*** Supportive Friends -- Looking to Release 50+ Pounds ***

@Ron, I think it would take a heck of a lot to tear me away from my man! But thanks for the offer.... :blushing:

Damn! Hopes dashed again!! Still, on the upside, it means I can hang on to my wife for a little while longer............. (It would cost me a fortune to get rid of her. As I said to her on our 30th, if I'd killed her instead of marrying her I'd be a free man now :explode: )

@skatergirl33 - welcome! This is a great thread - glad you found it inspiring. re: the tracking of food - I can't speak highly enough of it (doesn't mean I always do it as well as I should but hey - we can't be perfect all the time!) Stick with the tracking and mix the exercise up a bit - that way you can still run but do other things as well to take the pressure off your feet.

@meg - congratulations on the run yesterday - you did so well and lapped all of those sat on the couch! The Jillian Michaels DVD that I'm doing with weights is No More Trouble Zones which is a variety of exercise routines - the majority of which require weights (or tins of baked beans if you don't have proper weights:laugh: ).

@rdcphone - yep, that's the problem that I have - if left to my own devices, none of the fruit and veg that we grow would ever make it into the house for cooking with. Particularly the raspberries and strawberries! Talking of apples, I think there is a small apple tree in the garden as well but not sure - looking forward to finding out. It all makes it sound like a huge garden and it's not - a bypical new(ish) build in the UK with an ok sized garden - but the people before us have designed it to make best use of the space.

@ron - you are so right not to be bothered by the odd 30-40 extra calories for a one off day - sounds like your supper was good enough to make it worth it. You are of scottish persuasion? Where abouts are you from?

Well, I've got my session in on the cross trainer today - did the High Impact Interval programme which I have heard is better all round for you than just the standard programme. Did a 32 minute session and was pleasantly surprised by the calories burnt. Going to get back to the fitness DVD's tomorrow - I no longer have the excuse that all my husbands office is in the room whilst we decorate and my earlier weekend achiness (spellng?) is easing - so no excuses girl, get on with it. We have a friend coming round this afternoon (an Arsenal fan who wants to watch the last match of the season without his daughter grumbling about how boring it is!) and I've made ginger cake - as long as I only take a small slice, I should be able to get away with it. Have a great Sunday everyone!

@skatergirl33, welcome! How long have you been running? I've been at it a couple months now, and you probably saw my pics from my first 5K ever yesterday Have you tried different shoes to see if that helps with your feet hurting? I had a pair of Nike's that I started in but my feet were hurting too, so I got a new pair of shoes that were wider (I have "square" feet lol), and they are so much better. No foot pain now. The brand I ended up with was Adidas.

@Ron, hey, 30 years! That's great :happy: My hubby and are among very few people these days who can say their parents have been married that long or longer (his for 39 years, mine for 36).

@Jane, good job getting your workout in. You should have room for a piece of that ginger cake. Have fun watching your game! Have to say, I am not a sports fan at all, so I'm really thankful my hubby isn't either! Otherwise I'd be like your friends daughter, complaining that it is boring... lol. Although... hubby gets into the video games a little too much sometimes. That does get boring.

Well I had a little NSV this morning, along with a scale related one as well. 1 lb loss today, yay! And the NSV was I pulled a shirt from the "it will fit someday" section of my closet, and put it on. And apparently someday is today. This shirt is pretty much brand new condition, however, it's about 3 years old. I bought it the last time I lost weight, but it was still too snug to call comfortable. So it sat in my closet. And the best part about this, it's a size Large. No X! Granted, it's a t-shirt, so it's kind of forgiving, but it is a fitted one.

@meg - 32 years actually. Can't say they've been the happiest of my life, as I said earlier to Steph, my wife's post natal depression drove a big wedge in our relationship which has never been healed. But I was determined my son would not suffer being from a broken home so we stuck it out and now we've reached a sort of arrangement which would be very difficult to break. If I'm honest, and we had no children, I would have given it five years max. But there you are, and on the bright side, we could be making two other people unhappy right now :happy: Sorry if I sound cynical, but I am! Probably got a lot to do with my overeating and previous low self esteem. (Fortunately work has given me that back at least).

@Steph - Glad you're feeling better. You stick up for yourself, I know marriage is a compromise, but if you compromise too much you only become embittered, not a good way to go. Better to get it out in the open and stake your claims.

Hey everyone!

