Starting healthy in 2014

Sounds like you are on the right track. Keep up the good work

Hi and welcome! As we get older things get slower. Just keep up with your diary and keep moving. This is not a quck fix,this is for life. Never give up.....

Welcome to mfp! You've got this

Best way to start, in my opinion....get a digital food scale (one that switches between metric and imperial is best - so it will do pounds/ounces and grams). WEIGH EVERYTHING - weighing is way more accurate than measuring, but measure when you can't weigh. The reason measuring is less accurate is that a lot can depend on how much you pack it in, how things are positioned in the cup, etc - like potato chips go every which way and if you manage to cram a bunch in, it is often WAY over the actual weight serving size. Most labels will have both on there, usually something like serving size = 1/2 cup (30g). So when you can, use the weight.

Use a smaller plate, use a smaller bowl, etc. and weigh (or measure) everything that goes into your mouth. Log it accurately into MFP, and get a good snapshot of what you are doing currently that way. The smaller plates/bowls works well in making you 'feel' like you're getting more, plus it forces you to put less on there, versus having a plate with tons of room left.

Most of us way underestimate the size of what we're eating. "This? Looks to be....3 oz of meat!" when in reality it's 6 ounces. "Eh, this is about half a cup of pasta" -- uh, no, it's 2 cups.

The other area to watch out for -- calories burned exercising. Most of us, including MFP's database, greatly overestimate the number of calories burned. This, coupled with the underestimation of calories ingested above, can be a recipe for weight loss disaster. You can control the calories ingested one a lot more by accurate weighing and measuring of foods and logging everything that goes in your mouth. My recommendation for dealing with the exercise issue is to get a good heart rate monitor or something if you like (I don't use one, so no recommendations here, though I've heard good things about fitbit) or do what I do -- if I am on a machine that lets me input age and weight and gives me calories burned when I'm done, I use the machines calorie total - but I round down to the nearest 25-increment. If it says I burned 319 - I log 300, if it says I burned 326, I log 325. If it says I logged 324...I will either log 300 or I will go for another 2 minutes to get it to 325 If I am doing something that does not have a convenient calorie counter, I will search for it in MFP and typically cut MFP's calories in half -- 60 minutes of yoga = 265 or something in their database, so I put in about 125.

I aim to overestimate what I put in my mouth and underestimate what I burned, so that even if I am screwing up, I'm still in a deficit. I am then also looking at how quickly I am losing the weight -- too quickly and perhaps I'm doing my over and under estimations a bit too extreme and need to dial it back some! I am also looking at my measurements. Oh, and take photos of yourself now, even if you don't look at them. Twenty pounds from now and onwards - you'll love to see the comparison as a stunning visual reminder and NSV (non-scale victory).

There will be lots of advice here, some delivered pleasantly, some not, but don't write off the latter just because it is packaged poorly (or don't assume it's packaged poorly when it's really just bluntness. Bluntness is totally underappreciated).

I would suggest sticking to a lifestyle change and not a 'diet plan' -- don't try to cut foods out entirely unless you have medical reasons. Have a reasonable calorie goal (1200/day is NOT reasonable or sustainable, btw, even if mfp will allow it and such -- trust me, you can lose weight eating more, and you'll probably be way happier doing it).

Losing weight is about the calories. But getting healthy can (and in my opinion should) also include an exercise plan. Baby steps though - don't set yourself up to fail by doing too much at once. Pick small, sustainable goals and meet them and hold to them for a while and then increase your goals, etc. This is a long road and small, incremental changes are way better than dramatic, first-of-the-year ones that go down in a blaze of flames and bingeing quickly.