50+ with 50+ To Lose Group

swimmer54

Yesterday was a successful food day! This is major for me since I haven't even been willing to TRY to stay on my plan for a long time now. I came in a few calories under, even though my swim turned out to be very short due to some pain, and I didn't have the cushion of very many exercise calories.

Today:
Breakfast, usual cheerios and fruit
Lunch, left over ham loaf, broc, orange
Dinner, hope to make a cabbage roll casserole from allrecipes and maybe some low fat sausage with that
4th meal, always depends on my mood. Will try to get in bed to help avoid extended snacking.

I WILL be under on calories.

KeriA

Hi Swimmer looks like you are doing great.:flowerforyou: Hope the whole week goes well too. I just came back from my second weight training for the week and yesterday did my interval walk/run. The week gets busier from here on out. The pool is open now but Saturday morning is too busy for me to get back to my Aquafit class.:grumble: I did well with water yesterday and trying to keep it up today:drinker: I have been better making food at home but not sure about the rest of the week. Tomorrow is my daughters open house/curriculum night. Friday my sister comes in from France. But that is why I have concentrated on making food early in the week. Now we have some health leftovers.:happy:

How is everyone doing this week?

swimmer54

Tuesday was a successful food day and so was today, Wednesday. Tomorrow might get hectic on me so my food plan isn't firm. However, if I am unable to cook, I plan to take something out of the freezer.

After being off track for so long, it is helping me to write here and commit to staying in line with my plan. I was afraid I wouldn't/couldn't get back in control. Mary O.

swimmer54

For most of my "dieting" years, I have been a 20 pounder. Lose 20 pounds, lose interest, and eventually gain it back. I've been thinking about what it would take to actually lose a significant amount of weight and KEEP IT OFF. I'm not sure yet, but Bob Greene, Oprah's trainer, always says that daily re-committment is necessary. And I think that's true. So, MFP, and this group specifically, are helping me with re-committing to the process daily. When I was about to do my usual thing of losing interest and re-gaining, MFP, the group, and all the supportive people here eventually reigned me back in. And I'm really grateful for that.

Menu planning always seems like a hassle to me. I keep wondering why I'm reinventing the wheel every week. It takes a lot of time looking through cookbooks and recipe sites to settle on a plan for the week. And, of course, actually getting it cooked is a whole other story. lol. Anyway, this week I joined one of the recipe sites. I have used that site for a long time, but never joined. I decided on a paid membership because of the menu planning option, but also just because it was cheap and I wanted to support what they do. But I think most benefits are available for free. I'm sure they get the majority of their income from advertisements.

I have a point. After signing up and providing my email address, they suddenly began to send me recipes every day. I am pretty sure they would also do this with a free membership. At first I was worried that I would be tempted by receiving recipes I don't want to cook or eat right now. But so far so good. I have started saving the ones that appeal to me in my on site "recipe box". And...I'm hoping this will make the menu planning easier for me.

If any of you have tips for efficiently planning menus, I would be interested in hearing how you do it. Do you use a rotation system, or just make it up every week? I would like to become more tuned in to using up what I have on hand as well.

Thanks, Mary O.

archers

bump

KeriA

I am not that great with meal planning. I use a spreadsheet when I do it. I definitely rotate meals every so many weeks - family favorites etc. and cycle in ideas from here I want to try. It is hard to plan, grocery shop and cook. My son is vegetarian and we are never sure if he will be home or not. I just make a few favorites he can have and now I have started making non-vegetarian as well since we never know. Then he can have leftovers. I think I just got out of a period where I just had the hardest time going grocery shopping. I had some periods where I was working so hard my husband had to help with the cooking. So now I am trying hard to make healthy dinners at home. With kids it can be hard because of activities. Thursdays my daughter has 2 dance classes and one on Friday night too. So I have been concentrating on the other days. I like to make a pot of soup or vegetarian chili so we have it around for lunches or leftovers. I have definitely found some great recipes here. So I have my old favorites and cycle in new recipes to keep things interesting. I am wondering what it will be like next year when my daughter will be at college. My son will be home still since he is in law school but mainly it will just be my husband and I.

KeriA

It is a pretty good week for me. I did weight training on Monday with a bit of cardio. I went and did my interval walk/runs on Tuesday and made a great healthy dinner. This morning I went to aquafit and then did weight training and some of the cardio machines. It was the longest time I have spent at the gym ever. So I think the only way to do Aquafit and wieght training is to do both on the same day. So when possible that is my plan for Monday and Wednesday mornings. I have already bought the ingredients for dinner tonight as well. Water has gone well too. Hope this will result in some weight loss soon.

