40 and older with 10lbs or less to lose

singfree

IDGIE welcome to our circle of friends! We all come from different backgrounds and thus have different goals concerning weight and fitness. The common thread among us is maintaining a clean diet and regular exercise. We are not always successful, but we are trying awfully hard! I know most of us would agree that we can control our diets a lot better by not eating out as much. Sometimes it cannot be helped, as in your case when you are on the road. What is your typical diet and exercise routine? Good luck!

IDGIE

Thanks for the response. I noticed after I posted that the group was not just 40 and older, but only 10 lbs to lose. Oh well I guess I will do mine 10lbs at a time:laugh: On the road, I have a few tricks I use. I work in hospitals when I am working, so I stay out of the cafeterias. My weakness is the smell of the food, so I take my lunch and eat it in my work area. If I stay in a hotel with a kitchen, I go immediately to the grocery and stock the room. I stay at Marriott's and depending on the brand, they usually have a small free breakfast and I can stock up on the fruit, the low cal granola bars, and I will have a boiled egg for breakfast. I spend a lot of time in airports and those are the worst. It is easy to have a beer and a meal out of bordem, so I try to find the pre made wrapped sandwiches at the kiosk's and have just the deli meat without the bread. I am going to try to keep my carbs low and see how that works. I tried that once when I was just about 10 lbs overweight and it did not work for me, yet I worked with people who needed to lose about 30 or 40 lbs and they were very successful with it.

singfree

10 lbs at a time, set a series of mini goals! I agree that life on the road can be tough on the waistline. Airport food is brutal, tough to find anything healthy. Watch deli meats- lots of fat and sodium. My aim is to lower, not eliminate carbs and up the protein. With my lifestyle and workout routine, I need a minimum of 40% carb in my diet, otherwise my energy is sapped.

IDGIE

I agree. I am just limiting my carbs too and not relying on just that. I am working out daily now. Good luck to you!

duffyzmom

Happy Monday! - Not much time to post just wanted to welcome all the newbies and send more well wishes to SwissMiss. I hope you are recovering a little more each day.

caranne

This is pretty much why I joined here! Never had any problems losing a few pounds in the past, I'm now 43 with about 14lb to lose, been dieting and exercising for a full month now with NO results, so frustrated. I didn't weigh myself for that entire month until this morning, I could cry

singfree

My wife is 5'1" and was frustrated too. She started doing more High Intensity Interval Training and is very pleased with her results. We have a spinner bike at home and she alternates between high & low intensity. It's a killer workout, but she is seeing a difference on the scale and in the way her clothing fits. She also is strength training with more weight. This site is a great way to track your food and exercise. Good luck!

caranne

Yeah, I have recently purchased a cross trainer (elliptical) Haven't had much time to try it as I have been doing a LOT of walking recently. I do quite a bit of hill walking/hiking...

Swissmiss

Thanks duffzmom--Thought that I was dying this morning. No, I mean it. I even handed over the "what to do with my kids if I die" papers. After seeing the doctor, I am fine. I need to do less or I will not heal. I have trouble sitting still. I don't want to post the horrible details about this day. I will just let all of you know I am still with the living.

StiringWendel

Swissmiss, please take care of yourself! I'm so sorry you are having to go through this. Thanks for checking in, and please (PLEASE!) listen to your doctor.

I've had a very busy few days but want to welcome the new posters while I'm here. And thank you 2BLean for the details on CLX. I might give it a try later this year. I'm curious to hear of your results.

I had a tough weekend where there wasn't a second of both days that I didn't want to be dieting, but I managed to get through it. I don't know what was up with me, but I guess those moments are to be expected. Yesterday and today have been much better. And I didn't give in, so it has been nearly two months since I've had any 'cheats'.

But now I'm in the process of slowly increasing my calories. I know this sounds strange, but without giving in to the junk food I'm craving, I'm actually finding this to be a bit difficult. But I think I want to take my calories up to 1500 (about 200 more than I'm eating now) and hold them there while I try to lose these last five pounds. I want to get used to eating this amount of calories (1500) because I believe that is about the amount I'll be able to eat when I'm not working out if I want to maintain my weight. I also think that beginning next month I'll probably relax a little bit on what I'm eating. I don't ever want to return to daily doses of chocolate (okay, I WANT to, but I know it's best for me not to!), but I think the odd glass of wine every now and again will make me feel more....human. I think that's what I was missing this weekend.

Hope this finds everybody doing well. And, again, Swissmiss, thanks for checking in. Take it easy!

2BLean

StiringWendel ~ No problem on the info. I will keep you posted! I'm hoping for great results, especially with the LEAN phase coming up. Currently in my last week of the PUSH phase and then onto the LEAN phase.

