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

@Jane – Have you banished the monster from you wardrobe? I started cleaning out another room and yup, more mysterious stuff! I hear you on the work thing. It is suppose to be “summer easy”, but I am busier than ever. It's a good thing, but I am getting a little worn out. Hope house stuff is going well (at least that you are getting some feedback). Sorry to hear about the filling. I have gum grafting coming up in October. I am NOT looking forward to that.

@Ron – Glad to hear Germany treated you well. I am fascinated to hear more about your couch? What other features did it come with? And, does it come in cheetah print? I can assure you that Canada IS real. Unless of course, I too am a figment of your imagination. Hmmm...

@Meg – Ah yes, essential oils. I believe Young Living has a “therapeutic” line, but VERY expensive. I do have a few myself – frankincense, lavender, rosemary, cedar, and sandalwood. I use them topically. And then I also have orange and eucalyptus for my diffuser. But, my cat is not happy when I use it. How did the 8K go?

@Superzeromambo – Welcome to the thread! Remember that this is not a race. Just take baby steps and you will get there!

@Carolina – Welcome aboard! I think what has worked best for me is to just modify one thing at a time. Ie. Work on reducing (or outright eliminating) sweets. Once you have that conquered, then move onto the fried foods... or whatever else you want to make healthier. Just for the record, I don't believe in eliminating anything completely, but sometimes a temporary ban does help me until I can get it under control.

I heard about the new doctor. Not sure how long they stick around, but there may just be yet another changing of the doctor before I actually get to view the series. I checked today and I am still in the 100s in line for a copy at the library. Oh, it will take some time!

Speaking of furniture races. Every winter here (yes Ron, in Canada!) we hold bed races on the (frozen) rideau canal. It is quite hilarious to watch! (Crazy Canucks. Yes, yes, I know!)

I don't know how you can all eat so little calories!?! I guess I just don't have enough will power. I would be gnawing my arm off by bedtime. Glad to hear that it works for you though!

Well, I am sad to say that the garden does not look good. Most of the veggies are done and the one thing I was most looking forward to – the tomatoes – have been wiped out by a blight. I had not heard of such a thing, but it only took about 1 week to wipe out our entire crop. We probably had about 700 green tomatoes, soon to ripen. Sigh. RIP tomatoes.

Your mention of zombies reminded me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApmPQDAzYyM
I suppose the moral of the story (besides learning CPR) is to stay in shape so zombies don't have to revive you for food. We'll go with that.

Have a Super Sunday!

Thank you all for the welcome
I'm now into week two of this journey and saw my first weight loss. My Yeah moment !
I work every weekend 12 hour shifts. I packed lots of healthy foods which I could grab fast. So I would not be tempted to opt for fast food. It worked. So I'm celebrating one work weekend of success. Hope you all have a wonderful Monday !

@meg - sounds like you've got a really fun weekend coming up! Just steer clear of all that fair food

@amy - welcome. Feel free to add me - I'm on here every day and I've found that real motivation from friends makes the commitment to this much easier.

@carolina - congrats on the successful week. Sounds like you have a really good plan there.

@tru - gutting about the tomatoes - I would be so disappointed. On the low cal days, I will not be making a habit of it - I like my food far too much for that! And I don't know that it does work for me anyway!

Well it's been a mad and frustrating work week so far. The project I am working on may slip by 3-6 months due to external forces beyond our control and it means all I've done over the last few months will be for nothing in the short term. So frustrating. And I'm not getting my workouts in - too tired and cross when I get home! Need to give myself a slap!
Have a good middle of the week all - keep smiling:laugh:

Blimey it's quiet on here!

@ron - exercise bike????! You are in danger of getting 'the bug' - and beware, it's a tricky one to get rid of! Bet the dogs are liking the new you though.

@meg - sounds like you had a great weekend - you'll have to tell us all about it.

Well last day of work for me this week. Have a day of study leave tomorrow (which admittedly is just work just dressed up differently) - writing about training design - what joy! Then dentist on Thursday (eeek) then up to visits father in law Thursday through Saturday. He's about 260 miles away so always a bit of a trip. Long weekend here with a bank holiday then back to work on Tuesday to start delivering all the training courses - design of which have been driving me loopy over the last few months. So it will be good to finally actually deliver on the first phase of the project.

Have a good week all.

Welcome Olive, and Jane was only warning me, because I have a well known aversion to exercise (If I feel like exercising I usually lie down in a darkened room till the feeling passes!), that I would become addicted. Stick with us though, we're a supportive group when we're around! I sympathise over the delicious food, I'm the same, though I've learned to make better choices and smaller helpings while still eating basically what I want. I have avoided refined carbs like bread and pasta though as much as possible, mainly because it means I have to give up something else to fit them in my daily calorie allowance. I'm also not particularly a vegetable person thanks to a Scottish upbringing where veg was potatoes onions and carrots, and anything green apart from cabbage and peas was treated with suspicion and known generically as 'rabbit food'.I'm not so bad now though for a number of years and my tastes are changing thanks to this weight loss process. Seriously 2 lbs in three weeks is not so bad though I (and I'm extreme in MFP terms) try to lose that in a week. As people keep saying this is a marathon not a sprint, and if you wish to maintain the low weight you will eventually achieve for the rest of your life you have to change your mindset and your lifestyle. Just make sure you are logging as accurately as possible everything that you put in your mouth. I think it's a good idea to set yourself up on MFP as sedentary and then log your exercise, it's difficult to judge how active is active and how much to add for additional exercise. I'm sedentary anyway so didn't have to worry about this bit!!