How are your weeks going?

swimmer54

Well, I had a few good days last week. Then Friday night I got off track after running an errand late and eating out afterwards. After that it was all downhill. The exercise has been light this week as well for various reasons and I stopped tracking again.

The struggle continues.

Good luck to everyone else. Reading about your progress is helping to motivate me.

KeriA

Although this week was pretty good yesterday we went out twice. I went over but not by much. I have enough deficit that I was still under maintenance calories so for one day I was losing slower than the rest. One day doesn't matter. Don't let it sabotage the rest. I am drinking my water right now to get rid of the sodium in the chinese food and also with the exercise my muscles are probably retaining water. So log even when you aren't perfect. That way you can know what the problem was down the line. Hope everyone is having a good weekend. I keep thinking it is already Sunday since we sort of took yesterday off.

MCYoung

:flowerforyou:
Hey there everyone... CHEERS :drinker:
I have missed you all terribly these last several hectic weeks!!
I had hoped to check in and do my October goals long before this.... but life and work has stepped in and taken over! :ohwell:
Let me do a (hopefully) short recap for you all.
I joined MFP just 4 months ago, June 21st to be exact. :noway:
In those 4 months I have lost just over 40# :blushing:
ALMOST 8". OK so it is really 7 3/4 " but what is !/4" among friends.... right???
The break down for that if you are interested....
1/4 " gone from neck
5" from my hips
1/4" from my waist
2" off my thighs
1/4 " from my calf
Now the bottom 3 are not from the begining (June) as I accidentally deleted my waist measurement
However I did start writing it all down 9/3 and the loss for: waist, thigh, & calf are from then through this morning.
Not to shabby,if i do say so myself :laugh:
I have started exercising.... moslty riding the stationary bike and walking.... but have started doing Zumba recently (and I have been enjoying it.... who'd a thunk it???)
I have been drinking drinking water... ALMOST exclusively. :drinker:
Gone from a very tight size 20 pants to a slightly loose 16
My knees no longer grind, my snoring is GONE, I am less tired....and the smaller clothes are here but I have a goal in mind for even smaller :happy:
All in all I am quite pleased with my results ~ even the bumps along the way this past month just don't seem to matter to me anymore.
So I guess my goals for the rest of Oct and Nov would be:
KEEP MOVING...
Kep drinking water...
Get more into the Zumba CD's
Do my best to drop another ... 10#????? Got my fingers crossed on that one!!
So ~ that's my story and I'm sticking to it!!
Take care and keep on keeping on!!!

KeriA

Yay, Mary (McYoung) great progress and great October goals. Nice to see you back. Hope October is a great month for all of us.
Keri

YoungerNextYear59937

Thanks for the update, Mary. Since I'm pretty new here, it's more of a "background" for me. It's nice to see where you came from, how far you've come, and I'm looking forward to seeing where you'll be! You're making phenomenal progress. I'm so happy for you!

Joni

Bisbeegal

I haven't posted here for a while, and I just caught up on some recent posts today. This forum is really inspirational to me because I have to constantly keep myself motivated to not only maintain, but now to start losing again. When I read the quote from Bob Green saying that every day you have to make a committment to eat well, it really rang true and made me think about the days where I haven't. This week I decided I needed to recommit by really following MFP precisely, and I also need to make some positive changes. Something that has been a real issue for me has been playing with a bridge group that lunches out ever week. I don't think I've accepted how much that has contributed to my stalemate, but I'm stopping that this week. I also need to be much more careful in the foods I eat. Today I was shopping at a gourmet shop when I was hungry (duh!!!), and I started looking at the nutritional contents/calories on some treats. After looking at a dozen packages and boxes, I came to the conclusion that none of them were worth that many calories. I just have to keep chipping away at things that are standing in my path to success. Thanks for all the inspirational posts, everyone, and for the encouragement this group gives to us all.

KeriA

Wow Bisbeegal. That is a commitment. I identify with looking at foods and issues that might be standing in the path of success. You will be making progress for a while and then nothing seems to change and it stops. There seem to be so many factors to consider. Sometimes it is merely waiting for your efforts to reach ruition. All the posts on here seem like gems to me. This morning going through friends updates gave me just the extra inspiration to go back to the gym and complete what I planned. Your post just touched on some musings from this morning. I learn so much from my MFP friends. :flowerforyou:

copykatnjesus

Hi,

Joining 50/50:

I'm 51 and need to lose about 75 lbs. I just joined MFP 1 week ago. My
first weigh in is tomorrow. I just accepted a challenge from another member
to lose 20 lbs by Christmas. So that's my first goal.

