Am I making decent progress?

Oh, my YES! Your stomach is MARKEDLY smaller, and all the cellulite on your legs is gone. Well done, keep up the good work!

Huge difference! Get some Lutein in your diet, your eyes are going. :laugh: :bigsmile: :flowerforyou:

Definite progress! Well done

This is a journey that takes more or less time depending on so many factors, part of the mindset to get rid of is the comparative one. We compare our "value" by our health or our likelihood to survive (articles like 'people who do this are 40 percent more or less likely to die sooner rather than later" abound), and we compare our health against the average. Some fat people are very healthy (Specific sports folks for example). I got my bloodwork and everything checked on in 2011 and on paper, I looked like a normal healthy person, thankfully age still on my side. But I was 315 or so pounds at 5'10", deemed Morbidly Obese, and had a very low esteem and sense of self worth. So, that having been said, Health is not the sole factor that will determine a worthwhile cause and results-driven mindset.

Every time I tried to lose weight because I thought I needed to be healthy, accepted, and worthy of physical and emotional connections, I failed over and over. Yoyoing up and down, all in the Morbid Obesity category. I used MFP to take a scientific approach to my results, not curious why I wasn't losing as quickly as others, but just curious on what time scale and results my body would react. I somewhat wrote down my data from as early as 2008 at my peak weight of 347 lbs. I'm sure I hit above 350 a time or two, though I rarely could bear the thought of going and checking on the scale. But most of my documentation which will be revealed when I hit my goal of 173 lbs (50% of my original weight) with most of my detailing of the data taken since May of 2012 is rather fascinating to see the consistencies of my body at work. Like a giant slide at the fair, having bumps along the way, but generally working down.

4.5 years later, just today in fact, I hit 200 on the scale for the first time. 54 months, 24 of those devoted to any real effort in losing rather than maintaining or avoiding upward trends was my bodies time frame. 4.5 years seems so short now, but at the beginning, first taking in and trying to understand the monumental effort that would be required to save myself from myself and look as normal as I did on paper, I'd most assuredly say "F**k it.*. Often I did, so instead, I walked. I've walked several thousand miles over the last 4 years, low-impact being the key, and only in the last year getting the diet right too (which was the last of my emotional baggage to reduce, as in my addiction to food), and I didn't care if it'd kill me because I was dying in my body anyway, didn't care if people believed in me because I knew the science behind calories in and calories out, and didn't care about the inconveniences in my life to walk everywhere I went because I was tired of the inconveniences of tying my shoes, reaching down to touch a swimming pool, river, ocean or lake water that was recessed from the level on which I stood, etc.

The good news, my friend, is this. It is scientifically inevitable if you stick with MFP. You may or may not choose to eventually log every day or consult with friends for encouragement or all the things we feel we know we should do, but if you do, you really can't fail. The bad news, is it all comes down to What is your body's Time? It is not short, but thankfully, 150 lbs lost over 4 years isn't that long either and is perfectly reasonable. Needing to lose less makes it more so. Do what you can to remove the emotional pressures, set up systems to keep you reliable that don't involve deciding whether you feel like it (Read encouraging literature, constantly peruse people's success stories so you begin to know what its like to tell them, and respect what you think about yourself as much as what you think about other people). Even if it took ten years, would it be worth it? 20 years? if it buys you 1 more year on this earth, is it worth it? Only you can answer that for yourself, but I can positively encourage you by saying that when you decide that yes, it is worth it, and yes, you can put systems in place to safeguard yourself from self sabotage, then you will not be wondering why it took you so long. People will be wondering why they are compared to you. You've got this. Forget who you compare yourself with and you'll have a pleasant comparison to your earlier self before you even realize it.

Stay strong, each day is your renewed chance to find the beauty and strength in yourself that you must first discover in your own mind before those close friends or mere acquaintances you come in contact with will discover about you and will inevitably find particularly self-evident about you.

Neil