Hope everyone is doing great and Swissmiss, I hope your recovery is going good! :flowerforyou:

Swissmiss

StiringWendel--I have never thought about moving up to a higher calorie count as I reach my goal. That makes sense. This will get your body accustom to where it will be. I have been watching closely what I am eating as I am not active now. It hasn't been hard. Not much of an appetite and no way of getting to the store to buy cravings.:laugh:

singfree

As I become more fit, I find that I need to up the intensity of my workouts to feel like I worked hard enough. Also, I need to be thankful for small gains (in fitness, not weight). I am considering upping my cals a bit to see what happens. I'll keep you posted.

gnastro

Hi Caranne,
I know what you are dealing with and completely understand. I'm 42 and exercising also, it is so frustrating.I need to lose 15 lbs. I have pants for work that are too tight to wear. Eventhough the scale doesn't change are your clothes looser?You have to be very careful about the amount of sodium in your diet. You can retain fluid and it will show up as weight on the scale eventhough it is water weight.My problem is working out 5- 6days for an hour and not cheating at all takes it toll.I stick to chicken , cottage cheese, vegetables, fruit and turkey sometimes.It gets so mundane and if heaven forbid you have a couple of french fries or an occasion ice cream with your kid I gain 2 lbs. AAAAhhhhh.
As I get older my metabolism is slowing down, try weight lifting it helps speed up your metabolism. Don't give up you need to get healthier that is what I keep telling myself.

StiringWendel

singfree, it is interesting you mentioned that about your workouts because I've been experiencing the same feeling over the past couple of weeks with my cardio workouts. I'm still challenging myself with weights, but because I do cardio using my body as my resistance tool (step aerobics, kickboxing, etc), I'm finding it harder and harder to feel really challenged with my cardio. A couple days ago I was doing intervals on my step and trying to figure out why it seemed so easy (which I normally would NEVER say about interval training), and I actually think, in part, the weight loss (since my body is my resistance) has resulted in the workouts seeming easier (because I'm not hauling around the extra 18 pounds right now). I think the other part is that the endurance weight training I'm doing for my lower body right now is really, really effective. So I'm going to be looking for ways of upping my intensity a little bit as well. I hate machines, so I think I might try to find a way of doing my pylometrics or something.

As far as upping my calories, the one thing I've read/heard in a few places is that when trying to lose the last little bit, it really is important to keep the calories up and NEVER below your BMR. But, for me, this isn't so much about losing those last five pounds right now. I'm upping my calories because I really want to create a more sustainable lifestyle for me without all the crap food (or as much of it as I previously enjoyed). And, for me, it is amazing how I'm viewing these extra 100 calories I've been eating these past couple of days. Today I had a sandwich with lean turkey and swiss cheese for lunch--on normal slices of whole wheat bread (as opposed to the low calorie bread that looks like doll bread). I was so excited all morning thinking I was going to be eating a normal size sandwich for lunch!! To me, that's a good thing to recognize. And I feel completely full and satisfied. And I need to remember that as well. I can live off these calories, and I need to know that before I move on into full maintenance mode (where I'll eat back my exercise calories in addition to the 1400-1600 that my body burns a day). But based on my past experience with weight gain, it is critical for me to know that eating 1500 calories a day is perfectly easy, healthy and will give me plenty to keep going for those times when I can't workout.

It might take me a little bit longer to lose these extra five pounds because I'm doing this (and maybe not....I don't know), but I'm okay with that because this is ultimately much better for me right now than losing the five pounds and going back to how I was eating before. In a year or two, I'd be right back where I was in January. And I don't want to go back!!

Hope you are feeling better today, Swissmiss! And hope everybody is enjoying their day.

singfree

I think that we condition ourselves to a certain way of thinking (lo cal, lo cal, lo cal), and when we should eat more, we feel guilty. I know that I am on the right track now, and eating more good quality food is going to help me. Isn't it amazing that we are talking about aerobic being easy? What a great life!

Swissmiss

Thanks for the info, StiringWendel--before I had the surgery I only had seven pounds to go to reach my next goal. I had cut back more on my calories hoping to achieve this. It didn't work. I think I should have upped them instead. I am hoping that with what I have going through and it causing my to somewhat loss my appetite that I haven't gained any. I am planning on weighing myself after my doctor appointment tomorrow if I feel up to it.

singfree

Swissmiss, I hope you are doing well. Your 40+ friends are pulling for you.

singfree

ALF...if you are checking in, how's the weather in PR? Have a great time.

ontheedge50

Good golly!!!! I've never worked so hard to lose 3 lbs. But it's 3 lbs. less to pack around! YAY!!!

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