KeriA

Hi copykatnjesus
Welcome to the 50+/50+ Group:
New members usually introduce themselves by telling us a little bit about themselves and their health and fitness goals. The group title suggests that we are trying to lose or watch our weight but for most of this is part of trying to get healthier. So we usually include nutrition and or exercise related goals. Below is a quote from the first page of the group about our rules. I think many of us don’t remember this so it bears repeating here.
Rules are very simple: Check in once a week at least but I will be checking daily so more is fine. You let us know your goals for the week, month, season or by any timeline you have determined for yourself. Report on how you are doing, what is challenging to you and what you have learned. I hope we get to know each other so if life is getting you down or up let us know.

I am going to take this opportunity to post the updated list of members:

dfeledichuk
_gwen
grannysquare1 (Nancy)
salliebeige
meabonl
jimswife1
GreenHydrangea
CRody (Chuck)
KeriA (Keri)
elfie9863
SeattleGrl (Hazel)
jhamby
swimmer54
momb4 (Lynne)
bisbeegal
McYoung (Mary)
creasonr (Ruth)
Serrtana
casiannrn
njbvass
spoccer (Mary)
ndoyel (Nancy)
YoungerNextYear(Joni)
copykatnjesus

There should be about 24 of us.

Keri

James_1954

Friend request sent ... I hope it's not too late to join!

KeriA

Welcome James,
New members tell us a little about themselves and any health and fitness goals they are working on. Looking forward to getting to know you.
Keri.

KeriA

My mother had a fall and broke her collar bone. I have been checking in once a day logging etc. but not much else. Having a hard time getting in my regularly scheduled exercise but staying active. Hate it since I just started weight training and now I can't do it.

SeattleGrl

I'm so sorry to hear about your mother's fall Keri, I hope she mends quickly. When unexpected things happen it can sometimes put a wrench in our healthy living plans but iit sounds like you're still able to stay active which will make a big difference both mentally and physically. Keep strong and make sure to take care of yourself too!

KeriA

Thanks Hazel, How are you doing? Really miss hearing how everyone is doing actually.
I really need my life back. Tuesday the plan is for my Mom to move into a retirement community where she can get some assistance. It may not be the one she settles on so there may be some moving for her down the line. I think I have a break from it all this weekend and went to Aquafit this morning. The work out was not as rigorous as usual since my favorite teacher is recuperating from surgery. Since I haven't had much exercise this week it probably was ok for today. Last Sunday I had a great walk/jog and that is it for real exercise this past week. Looking forward to getting past Halloween and getting my Mom settled. Anyway nest week will not be normal either but should improve.
How are all you doing?

KeriA

Yay finally some exercise again. Started back into my weight training. How is everyone doing?

swimmer54

Hello to everyone. Well, I wasn't great at meeting my October goals which were:
1. No binging on sweets.
Throughout the month I did continue to binge on sweets, but one night, after doing it, I think a light bulb came on. It all suddenly seemed really self-destructive, and I did some thinking about how it began. For me, when grocery stores started having bakeries it was a disaster. Before that, it was pretty easy to stay out of a bakery. I know that when I eat right I don't have cravings for sweets or anything else. So, it's really a matter of biting the bullet and beginning to feed myself properly.

2. Limit swimming. No more than 1 long swim per week. Other 2 swims limited to 1 hour each.
Well, that didn't turn out as I had planned. Not only did I limit my swimming, I pretty much stopped all together. There was an incident in the pool room that upset me and I haven't gone back since. I realize I just need to forget about that and move forward and get back into the pool, but keep it reasonable.

3. Complete home training on Tuesdays.
I had to go back up from 1 day of personal training a week to two unfortunately. My trainer helps me with my chronic back pain (mostly caused by 3 bad discs in the mid-back) and just going once a week wasn't working. So, that will cut into my available time for swimming, given all the other stuff I have to do.

4. Log food, no matter how bad it is
Logging food. ugh. I like using the 400 Calorie Fix plan and it worked best for me to just count to 400 and stop. Not spending time logging really worked (at that time) and I felt more like a normal eater which I really liked. But of course, I also avoid logging because I know I am way over my calorie limit. IF I ever get back to logging, I might just do a quick calorie add. But, so far I am finding it very, very difficult to get back on track, with eating and with exercise.

5. Become aware of water intake.
I have worked on this, setting alarms on my phone to remind me to drink. I don't log what I drink, but just try to drink more.

