I'm having troubles... :(

Welcome back and congratulations for making the commitment to become a healthier you! Trying to balance dieting with your busy schedule shouldn't be a hard thing to achieve, it may take a little while to work out what is best for you but once you do everything should fall into place.

In terms of exercising and cooking healthy meals here are a couple of things you can try:

1. If you have a car leave it at home, try walking to your destinations or combine walking with public transportation. If you need the car, and I use to do this when I was at university park the car further away and walk. Because my university was on a hill, I use to park at the bottom of the hill, 100 metres or so down the street and walk up to my classes.

2. If option 1 doesn't suit, you could youtube some exercise programs. I haven't personally used them, but I have heard others have and with great success. Plus the beauty is they don't cost you anything to watch and you can do them at any time of the day.

3. Pre plan your meals and get yourself some really good cookbooks. Jump onto Amazon and search student cookbooks - you can find really good ones that are dirt cheap and they have some amazing recipes in them all designed for people wanting to prepare meals on a budget. Also recipe websites - Australia has a great one - www.taste.com.au which has some fantastic recipes which you can print off. Maybe pre-planning what you are going to eat during the day and also food which are lower in sugar and have a low GI (low GI food will help keep you fuller for longer and slowly release energy into your system rather than all in one hit) will help with the cravings as well.

4. This is probably the most important one .... create a circle of positive friends who will help encourage and motivate you and stay positive! This is something you and and you can do it

Good luck with your journey and please feel free to add me if you would like some support

When I used to workout 4 times a week at the gym (I can't right now due to having major abdominal surgery 2 wks.ago) I would get up a couple hours early and go workout before my day began. If you can't go to the gym because of the cost, you can always purchase a dvd from Jillian Michaels or other fitness experts (I have 2) and workout at home.

This site is very helpful in keeping you accountable to yourself and if you have an open diary others can make helpful comments to eating more nutritiously. I have an open diary and am on here every day.

I understand not having much money. My husband live on my disability and his social security and that's not much coming in each month. Canned veggies and fresh fruits and veggies are pretty cheap at stores like Aldi's.

Feel free to add me for support and encouragement. Feel free to message me.

Hello,

I don't want this to come off as mean, but to be honest.... as with any addiction or bad habit, you have to REALLY want it for it to work. I think we have all been in your shoes at one time or another, I have yo-yo dieted many times myself. Always found the week was easy and the weekends were awful and would derail all my efforts during the week. I always made excuses to myself and refused to ever start on any day but Monday. So, if I had a bad day on say Wed, I would just screw the rest of the week and start fresh on Monday. Not really the right way to go about it. Have a bad day, get right back on it the next, it will happen.. move on.

For many, something triggers the motivation and strength needed to stick with it (pictures, health scare, etc). Someone else doing the healthy thing or exercising often doesn't work. I know my husband started running 6 years ago and tried and tried to get me to join him. I made excuse after excuse, we are now running together and I'm kicking his butt.

It's something only you can truly figure out. What do you want and how badly do you want it? What is your motivation? Is it something you can use to keep yourself going? Find exercises you enjoy doing to start out with, it's much easier to stick with them that way.

You can do this, you just have to decide for yourself it's something you want to do and dig deep for the motivation to keep it going. Don't let one bad day derail a week's worth of efforts... get back on the horse.

Good luck to you!!

Having trouble,

I know the feeling about cravings.... About 2-3 months ago, I started logging everything I ate. I was so surprised at how much I ate from maybe 4pm til sleep.

It is NOT easy, but I had to change my routine, so I planned dinner, made it, cleaned up. While I did that, I counted 1 serving of whatever it was I was craving. If it said 9 chips, I took out 9 chips. After I cleaned up, I had to go do something different. I started with a project upstairs away from food. Not very exciting, but it started to work!

I am still having a hard time, but SO much easier, once you stop your bad habit. A habit is a habit. You have to use all the willpower and brainpower to change what you are doing-go outside, go clean the garage, go make phone calls, do paperwork-anything different to avoid the same old habit of eating what you are craving.

THEN, you start to feel proud of your changes and proud of logging a good day : ) good luck. Change the habit!!! you can do it.

One thing to remember is that you can't just make it a diet. It needs to be a life style. It's best to get rid of the junk food so it's not around to tempt you. There are so many other alternatives that are just as tasty, too! This might help you out some. http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu46/freefallingwithfate/snace.jpg