@Jane - yes indeed the dogs like the new me, they don't think I'm such a fat b*st*rd any more :bigsmile: Sounds like you have a fun week ahead, particularly the dentist...........:sad: I had forgotten about the Bank Holiday until yesterday, though I'll probably work it as rest of Europe will still be open for business and I can do a minimum of support for a lot of money!

Where is everybody? Steph's in Canada, Meg will be running and _Tru_ probably gardening....................

@111grace, the trick is to not think of it as a diet. You're just changing the way you do thing in regards to food. And motivation is not a stable thing. It has to be determination. So if you stick around this thread very long, you'll see we're very supportive!

@Ron, you're right about me running. Just created a calendar with my running plan for the rest of the month. My goal for August is 60 miles, and I'm short by about 20 right now, so I wanted to plan out the rest of the month to make sure I get there. Someday Ron, you're going to admit that you're actually exercising! :bigsmile: And I think all of us will faint from the shock when you do.

@Olive, welcome, and see above what I said to grace :happy: When people diet, they think of it as a temporary thing. I want my life to be permanently changed, so I don't diet!

@Jane, it was a great weekend! But I'm kind of paying for it now... way too much food on Sunday! Hope your study day went well. Have a fun weekend (after the dentist of course!).


Drove up to my friends house on Friday mid morning, arrived around 2:30 p.m. after making several stops. Just hung out and didn't do much that day. Saturday morning's run was absolutely beautiful. My lucky friend lives literally across the road from the beach, and 1 mile from the Discovery Trail, which is a 26 mile mostly paved former railroad track. So for my run, I ran the mile up to the trail, then along the trail for another mile, and then turned around and came back. Had a hard time making myself turn around, I just wanted to keep running! After my run, my family and my friends family went to the county fair, which was oddly smaller than my local fair even though they live in a more populated county than I do. Took the kids to see all the animals, and the boys got to pick one ride to do, and they all chose a bungee trampoline thing, and my 4 year old was the bravest, he went so high! Also saw a free comedian/juggler show. The kids thought it was hilarious. We packed our dinner in, but did splurge on an elephant ear, which I ate about 1/3 of. Then Sunday we all went to church, and afterward my friends awesome husband kept all 5 kids, while my friend and I went out to lunch, then shopping, for a walk on another section of the Discovery Trail, then out to dinner, and then to the movie The Wolverine. It was a great day out with her. Monday we took the kids swimming in the morning at the community pool for an hour, then had some lunch, packed up, and came home. The drive took about 3 hours with stops, and as soon as I unpacked the car and hubby got home from work, I was out running 4.23 miles.

The scale went up from my indulgences on Sunday... and probably a heck of a lot of sodium. So yesterday I did a low cal day, and today I'll be back to normal for eating and running. Like I mentioned to Ron, I'm creating a calendar of my running schedule so I know how far I should run each day to get to my goal. Finished out this month (60 miles), and all of next month (70 miles). I think I'll create October's as well, and then look at my half marathon training plan starting in November.

Hello All!
Need to do some reading to catch up but see there are some new faces, hope you stick around. Well it's 330 in the morning and I'm siting with a sleeping baby who has had a fever for 12hrs now and thought I might as well use the time!

My trip home was great and once again leaving was the hardest thing ever. It was wonderful to meet my niece and the two cousins seemed taken with each other right away. I got lucky on the flights in that Kenzie slept most of the way. As it always is, food was a challenge at home. Being there is always an opportunity to have things I don't get in the UK. and so there was indulgence. Disappointed in myself for only getting in one run. The reality is I was a bit lazy and secondly wanted to spend every minute with family, even when they were driving me nuts. This trip to Canada (Ron, it's a magical place like Narnia!) as I didn't have to rush around anywhere and generally hung out in my parents backyard. Did have an excellent time doing swimming lessons with little miss.

I had been weighing in at my parents who assured me their scales were correct. I've come home to find they were not. I've dropped 4 lbs since getting back (good old salt) so going to give it another week before recording especially as that *kitten* Tom will visit sink enough.

School starts Monday. While parents cheer like most teachers I hide my head under the duvet in denial. Results weren't great so going to be along first day with the head ranting! Well little miss us feeling cooler so I think I may return her and I to bed!!

Seems like ages since I posted on here, and it is! Last week was just chaos. However this week I'm working from home so it will be a little less chaos! This year just seems to get crazier, looks like I am off to India again within the next two or three weeks, just waiting for the authorisation to come through, I've had another project dropped in my lap on Friday and it is looking like I will have to treble my UK team from 2 to 6 and increase the Indian team or buy in resources from another Indian IT company. I had planned, well thought about, no plans were actually made, a small vacation in October, but that is looking impossible now. Oh well, no point in complaining, I'll get that break in eventually, even if it has to wait until Christmas......... and in any case I love all the chaos really!

I'm still in a stall, my weight hasn't dropped below that taken on the 21st September. I'm not entirely sure why, and it's complicated by the travel/eating out scenario and water retention, but I've also been more active and my skeletal muscle percentage has increased, don't know it that has anything to do with it. I'm not concerned as my weight has hovered around up to 3lbs above the last weigh in. I'm not concerned as I feel I am eating enough and not too much and I feel if anything healthier and I have lost another inch or so off my belly. This morning for the first time since last weigh in I am the same weight, so maybe it's looking more positive.

This is probably too much information but I ordered some new knickers yesterday in a smaller size as my current ones are a bit loose (an NSV!!). Do Amazon do absolutely everything?? I can order the ones I favour direct from Jockey, or I can order them from Amazon, supplied by Jockey, cheaper! Go figure!