100 pounds lost in just under 8 months

sglane

I did it. Never thought I'd be able to but I've lost over 100 pounds. I started out on September 23rd, 2010 weighing "Err" because the scale's maximum was 335 lbs. and this morning, May 20th, 2011, the scale read 234.8 lbs.

I'll post some current pics later today or this weekend but you can visit my site http://www.shawndoeslife.com to see a variety of before and after pics.

MyFitnessPal has been such a huge help in my journey along with the support of family, friends - in person and socially on here, and people that I've met along the way.

Now the next stage begins and that's maintaining. I'm pretty sure I can do it because I know I never want to go back to where I was. And again, with the support of family, friends, MFP and the confidence I have in myself that I never knew I had, I know I can do it.

ShellyKay67

congrats!! you should be extremely proud of yourself for sticking with it!
what a great reward for your perserverance!!!!!!!!!!!

mikeyrp

Fantastic story - well done!

amandae79

AMAZING! Great job!!!

bkthomas2004

Oh my gosh!! What an accomplishment!!!!! Great job and congrats! Surely an inspiration for me and many others!

Goal_Seeker_1988

Wow! That is amazing!!!!!

mrmarius

wow thats awesome. checking your site out now

tallen3687

Congratulations! You are my new inspiration.

Andi_Mo

AMAZING! Congrats and you look at least 10 years younger! So happy for you!!!!

ket_the_jet

Holy **** dude. Good job.
-wtk

shellgoff

way to go! keep it up!

GorillaNJ

Congrats! I am driving for the same goal!

TriumphNow

Wow...Congratulations! That's an awesome accomplishment.

Shazzabommerrooney

Great Job, You are an inspiration!

Amanda421

great job! keep your confidence up and maintain that loss!!

karenyg

That is wonderful! Can you post some tips on what you did, maybe what you did can help others.

pearlof69

Amazing progress and also a really good blog. Loved the progress pictures - what an inspiration. I have just finished W2D3 of C25K - the best app ever.

Again, amazing job and a true inspiration - thank you for sharing.

efoxy82

wow that's a blessing !!!

BradNC

Congrats dude. Don't look back, just keep moving forward!

angijunbug

Fantastic!!! Congratulations on hitting your goal!!!! It's so inspiring to hear stories with awesome results! Thanks for sharing :happy:

Kytana

What a fantastic accomplishment! Care to share any tips, or what a typical day/week consisted of, to help others?

arhzon

Awesome job, man! You are an inspiration!

Harper0618

That is AWESOME!!! Great Job!!! Please share any tips you may have to help us. I would like to lose 150 pounds. Thanks and keep up the great work!

Tree72

Congratulations! That's an amazing accomplishment. You look so much happier and more confident now.

imsoserious

Congrats! Great job, keep up the good work.:flowerforyou:

reneelee

I'm going through my blog here on MFP and finding a few pieces I think are worth sharing on the main board. This piece specifically was a blurb from a conversation I was having with a relatively lean female who was "having problems" getting leaner.

**************

Where I'm going with this is... being a light female, you don't have a lot of room to wiggle, calorically speaking. 12 calories per pound is typically where I'll start my clients who are interested in fat loss. That's assuming a maintenance of around 14-15 calories per pound and frequent exercise.

So in your case, 12 x 122 = 1500ish calories per day.

You're most likely eating close to that after you eat your exercise calories back. Plus, keep in mind that mostly everyone under-reports actual calorie intake. Humans are just very poor at doing this accurately. I have papers showing dietitians significantly under-reporting their true intake, believe it or not.

So in this case, we're assuming your maintenance is 14 x 122 = 1700 leaving you with a 200 cal/day deficit.

Given that there are 3500 cals in one pound of fat, assuming all you lost was fat (which isn't the case), it would take you 17-18 days just to lose one pound.

And even with that, smaller women who are trying to diet invariably deal with all sorts of water balance issues. Part of it is glycogen, as mentioned above. Each gram of glycogen that is stored carries along 3 grams of water. But it also has loads to do with hormone balances that tend to get wonky in women in your position.

So your fat loss could be happening at this excruciatingly slow pace and even then, you won't realize it on the scale as it can be masked by 2-5 lbs of water weight.

I see it all the time... women in similar shoes heading in the "right" direction but they never stick with things long enough to realize it. They solely use the scale to measure progress so they never actually realize they're losing fat and this is coupled with short-term perceptions/expectations. They never stick to the plan b/c they allow water weight to dominate their emotional well-being. More often then not they cave, binge, and try again next week or month or whatever. It's a viscous cycle.

More often than not, managing expectation along with tracking weight/body comp over many weeks and plotting a trend is what's called for. Or to put it differently, it's a matter of patience, assuming you have your nutrition and exercise dialed in correctly.

I'm just finishing working with a woman who's a fitness competitor. Over the course of a 2 month cut she averaged under .5 lbs of fat loss per week. And her weight remained the same throughout much of that time. Think about that.

Also, keep in mind that your maintenance may very well be under 14 calories per pound. Say it's 13. That puts maintenance at 1600 and if you're consuming 1500 cals/day, that gives you an average daily deficit of only 100 cals. At that rate, again assuming you lose nothing but fat, it would take you 35 days to lose one pound of fat.

See where I'm going with this?
- Steve

Steve is GREAT! His name on MFP is stroughtman81

rosiedoes

Amazing! Well done!

jenreb1

Congrats - that is amazing!! Your an inspiration to the rest of us ..... Great work!! Thanks for sharing!

eamconnor

RE: ..."weighing "Err" because"... You clearly haven't lost your wittiness.

mymelody_78

Amazing! That's a whole person!!!

rhenderson1229

That is incredible! You are truly in inspiration. Best of wishes in your endeavor to keep maintain the weight loss!