@meg - oh my, running backwards sounds tough! You are really doing great with the progressive nature of your exercise. Really nice!

@stephanie - going farther than you did in October sounds like the right direction. I bet if you keep asking for help with the family, you will get it. My husband had to be asked real real often at first and now he does the laundry every week without prompting...this makes me happy and that makes us all happier! Lol!

@ron - my in-laws have been together over 52 years...my father-in-law says he's still trying to "learn" her...never give up! Also, your being Scottish sounds interesting...you should tell us more about that culture....

@jane - I can't wait to hear about the bounty. Take pictures if you have any vegetables that come out interesting in shape. In NC it is common to have contests about fruits and vegetables that look like famous people...Richard Nixon is a common winner...Lol!

Well, we cleaned the house and did our usual stuff for the weekend. We are both looking forward to some days off soon. I got my workout in late last night. I forgot I changed my days off from sat/sun to Thursday and Sunday. So, I had to jump up and get on the treadmill at nearly 9 pm to get it in but I did it. Felt victorious for doing that. I have a early morning project meeting that prevents me from working out on Thursday. I'm not a morning person really but need to do exercise first thing to be sure to get the time at least five days most of the time so I adjusted my days.

Have a great week folks!

@Meg - things are definitely getting a whole lot better on a personal front. My low year was 2010, due mainly to a major client keeping me hanging on with promises, then cancelling projects at short notice due to budget restraints so I ended up working (and earning) only about six months of the year. I think I did a lot of stress eating then! Things got better from February 2011 and continually improve. From a marriage point of view, don't get me wrong, we are good friends and sort of rub along together but I feel (and I'm sure she does too) there must be more to it than this. I notice a big difference when I'm with my family, sisters and mother, we just laugh non stop and I realise my life was always full of laughter (they do say it's the best medicine) but not in this marriage and I think that is what is missing, for whatever reason. However I am now full of optimism and feeling much better than I have for some years so the future looks pretty good.

@rdcphone572 - Although I was born there, I only lived in Scotland for the first ten years of my life so apart from drinking whisky I'm not very Scottish really. It's useful sometimes, in France for example, the English are not liked, so when asked if I am English I look offended and say "No, I'm Scottish". Traditionally and historically France and Scotland were allies against the common enemy England so the atmosphere immediately warms up! And they forgive my bad french!!

@jehan - Welcome back! And don't beat yourself up about losing it for a few days, sounds as if you had good reasons. Regarding eating your exercise calories, I think it depends what you set your activity level at. I am set at 'sedentary' so eat back most of my exercise calories (in the rare times I do exercise!), if I had set myself to lightly active I wouldn't and would probably have to do more exercise to warrant that level. Only you can tell, and it all comes down to what works for you. This works for me, I continue to lose about 3 lbs a week which is high, but then I have a lot to lose!

I'm away tomorrow and Wednesday, but only about a two hour drive from home so not too bad but I'll be in a restaurant tomorrow night......... Got a funny couple of weeks coming up, I'm off on Friday as my wife's cousin is arriving from Canada and she'll spend a week with us, Monday is a public holiday, then in theory I'm working next Tuesday/Wednesday but off again on Thursday for another long weekend. My sister also arrives from Africa next weekend, though she's not staying with us, so it's going to be busy!

Keep up the good work all :bigsmile:

@Loulou, welcome! Hope you do well on your way to getting fit.

@Ron, good to hear :happy: Have fun visiting with your family!

@Jehan, like Ron said, it depends on what activity level you have set. Mine is sedentary, so I eat back a portion, but not all, of my exercise calories. I have it set that way because I like having a baseline for days I don't work out. So if yours is set to something other than sedentary, you could change it to that to eat back your workouts.
Good luck with job interview! And don't worry to much about being away for a bit, we all have those times that things just don't go as well as we'd like.

@rdcphone, I'm not actually going to run backwards! lol, I guess I didn't say it the right way. I'm running my course in the opposite direction :bigsmile: Good work making sure to get your exercise in!

Monday... Going to walk my son to school this morning, then do grocery shopping, and then work on making jar cozies (a little side income, a friend sells them at her tea shop), then walk to school to pick up my son, then make dinner for the family, then go for a run, then come home and relax! And this is a typical day off for me. LOL. Have a good week everyone!