I am very grateful for MFP. Reading about others who are winning the battle is the thread that keeps me from completely giving up. I can see that it is possible to do this. I have gained back some of the weight I lost, and I am not happy about how that affects how I look in my clothes. But, overall, I am so much better than I was a year ago following both neck and knee surgery. At that time, I didn't think it was possible to recover to this extent. Makes me think that just about anything is possible!

November goals:
1. No binging on sweets.
2. Exercise at least 4 days a week., Swim for reasonable distances, and stay at the gym after personal training to do some cardio. Consider a class???
3. Work at following the 400 Calorie Fix. Try to at least log calories eaten. Prepare appropriate foods and have them on hand.
4. Eat within an hour of getting up.
5. Continue to improve water intake.
6. Weigh more regularly. Record weight every 2 weeks.

greenhydrangea

Swimmer, you've inspired me to set November goals too!

My mantra: Pay attention!

Here are goals:

1. Eating out: just get the salad and forget about all the frou-frou.
2. Be mindful of what goes into my mouth while cooking.
3. Log _everything_, even the slurps and tastes (see #2).
4. Water! 6-8 per day.
5. Weigh everyday.
6. Check BP everyday.
7. Say no to holiday snacks at work and egg nog.
8. Bring carrots and almonds to work to combat #7.
9. Exercise 6 days per week.
10. Stretch stretch stretch

KeriA

Swimmer such a great and honest job at evaluating October and setting November goals. Talk about inspiring – that inspires me and it looks like GreenHydrangea too. Can’t to read her goals next. One thing logging has done for me is sort of helped me self correct. I see immediately what is the problem and sometimes that is all I need. Like seeing a food that just wasn’t worth 1000 calories or seeing the water glass splash over when I drink more than 8 glasses is a pat on the back for drinking enough that day. Or seeing I am starting to eat more later at night etc. However everyone is different in what works for them. I will do my goals after reading Green Hydrangeas. Thanks for sharing what you learned this month. That’s why this group is here.

Green Hydrangea you are another inspiring friend. You are so encouraging, I now can spell Hydrangea and I love your mantra (and your poems). Another set of great goals for November. I like the way you are being proactive about the holidays.

I will post my goals next. This has been the hardest month I have had on here I think.

KeriA

Thanks Mary (Swimmer) for getting us going this month.

This Month I had 2 challenges that have really got me off track which is really the first time since getting on MFP. I still have logged daily but all of my goals have been derailed. My mother fell and I have been the primary care giver for her although all of us have kicked in and my sister from France was here at the time and she was the primary care giver before me. Then once we got her some respite care I go and run into playground equipment head first at my very part-time temporary job. That was just a week problem but then Halloween is always a challenge as well and I didn’t need to have a hiatus in exercise just after Halloween. For once I feel I have gained instead of maintained. It is hard to tell with me since my weight varies a lot. Anyway I go into November determined to get back on track. Early October went fine but here is my latest.

October Goals evaluated. :grumble:
1. drink between 10-14 glasses of water a day – This one has to stay since while helping my Mom I fell down with this.
2. I am going to make sure it includes weight training and running intervals (post C25K), Zumba and a rest day. I want to ease into it for once and when the pool is open I will add in Aquafit again. - This month I really started weight training 2 days a week and it was starting to work when my Mom had her fall. So starting last week I have gotten back to this. I haven’t been to Zumba for quite awhile. This week it was because of my head injury. Maybe next week. I did start into Aquafit when the pool opened but now my favorite teacher is having surgery. However it makes OK cardio along with the weight training on Monday and Wednesday my second fav. teacher teaches it. I have been running on Tuesday mornings again since my Mom has moved into the Retirement Community temporarily for now. Thursday I have been working as a substitute at the preschool my sister works at. It is very active.
3. I think I have my calories goals set right so just need to work at making them.
4. Make healthy meals (my mother’s fall really messed this up but I have managed to make some great ones now and then_.

November goals
1 Water: stays the same for now:drinker:
2. Exercise: Monday and Wednesday will be Aquafit and weight training (2 hours), Tuesday will be interval running. Friday I will try to make it to Zumba, Saturday or Sunday I will have a walk with my husband and the other will be my rest day. If on one day during the week I miss my exercise I will exercise both. Thursday could be a rest day but my work is very active so I will play it by ear. It gives me the flexibility if I decide to exercise on Saturday and Sunday. Like maybe a short run fit in on Saturday or Thursday afternoon. Yes I like this idea.:happy:
3. Calories: For now my calorie goal will stay the same. If I go over a bit I have enough of a deficit I should still have a deficit just smaller. Probably Thanksgiving (and Christmas Eve and Day, Anniversary and Husbands birthday, other family party days) I will go over my goal but plan to stay at Maintenance.:ohwell:
4. Food Quality: Making healthy meals at home are going to remain a big priority to me.

