weeks, but I haven't gained much if anything, either.

I need to get back on track because exercise makes me mentally healthier and I want to keep improving both my physical and mental health. Today, I will go back to tracking EVERYTHING. Next week, when I return from my trip to Maine, I'll go back to the gym.

(Edited to add: wow that's a lot of text to say not much. I've just been a mess lately and I suppose it helped to write things out)

wennim

I've remember being big in kindergarten and having one of the high school neighbors pick on me about it. Now that I look back I really wasn't that big then. I didn't have access to a scale in high school but I knew I was bigger than a lot of the other kids. My junior year into senior year I really lost a lot of weight from a size 18 to a size 12. But it wasn't in a healthy way. I didn't eat hardly anything. am talking like 600 calories a day while going to school, gym class everyday and working part time. My parents and sisters knew but no one said anything. Then I went off to college and had some bad experiences and put on a little bit. I guess I pretty much maintained that until I met my husband and we started having babies. Eight pregnancies, postpartum depression and five children later I almost 300 lbs.

In January I had what I am referring to as the "whale flop incident"...it was a doozy and I am sure if I looked hard enough someone has it on you tube. I tripped at a sporting event and broke my ankle. I couldn't walk for almost 6 weeks. During this time my husband joined one of the weight loss contests at work and became willing to eat better foods. He started losing weight like crazy while I managed to maintain while not being mobile. Once my ankle was better I started tracking calories and exercise and it seems to be working this go around. I have tried before and never gotten below 240 so this is a big step for me. I started out with the treadmill and then progressed to my mountain bike. I love my bike. I am worried about what I will do come winter again since schedules and well ...snow will prevent my riding. My weight has consistently gone down but seems to be stuck right now. I am trying a couple of things different to see if I can shake it up a bit. I have managed to mostly stay within my allotted calories and I am proud of that since my schedule the last three weeks has had me going nonstop and before it would have been a lot of fast food meals for the family.

wow...guess I felt like rambling today!

spooks1960

I have always had weight issues since I can remember. I have been on one type of diet or another since around 9 years old and I have just gotten bigger and bigger. I have been on weight watchers (to many times to count). I've done LA weightloss, Atkins, cabbage soup diet, low carbs plus many more. So many I can't remember. I must have lost hundreds of pounds over the years, but nothing stuck and I gained it all back and then some. The program I am on now seems to have some promise. It is a bariatric weightloss program which you may possibly get surgery if you qualify. Am looking into that possibility but I would like to do it without surgery. I am warily optimistic as I have been through this many times with little success. My husband believed that this was the program that would make the difference, so this is for you Honey. Miss you

tishtash77

Up to the age of about 4 or 5 I was slim as a child. Between 5 and 7 something happened (I do not mean literally) and I started getting chubby. From there the weight just kept creeping on, I was teased at Primary school, bullied at Secondary. I stayed a virgin till the ripe old age of 30 because I was too ashamed of my body and the very few times I got male attention I panicked and hid behind friends as I couldn't do the whole fat and naked thing. I cannot visualize myself at my ideal weight because I have not ever been there. During all that time food was my comfort and pleasure. I have done WW a few times and had some success but when I would stop to save money it would come back on eventually plus a bit more. I ordered pills online as a teenager behind my mum's back and took them but they didn't help of course thankfully they also didn't kill me. I tried slimfast once but that stuff is gross. Or it was lol. I am a natural couch potato, exercise is not an automatic thing, as much as I enjoy badminton or swimming when we get there I would still happily play on my pc, watch rubbish on tv, read and through all those things eat. I had a group of friends at uni and was more social then. Now it is hard to get DH out of the house for anything and I have become that way too. So now I am here and I am fighting again for my son, for my health and for me.

persistentsoul

I have been big all my life. I looked very pregnant by age 7. I was relentlessly bullied all through school. I have been on constant yoyo diets since age of 10 when i was 140lb. By age 16 I was 245lb. My highest adult weight has been 322lb this year, my lowest adult weight after a severe raw vegan starvation diet i briefly went down to 175lb (very short visit) The day I first saw 175lb on scale was the last day i saw that number prior to is skyrocketting back up until reached 294lb, few years later i got down to 182lb for an equally short visit before making my way up to 322lb. Plus all the thousands of smaller yoyo fluctuations and plans along the way.

I think I must have worked my way through almost all the clubs and special diets in past with no long term results. The plan i am doing now came about by accident in terms of it being for weight loss. I am following a ketogenic eating plan for other neaurological health reasons, hoping it will help sooth bipolar symptoms. It is a bonus that it has removed my hunger and cravings. It gave me the added kick of motivation to follow an eating plan that incorporates many of the changes I already knew were helpful to me.