@Loulou - welcome, told you this was a good thread :happy:

@Steph - She's from Edmonton, AB, she's been there since the late 60's but still has a thick Norfolk accent. My first wife had an aunt (and family) in Sexsmith - drive north west of Edmonton till you just about hit the Arctic circle and you're there! - always tickled me that their main produce was rape...... Drove once from Vancouver through Jasper to Calgary and up via Edmonton to Sexsmith to visit, but a long, long time ago. Fantastic trip though, stopping along the Frazer river to watch the salmon jump the falIs and Jasper was something else. I was very disappointed to find the Mounties didn't wear the red uniforms and the funny hats though! Had a strange experience outside Calgary (the stampede was on, all the motels were full, and we were desperate for somewhere to stay, ended up in a .......town?......dorp?.... called Stony Plain. It was kinda like the wild west. Weird hotel with drunk people and no locks on the doors. I'll tell you about it sometime :laugh:) You Canadians are crazy Strangest thing about that trip was we'd been all through the US, southern states mainly from FL to CA for about four weeks, we were even starting to differentiate accents, and when we got to Canada they all sounded English in comparison!

Also @Steph - don't envy you your commute (tube?). I've had various contracts in London involving a 40 minute train to Charing Cross then, usually, a tube journey. the worst two being Kensington High Street and Hammersmith, or Canon Street and the City (at least that is walkable). Fortunately the last London one I did was a couple of years from 2001 at Universal Pictures in firstly the Ark, Hammersmith, then we moved to Oxford Street which was a damn sight easier. Since then I've been fortunate enough to be outside London and able to drive, and/or work from home.

Seriously though folks, someone is going to have to have a word with Meg's ponytailed husband and see if he can't hit her off button for a while. She's running hither and thither like a demented running thing, and showing us all up to be lazy and useless. I'm getting embarassed seeing "Meg has burned 50000 calories running around at top speed like a demented running thing", I feel just so inadequate. Gotta love her though, she's putting everything into this (Only joking Meg, we're full of admiration really!)

OK time to get to bed as I really need to be up at 5 am if I'm to avoid the worst of the traffic. Night all :yawn:

@RON! You really made me laugh out loud! I'm still laughing as I type this out! Now if anyone knew where my off switch was, it might actually be kind of nice. All this working out has given me so much energy, so I work out some more, then have more energy... You could say I'm siphoning it off my kids. They can't keep up with me anymore. In fact, as we were riding bikes to school one day last week, I told my older son to slow down for his wimpy mama, and he said "You're not a wimp Mom!" High praise from a 9 year old boy!

@Jane, glad I can be an inspiration! Funny story about organization. As a teenager, I always had things in my room very neat and tidy, it was unusual to find any sort of mess in my room. I know, a teenage girl whose bedroom floor was visible, who'd think they'd ever see that? Anyway, because of my (self diagnosed) OCD, and always clean bedroom, my dad used to come in and hang out. Just because it was clean (should have seen my siblings rooms!). I had saved up money and bought myself a futon, and he would just sit down on that and read a book. I thought it was funny, but it didn't bother me :laugh:

Well, my HRM finally arrived! I'm excited to test it out on my walk to school, then my run later this evening.

Hi guys, I’m very much here (mfp), back on it 100%, eating right, exercising (commuting every day), AND running whenever my work schedule will allow…though recently it hasn’t allowed it. I’m doing a 10K in July, so I’m absolutely committed to keeping that up. I’ve sorted out my foot niggles by getting better more supportive shoes for work so I can still power-walk without doing myself any damage.
Life is pretty hectic right now, work is manic, at home with my parents things are still really tense, and I’m seriously house-hunting for a house/flat share for me so I can move out soon. Doing viewings etc is adding to the hectic-ness but hopefully it’ll help things calm down in the long run.
Bf has moved, settled into his new job, new flat, and things are generally a bit calmer on that front. I very much look forward to reclaiming some quieter weekends once my own situation has calmed down a bit.
As I say, work is hectic, and my evenings are hectic, as when I’m actually home at a sensible time, I’m looking for houses/sorting out phone contracts/whatever other busy-ness needs doing! So I’m not on this thread as much as I’d like to be. I’m sorry I’m not providing much support, the only times I get onto mfp is via my phone/ipad when commuting/in 5 mins between work stuff, so if you need some extra support feel free to friend me, otherwise I’ll pop in and out when I can on here!
Hope you’re all doing great xxx