Week 3 of working out and my knees are killing me! Help!

I agree with Wendy on her points of making sure youre not over-doing it too quickly. I have a knee problem as well and im 189lbs, its something youll have to find the right exercises that wont make it hurt too bad. I wince if Im told to do lunges! Just keep at it and know that the smaller you get, the less it will hurt.

Try exercises that are easier on your joints...swimming, walking, or even the elliptical! As you get stronger, high impact exercises will get easier and less painful. Good luck!

When I was heavier, I started with Leslie Sansone indoor walking DVD's. They burn lots of calories, but are not too stressful on the body and joints. Good for you for exercising though!:flowerforyou:

I had been doing turbo jam and zumba and after a couple of weeks my knees started to give me probs. So a good friend suggested Leslie Sansone and I started that tonight, just finished actually. Very low impact and was actually fun because I was able to keep up Good luck!

I started at 356, and my knees felt like they were stabbing me with razor blades when I tried to do anything too involved. Start out very slowly. I went for walks until they felt a little more limber, and then I started doing Turbo Jam and followed the low impact instructions (there are two instructors on the screen who do modifications you can follow).

If you have access to a pool, I highly recommend swimming. You'll still get a great workout, but it isn't a "load-bearing" exercise.

Make sure you get fit for a good pair of walking shoes. Not everyone is built the same, and they'll examine your stride so they can get you into shoes that give you the correct support and cushioning. I kept getting shin splints and ankle pain because I over-pronate. It took a good pair of shoes to give me support where I need it and correct my stride.

Don't forget to stretch (gently).

I'm not sure what's causing the headaches. Headaches can be a symptom of SO many things. Are you staying hydrated?

There is a lot of good advice about going more low impact. One piece of advice that helped me was to stretch my hip flexors and over time using the hip flexor machines with weights. This relieved all of my pain in the knees. Good luck.

The pain is your body telling you to STOP and slow down--you'd better heed the warning or you won't even be able to function normally throughout your day, then were will you be? You are really piling on the exercise--how is your healthy eating going? You're not using exercise to compensate for your eating habits, are you?

In the beginning, dropping the pounds is more about what and how you eat--that should be your main focus. Then when your knees recover, start out slow (i.e. walking, low/no impact) as the weight comes off, working out will become easier on your joints.
Using MPF to track your food intake is key at this stage of the game...I know you want the weight GONE NOW (we all would like that to happen), but pushing yourself to injury isn't the way to go. Take a breath, eat healthy, ease into exercise and the weight will come off. You can and WILL do this.

I would definitely consult a doctor about what exercise (and how much) is suitable for you. I totally empathize, here; I'm trying to lose 125-130 lbs (140-144, if we're counting from my highest weight of 279 lbs), and I avoid anything that has me bouncing up and down. Right now I'm just burning a lot through strength training, which I highly recommend because there are a lot of low impact options in strength training, and it does double duty: it gets your heart pumping and calories burning, and also builds muscle that both supports your joints and raises your calories burned at rest. Aside from that, I throw in some fairly easy walking at 70% of my maximum heart rate (for me, that's about 135 bpm) to stay in the "fat burning" zone.

Aside from that, I agree that for high intensity cardio, replacing some of your activities with time on an elliptical (that also has moving handles so you can work your arms. The one up at my rec centre also has an "arm blaster" feature that forces you to really push with your arms for short bursts). The elliptical will give you a good burn, without gravity bringing your weight down repeatedly on the knees.

Last, but not least: look into exercise classes at your local pool. The ones in the deep water are what will really give you a workout (I'm not a swimmer; they had float belts you can wear), there is more room to adjust your own intensity and go at your own pace (I'm not encouraging you to go slow, here. What I mean is, paddle and kick as hard as you can). I'm currently off work for disability issues right now, and last August I started back with exercise and rehabilitation by going to "Chronic Disease Management" classes, funded by my local health authority, at the local rec centre pool. I built crazy amounts of muscle, more than I ever had even in my prior lifting days. It's also great because it's a relief on all of the joints. The water removes most of the gravity from the equation. I have now graduated to land exercises again.