I am definately looking at this as a long term permanent way of eating and not a short term diet. Once I realised this would work for weight loss too, I focused on maximising that aspect as well by combining Ketogenic/Paleo/ "clean eating", whole food, principles with calorie deficit and also intermitent fasting where i eat lower calories 2 days a week but not always. This helps compensate for my lack of mobility a lot of the time. I feel very happy with what I am doing and it is working well for me. The only thing i can see changing much in long term is that I will increase my calorie intake when nearer to goal or when i am able to be more active or find i get more hungry. I have almost completed 6 weeks so far which is amazing as usually aside from two long stretches in past, normally i fall off wagon after two weeks when cravings wear me down. Not having the cravings makes it much easier to stick to. Sure I would still quite like to eat lots of things that I used to eat such as mass quantities of junk food but I can choose not to so i do. Before the cravings were so bad they drove me crazy constantly until i would cave in. I don't have that toturouse craving now and that is what makes the difference. I guess this is how naturally healthy or moderate eaters or naturally slim people are around food. No wonder they can't understand food addiction.

I should probably point out that although I have lost 31lb in 6 weeks , 27 of those came off in first week and a half, I had much worse fluid retention issues that I ever dreamed. I was peeing it all out in that first week and half faster than i could keep pouring more water in. My abdomin is no longer sore and swollen (still got big fat belly but not with added fluid and inflamation from eating all the foods i was intollerant to but addicted to) My shoes are now loose where swelling in feet and ankles has gone. Just all over a layer of added fluid puff has gone. I then mostluy stalled for a few weeks before things started shifting again last week or two. What is going now is the more settled in fat. I feel much better without the 31lb of baggage shed so far what ever it was

PatrickB_87

Sorry it's been a crazy day going from client and i'm still not done. Nothing like 10pm phone calls.
Just stoping in to say hi. I'll try to get back to the conversation if I can but back to work.

BettJo64

hey ya'll :bigsmile: I'm Betty from Georgia. 50yrs old and 340lbs today :noway: yep, this is a big ole girl! I've been big pretty much all my life. I believe I started to eat more and gain weight on purpose as a result of a traumatic childhood event. But this continued all my life even though I totally understood why I was doing it. I've dealt with this trauma as an adult, but never was able to stop my bad eating habits and sedentary lifestyle. I married my husband of nearly 30yrs when I was 20 and weighing 230lbs. He adored me and didn't care one bit about my weight, thank goodness....because by the time I was 30 (2 children later) I had ballooned to 430lbs!! He heard my muffled cries at night and watched me withdraw from social gatherings in my attempts to protect my loved ones feelings from shame of being associated with this big me. Before my 30th birthday, he delicately presented me an option through his new insurance of having gastric bypass. I was grateful for an answer to my prayers and jumped on that bandwagon!! By the end of my birthday month, I was laid up in the hospital recuperating from my lapband surgery! Now that was 1994 when they only offered non-adjustable and it was a pretty new procedure. Within the first 1 1/2 yrs I had lost 215lbs! That was 1/2 of me!!! Unbelievable! Freeing and life-changing for me! I loved it! Exercise became part of my life for the very first time! I even joined a gym! I got myself a part-time job once my youngest started school and life was going good. But then everything changed for me. I fell down my backporch steps one afternoon and messed up my ankle pretty bad. Laid me up for about 6wks with crutches. This was the beginning of my downfall. No exercise. No work. Home alone. In my feelings. Food began calling my name again. Soon enough I was healed and back at work with bad habits once again to break. But no sooner had I began working, walking, and improving my eating....then suddenly I had to have an emergency appendectomy! Lordy, Lordy. let me tell you that is some kinda pain leading up to needing that surgery. I had worked for 2 days with that pain, doubled over at times, crying my eyes out at night with my hubby...but thinking the whole time I had a stomach virus or food poisoning. Thank goodness, he insisted finally on rushing me to the emergency room because they said it was on the verge of rupturing! WHEW! Anyways, now that recuperation took 9 more weeks of healing. This just zapped all the fight and will power I had left. I gave in and gave up to laziness and temptations from then on. Of course, this lapband limited the amounts I could eat. However, if you're not eating the right stuff then this shows you can still gain!! I suffered as well with this lapband. I've spent nearly every day of the whole 20yrs throwing up. Yes, sorry for that visual, but that is my life to this day. My lapband, while a godsend for the loss in the beginning, has always made me sick. It's my understanding from my doctors that my body has actually been in starvation mode for way too many years and holds onto every single calorie that I do eat and keep down. It refuses to let me lose weight while in starvation mode. I typically would eat 200-500 calories tops, yet lose nothing. Just hold steady for years. I began in April to have severe acid reflux. My gastrointestinal doctor did an endoscopy and discovered that I have Barrett's Esophagus as a direct result of my lapband. This disease causes the growth of cancer cells on the esophagus that COULD, not necessarily WILL, lead to esophageal cancer. My doc performed an ablation in June, which is lasering or burning the cancer cells off the walls of the esophagus. That hurt like you wouldn't believe for at least 10 days!! Burning from the throat down to the breastbone! Affected by every movement my body made so I had to be like a statue in order to have even a moment of comfort and peace. Well, I went back just recently on the 28th for another followup endoscopy to check-see if any more cancer cells had re-appeared...and yes, there were more. So here I sit today after another ablation. I'm not hurting as much as the first FULL COURSE ablation, but it's no picnic. My doc says it could take 3 or 4 shots at these cancer cells before regrowth ceases. Fingers crossed that it works soon. He also wants to remove my lapband after the Barrett's Esophagus is under control. I can't risk myself again. Once I live a few months with no lapband and my body heals, he then wants to perform a Roux-en-Y procedure on me. This new gastric bypass will totally bypass the stomach altogether, so no more stomach acids to worry about flaring up into my esophagus. I must admit that I'm tremendously nervous about several things here! First, I haven't been without a lapband and on my own to eat for 20yrs! Those months of healing are gonna be scary for me. How will I be without the lapband??? Also, after all that I've dealt with and suffered from due to the lapband...do I really want to do a gastric bypass again? I know it's 20yrs later now. Modern gastric surgeries are different now. I've talked with many people that have had the Roux-en-Y and I hear that some still have the same issues that I had with the lapband though, as far as throwing up, definite foods that are not tolerable, not losing weight, and even regaining their weight with this procedure still in place. Some issues never change. I'm still not sure what I'm going to do. In the meantime, I'm learning good eating habits and for the first time in my life...I'm counting carbs, proteins, fats, and calories. Even looking at sodium lol These were never of interest to me before. So it's fun and interesting to me now. I'm on a 20 carb lifestyle (diet is an optional word that I don't want anymore!) that my doc says is standard leading up to a gastric bypass. Whether I decide to do it or not, it's still a good process for me to wean myself off many high carb foods in my life. I feel I have 2 good options waiting for me down the road after my lapband comes off. I'll just have to decide whether by then I feel strong enough and capable enough to fight this weight on my own once again or whether to trust in my most excellent reputable doctor and believe that I'll have a better desired experience with this new gastric bypass. Time will tell..... :flowerforyou:

