I'm smile4hope and really need friends

Hi there Simle4hope! Welcome.

I wish you the best. You can do it.

I just posted my success story http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/732679-what-the-venus-index-workout-did-for-me-with-pics so that is a bit about me.

Most people here are pretty supportive and it's fun making friends from around the world and we all help each other out. Different people have different ways of doing things (some say eat less, some say eat more). Only you can decide calories, base it on how you feel and what the scale trend is doing, not what anyone here tells you to do. You can always gradually notch your calories up or down by 100 and see how you do. It takes some experimentation to find what works for YOU. What worked for the next person may not work for you just because it did for them.

People like to give advice. Remember this is about YOU. You deciding what to do with your body. You making food and calories choices. You own it not them. Experiment and find what works for you, and always give it a bit of time to see what really happens.

Your body loses weight in chunks, not linear. I have found that you can do everything right and your weight loss seems to plateau but you are patient and keep exercising and eating at a deficit (however slight) you will lose it, it will suddenly "whoosh". There are so many variables for the scale though: water retention, digestion, allergies, sodium, carbs, water intake, DOMS, inflammation, the list goes on. People mistakenly think they lose or gain weight when they eat more or less because of these fluctuations

The scale is a trend tool. The scale is good but put it away and only check once a week and only use it as a trend tool, the same with other metrics. Take front, side, and back progress pictures at least once a month. You will see differences that the metrics won't tell you and it's that little bit of NSV that will keep you going until the next victory.

I hope this helps.
-Ro

Good luck and feel free to add me x