Short and Chunky and Loss of Inspiration....

Since you mention "steps", I figured you would like to read this. I, too, believe steps are the perfect way to get into a weight loss (or new lifestyle routine).

By following these, I have lost 10lbs in 6weeks, I still eat fast food every once in a while though. I am age 26, height is 4 feet 9 inches, and I currently weight 177 (started at 187 May 17th). I weigh myself on Mondays.

You should take each change one step at a time and allow your body to adjust to each step. Give it time, roughly 2-4 weeks.

To do this correctly, you first must find out how much fat is in your body, and how many calories your body takes to maintain it's weight. We find out the Body Fat Percentage first, go here and fill out the form;
http://www.freedieting.com/tools/body_fat_calculator.htm

Next we need a Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) calculator, I like this one;
http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

When you filled it out, you know how many calories you should consume. You can start out as "Fat Loss" or "Extreme Fat loss." Try this for about 2-3 weeks (I did it for a month) and see if you lost anything. If you feel ill during this, try incorporating some protein (about 40-50g a day), protein curbs a lot of peoples appetite and cravings (it did with me).

Don't step on the scale a lot expecting extreme changes, this is unhealthy PERIOD. I stepped on the scale a lot, just with curiosity, but I didn't get too upset, and you shouldn't either. It takes your body at LEAST 2 weeks to adjust to anything. So give it time. Also losing 1-2lbs a week is very healthy. As most of us say "You didn't gain it all in one day, how can you expect to lose it all in one day?!"

Step 1; Week 1-4. Eat like you normally would, but with in your calorie goal for 4 weeks. You can weigh yourself, but do not count ANY weight loss until the last of of the 4 weeks. This weigh in will be your official first month weight loss. If you wish to push yourself a little harder, try training yourself to eat appropriate proportion sizes. An example of a proportioned dinner would be: 1/2 COOKED rice, 2-4 oz of lean meat, 3/4 fruit and/OR 1 cup veggie (I usually save my fruit for dessert later).

Step 2; Week 5-8.
If you haven't started proportioning your food, this is the next step to work on. Proportions are serving sizes. Meats are 2-4 oz, grains are 1/2 cup of what ever is cooked (potatoes fall under grains here), 1 cup for a veggie, and 3/4 cup for a fruit, dairy is 1/2 to 1 cup depending on your choice. Usually, I don't fret on the proportion sizes for fruit or veggies.

Also, during this time, you should start an exercise. For 2-3 days out of the week you need to do something active for 20-40 minutes. You can walk, run, you can even do some sort of outside chore (like push mowing the lawn). For whatever you choose, you need to be MOVING for at least 20 minutes. I KNOW this is a HARD thing for most people to do, but I will tell you, the weight loss is over DOUBLE than just sitting on your bum all day. No joke.

Step 3; Week 9-12.
Usually, by this time, many people should already been eating healthy. This is because you learn fast that healthy eating usually allows you to consume more food, but if you have not realized this yet, this is your next step. For the next 4 weeks, you should start eliminating a lot of processed foods such as frozen dinners, canned meals, fast food, and the ever loved junk food. You do not have to COMPLETELY shut this all out, we all know stuff is da B0MB to eat, but maybe try making some healthy meals for 3-5 days out of the week instead of relying on a company to provide you unhealthy meals. You will be amazed how heavy your wallet will get with this too. Or how much more food you can buy with your saved money.

Step 4; Week 13-16.
Have you lost a lot of weight so far? Maybe you should redo the TDEE and Body Fat calculators. Your body is probably ready for a new change by now. This month, you should start focusing on lifting weight if you haven't started yet. Weight lifting will build up your muscle while also burn extra fat. This is a good thing to do because a lot of people who have lost a LOT of weight become what a many us like to call "Skinny-Fat". This is when you are skinny, but your skin is flabby because there's nothing to "back it up", so it's wise to put something there, and muscle is the obviously the best choice.

Step 5; Week 17+
I sure hope by now that you have a lot of confidence and have gotten yourself into a routine! I hope you have also bought yourself some nice clothing too, I would have assumed you would need some with all the weight you have lost!

Hope these steps have helped you, or has given you an idea on where to start. Just remember, we're all different, and we're going to gain/lose different than someone else.

Well as my friends would call it...FLUFFY (not fat)! I am a new user and to be honest I don't have a lot of inspiration. I really do want to lose weight, but I guess I just don't feel the push. Slow steps though right?I am still taking the steps, but it hasn't been easy. I just thought maybe if I looked for new friends and see that other people are going through the same problems then maybe I might have more inspiration and not feel so alone to lose weight.

I am....
~Female
~27yo.
~5'5"-6"
~270lbs
~150lbs to go.

I'm a girl as well, in high school, and I'm only 5'0/5'1! I have about 87 pounds left before my goal.

I am going to give contrarian advice. I am not going to say YOU GO GIRL! And YOU CAN DO IT! And "just set up MFP to lose 1-2 pound a week."

I say: If you aren't too motivated, then why push it? Just use MFP to take inventory. Don't even think about weight loss just yet.

That's what I did when I first started. The goal at first isn't even to lose weight. It's to figure out where you are. See what you are doing well with and what areas need improving. Then you can decide if there is anything you want to change.

For me, I started logging my food and my fluid because I was thinking about WLS and I wanted to see where I was. And just the act of writing down what I was eating caused me to eat less. That happens sometimes.

Then I noticed in my logs that I wasn't drinking enough. So then I started drinking more. And, by drinking more, I was eating even less. The next thing I noticed is that some days I hardly got in any protein at all. So I started trying to eat more protein-focused snacks. And I found I was full longer and eating even less.

And so forth and so on and all of this was even before I started to exercise! (Which I eventually did.) I went from eating about 2250 calories a day to eating 1500-1700 without even breaking a sweat. Most days I wasn't even hungry.

At that point, I got motivated. That's when it got harder. Going below 1500 was hard. Adding in exercise was hard. That’s when it felt like being on a diet and some days I went to bed hungry.

But I lost the first 21 pounds just making small changes and without really trying. And I think you can too. Motivated or not.

The other thing I would say is that everything we know about weight loss is wrong! Our whole approach is wrong. It's all based on deprivation and shame. It's based on a cycle of YOU GO GIRL! followed by "falling off the wagon." Well, I don't think there is a wagon. There's just our life.

Not to mention losing 1-2 pounds a week is not slow loss. It’s FAST!

It took me almost 6 months to lose my first 21 pounds. But I wasn't hungry that entire time. I wasn't depriving myself.

And I didn't get into that cycle of deprivation, followed by falling off the wagon, followed by shame and beating myself up, followed by binging, followed by renewed deprivation so that I was losing and gaining the same 20-25 pounds over and over either.