hasjejc

like most of you I have tried every diet going,had some success and some failures, being honest i never really stuck at anything long enough for it to work properly, i would condition my brain to think if i had a bad day and ate one biscuit too many that i was doomed, and then i would eat everything in sight, instead of just drawing a line under it.Also if i had a good week, and went on the scales and was not 14lbs lighter i would think my "diet" was not working, and again stuff my face.
I have always been a big girl, even as a child, i was always the biggest in my class, and fattest out of my group of friends.. I am fed up of wasting my life not going out socially or being too ashamed to accompany my husband on work events, too scared that people will judge me and talk about my size. I have now decided (AGAIN) that i will give calorie counting a decent go, i mean i have nothing to lose except weight, and the alternative is too be another 10lbs heavier this time next year if i don't do some thing about it. plus my knees have started to let me know that they are fed up of carrying my bulk around. hopefully i can condition my brain to be pleased with small losses and the end of the week, instead of thinking negative when i lose a little, i should see it as a step towards goal.this is coming up to my forth week, and so far its ok.i have slip ups and bad days but i just draw a line and continue.. i have 100 plus pounds to lose and its a long journey but i have made a start and don't intend to turn back now.

hasjejc

like most of you I have tried every diet going,had some success and some failures, being honest i never really stuck at anything long enough for it to work properly, i would condition my brain to think if i had a bad day and ate one biscuit too many that i was doomed, and then i would eat everything in sight, instead of just drawing a line under it.Also if i had a good week, and went on the scales and was not 14lbs lighter i would think my "diet" was not working, and again stuff my face.
I have always been a big girl, even as a child, i was always the biggest in my class, and fattest out of my group of friends.. I am fed up of wasting my life not going out socially or being too ashamed to accompany my husband on work events, too scared that people will judge me and talk about my size. I have now decided (AGAIN) that i will give calorie counting a decent go, i mean i have nothing to lose except weight, and the alternative is too be another 10lbs heavier this time next year if i don't do some thing about it. plus my knees have started to let me know that they are fed up of carrying my bulk around. hopefully i can condition my brain to be pleased with small losses and the end of the week, instead of thinking negative when i lose a little, i should see it as a step towards goal.this is coming up to my forth week, and so far its ok.i have slip ups and bad days but i just draw a line and continue.. i have 100 plus pounds to lose and its a long journey but i have made a start and don't intend to turn back now.

mikesgirl4evr

Welcome BettJo64. Sorry you have had so much trouble with the band. I had the RNY 8 years ago. I know it's changed some since I had it but I'm willing to ask any questions that you might have and help in any way I'm capable of helping.