I will continue to check the thread daily and will post regularly to keep it up on the Topics and weekly let you all know how I am doing with my goals. Hope you all do the later as well. I love to hear how it is going.:flowerforyou:

YoungerNextYear59937

Hi everyone! I am nearing my goal weight once again. I want this to be the last time in my life I EVER say that. I know how to lose weight, I certainly know how to gain weight, but I have NEVER been able to maintain. Even though I am 4 pounds from my goal I am happy where I am now and it wouldn't bother me to stay at this weight. At my heaviest I weighed 172 in 2009. I am only 5'1" tall. In March 2010 I weighed 121. I thought at the time I looked good, but I look at old photos and I looked aged and gaunt. I didn't feel well then either. I raised my goal to 129 this time (only because it was in the 120's). I now weigh 132 and I feel great. I think I look good in my clothes and I feel I am getting fit from working out, so I'm happy with where I am. My goal is to really eat healthy. Before when I worked out I did it so I could eat more crap. So my goal is to continue to work out and to quit eating crap. I have started to eat fruit (I hate fruit, or so I thought). I ate a pear yesterday for the first time in my life, and it tasted pretty good. I know it doesn't sound like much to a lot of people, but honestly I had NEVER eaten a fresh pear in my life.

I will be going on vacation Thanksgiving week. I will be going to my beloved Montana. My goal is to be able to continue to work out and eat healthy while on vacation. That will be a biggie for me. Temptation will be around every corner and I want to keep on track.

Yes the holidays will be upon us soon. The best advice I ever got about Thanksgiving was this, "Just remember it's only a meal." It's a meal like you would have any other day. Don't let it get out of hand.

I love all the goals I've read from you guys so far, and I know you can do it all. Thank you all so much for being such an inspiration, but most of all for being so wonderful and caring.

~Joni

swimmer54

I agree with you all. Paying attention is probably the number one thing I need to do. You mentioned, Keri, about how logging keeps you on track. Last night I made an old recipe for a very hearty cornbread. I've been eating this for years and don't recall ever knowing how many calories were in it. I entered the ingredients as a recipe and IT WAS A LOT! lol. I had to log grocery shopping calories just to get by. And Keri, your mention of aiming for "maintenance" on special days made sense to me. How do you figure out what "maintenance" is? Oh...add 500 calories? ok.

And Joni, CONGRATULATIONS on reaching a weight you are happy with. I think I have failed at dieting so many times that it's hard to believe I can do that. And, I'm thinking that believing in the possibility is probably one of the most important things. Coming to MFP and reading what is happening with others really helps me with that.

Right now I'm leaving some of my cheerios and fruit in the bowl. I have always eaten every bite of every meal. What if I just left a little each time?

Mary O.

KeriA

Hi Joni, congratulations on achieving a healthy weight. If you maintain a weight for 2 months or more it resets your normal weight so learning to maintain your weight is important and after 2 months your body will help you. If you do not reset what your body sees as normal by maintaining for 2 months it will fight to take you to the last weight it saw as your normal weight. Even losing more will mess up the process of resetting your weight. In other words the last step to successfully losing weight is not achieving your goal weight it is successfully resetting your body’s definition of your normal weight by maintaining the new weight you achieved. So many people don’t realize this. We have been fighting our bodies which are made to maintain our weight when we lose weight. Once we have reached that weight we have one more fight and that is to reset what our body sees as our normal weight to our new weight. That takes 2-3 months of carefully maintaining one weight within a couple of pounds up or down. Then we don’t have to fight our bodies so hard anymore. The added benefit of doing this work is that you have a good idea of what your body needs to maintain. You discover what is the best balance of calories and exercise to maintain.
I love that you are recognizing that what is your ideal weight now is different than before. That is what I think this group has in common a focus on our health. The problem with fruit is getting it when it is just ripe but not over ripe. I love it but I tend to be picky about it. Lately my husband has been really good at picking out pears. They are great when just right.

KeriA

Mary O yes you can find your daily deficit by going to your goals. It will tell you and it depends on what your calorie goal is set at. Then there is your calorie burn as well. If you have a 500 calorie daily deficit and you burned 250 calories you could eat 750 calories above your calorie goal and still be at maintainance calories for that day. Really the deficit is more important weekly anyway.

Alot of people lose just by being better with portion control. So leaving some on the plate is definitely an idea. Some people get smaller dishes too!:laugh: