What's the single biggest change you've made?

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Replies

  • TheVimFuego
    TheVimFuego Posts: 2,412 Member
    A dead heat between quitting grains and starting resistance training.
  • pedraz
    pedraz Posts: 173
    Exercise! Exercise! Exercise! It's made all the difference. Also, cutting way back ( not completely ) on milk and wheat products. I almost never eat bread or cereal anymore and pasta is just an occasional fling. i feel soooooo much less bloated. Try it you'll like it!

    PS, i never drink juices or sodas or flavoured anything and never have. I have not given up my evening aperatif and weekend wine or beer with din din. I do have my limits you know!
  • Heather_Rider
    Heather_Rider Posts: 1,159 Member
    two best this i ever did was buy a food scale, and started running.

    Biggest changes i have made... pretty much everything! I quit smoking and researched exercise machines and bought an elliptical a year before i even started this. (No room for excuses, so make sure you have none!) I gave up fast food, soda (i have one on cheat day on occasion!) only drink on saturday nights now (i used to drink more than 18 beers every day) i stopped drinking my calories, i have increased my fruits and veggies and more than anything at all.. ive changed my outlook on life!
  • Alast
    Alast Posts: 33
    More sport!
  • pedraz
    pedraz Posts: 173
    two best this i ever did was buy a food scale, and started running.

    Biggest changes i have made... pretty much everything! I quit smoking and researched exercise machines and bought an elliptical a year before i even started this. (No room for excuses, so make sure you have none!) I gave up fast food, soda (i have one on cheat day on occasion!) only drink on saturday nights now (i used to drink more than 18 beers every day) i stopped drinking my calories, i have increased my fruits and veggies and more than anything at all.. ive changed my outlook on life!

    Wow! I'm holding on to this one for awhile. VERY inspiring! Good you!
  • jennifleurb
    jennifleurb Posts: 97
    Before joining MFP, my husband and I became Pescatorians - we only eat fish (no livestock or poultry). Since joining in the past few weeks, I would say my biggest changes have been to cut out wine, drinking mostly water and starting couch25K (which I love!).
  • rachelroma
    rachelroma Posts: 22 Member
    Recently went paleo. Not able to do excessive amounts of exercise, but since I gave up the wheat and white sugar the weight is coming off anyway.
  • mattgreenwich
    mattgreenwich Posts: 2 Member
    I gave up diet coke completely - I was drinking about 4-6 litres a day, costing me an absolute fortune! Now I only drink water and feel much better for it. Also, actually doing exercise! I swim about 4/5 times a week now.
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    i do regular exercise! and dont always eat what i fancy just because i fancy it!
  • juicygurl1
    juicygurl1 Posts: 195 Member
    Cutting out Wine :-( I love really good wine and I was drinking almost every day while cooking then have another with dinner, wow those calories added up quick. I always had a snack of cheese with these glasses because it tasted and paired great. The amount of calories I consumed with wine and cheese was more or the same as my dinner which I never missed wow no wonder I was super-sized. I was in denial that I would work off those snacks. The more I ate and drank the lazier I became and found the TV entertaining me. Not good there is so much I can do without being ashamed of my appearance; going to the beach is not humiliating neither is riding my bike.
  • happyfeetrebel1
    happyfeetrebel1 Posts: 1,005 Member
    Tons of water so I stay hydrated

    A LOT less carbs. Not specifically LOW carb, but just less crap carbs. If carbs from fruit, I don't care, but if they're carbs from crap, I try not to. The less I eat them, the less I crave them; and the better I feel :)

    Oh, and a TON of vitamins. After bloodwork, I was hideously deficient in a lot of stuff, the vitamins have helped amazingly!
  • misskarenq
    misskarenq Posts: 10 Member
    Wow, I'm so glad I posted this! What great responses, and I'm so inspired to see other people's goals, lifestyle changes and weight loss journeys. Sweetened drinks seem to be the most popular villain - LOL! Thank you all for sharing your experiences :love:
  • diver71_au
    diver71_au Posts: 424 Member
    To bring it all to one single change ....

    I joined MFP - made some good friends who have helped me stay focused and make the other changes stick.


    Minor changes:
    Exercise .... no longer do I spend all day at my desk at work and then log onto the net as soon as I get home.
    Food .... 1) Portion size - if the pack says serves 4 I freeze 3/4 of it for later .... previously I used to eat a "man sized portion" (assuming that the man was 4 times as big as the average person) - 2) I cut out my morning donut and sausage roll - 3) I no longer have KFC or McDs 3-4 times a week.
    Drinks .... my daily "soda" has been replaced with water .... my daily beer replaced with water .... my daily tea ... well that is still tea but now it is weak with less than half a sugar.
  • Nurturegirl
    Nurturegirl Posts: 82 Member
    The biggest change is cutting portion size to approximately half of what I used to eat.
  • xSophia19
    xSophia19 Posts: 1,536 Member
    Ive cut out the fizzzy pop!! Back in high school i used to drink like 3 - 6 bottles of fizzy pop a day! It was for about a year!! I gained soo much weight, ive had to have a few fillings in my teeth because the amount of sugar has just rotted them away! And i made myself not buy anymore and drink anymore and see how i could cope without it. Amd 3 years down the line, i never drink fizzy pop! I dont really like it anymore! Water is much nicer and healthier :)
  • Lumett
    Lumett Posts: 29 Member
    Reading labels, getting enough protein and most of all I exercise every day,
    I love swimming so that helps HUGELY as vigorous exercise doesn't feel like a chore
  • rainbow4113
    rainbow4113 Posts: 1
    I only drink water all day and one iced coffee. I switched from cream to milk in my coffee as well. I don't feel hungry as often because I am drinking 80-100 ounces of water a day. It really makes a big difference in the hunger.
  • sho3girl
    sho3girl Posts: 10,799 Member
    6 out of 7 days a week exercise before and after work :smile:

    MFP (honorary mention)
  • nzmila
    nzmila Posts: 2 Member
    I cut out unnatural sugars. Fruits and all that are okay, but I used to add sugar to everything. Now I like the taste of a latte with no sugar in it.
  • dhakiyya
    dhakiyya Posts: 481 Member
    Stopping undereating. I didn't realise that I used to do that until I started tracking my calories. I lose my appetite sometimes (due to mental health issues) and I used to go through long phases of undereating, then suddenly get hungry and eat a lot. The combination of the two meant that what I ate on the hungry days was stored as fat all around my waist.

    By ensuring that I eat enough calories even when I've lost my appetite, I no longer have phases of overeating and I've lost more than 10 inches from around my waist.

    Most people don't realise how much undereating can sabotage you. I was already eating reasonably healthily and doing exercise before I realised this about undereating. So that was the biggest change that led to me successfully losing the weight.
  • lkcuts
    lkcuts Posts: 224
    cutting out white flour as much as possible andthe #1 thing weighing and measuring all my food..every day all the time. Portion size for me was way out of whack. ate WAY more than I should have. cut WAY down on eating out cook as fresh as I can.less processed foods. turns out if I cook fresh , I can have alot more to eat for my cals! love it.
  • cleanandlean2012
    cleanandlean2012 Posts: 71 Member
    I only eat natural products or items with no more than six ingredients. I have cut out all sugar, refined products and heavy carbs - breads, pasta, pastry. (I have not had alcohol in 17 years, bar one glass!). I have one meal a week where I have anything I want, but I have still found I can't eat heavy carbs, so my preference is good quality chocolate :)

    I am going for a clean and lean (James Duigan), lifestyle change. So far 19 days in and 12lbs down. only minimal exercise as I injured my back and I am currently on heavy painkillers. BUT I will be running in a 10k on 7th October, hence starting to walk again.
  • fizzletto
    fizzletto Posts: 252 Member
    My biggest victory so far I believe is stopping snacking when I'm not hungry.

    I used to snack on really unhealthy things (crisps (potato chips), chocolate, biscuits (cookies), sweets (candy), cereal, ice cream) throughout the day, every day. It just seemed like my mouth got bored of having nothing to do so I would be constantly grazing on something whilst going about my daily activities. I know I wasn't really hungry, because if I was snacking and you suggested to me "have a piece of fruit", I wouldn't be interested. Also, I was eating 3 full meals a day, with overly big portion sizes, so I can't have been hungry.

    I began weaning myself off of the snacks by chewing gum all day long. It gave my mouth something to do so I wasn't thinking about snacking. Sooner or later, I would be able to only have one or two pieces of gum a day, until I stopped eating it altogether.

    Now I only eat snacks when I have to up my calorie intake, and it's usually fruit, frozen yoghurt instead of ice cream, low-calorie cereal bars instead of biscuits, and low-calorie baked snacks or cassava snacks instead of crisps.

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