Any teachers???

I teach K-5 music full-time, have 2 kids, and I'm an active musician in our community. I have to be honest, the bulk of my intense exercise came in the summer months. I started on mfp about a month before the last school year ended and spent that time getting to know the food database and realizing how out of control my portion sizes were. I lost 5 pounds during that month just by adjusting my foods and portions. Once summer came, I exercised 6 days of the week for at least 30 minutes. By the time fall came around I had lost 20 pounds and now I've lost over 30 (my ticker doesn't reflect the first 5 pounds). I am not able to exercise as much now, but I've made changes in activity while at work...for instance, I will walk to a teacher's room to deliver a message or ask a question rather than send an email. Somehow in that time I've also programmed myself to not need or desire many sweet snacks. Our staff brings snacks once a week on Friday's, so I purposely pack less in my lunch and I only take what I can't live without. I'm also lucky to work in a building of pretty health conscience people! Good luck to you, you can do it

I have a few days of Feb. vacation off and I'm realizing just how stressed I feel all the time. I use food to make me feel better. I'm trying to find some things that can be stress reducers in my life. Any suggestions?

I teach high school math in Ontario, Canada. I love the job and am good about packing a healthy lunch, I just wish solving quadratic equations burned more calories! The nice part is I can get home after school and get a workout in before making dinner.

totally! i'm a school counselor at a 1-5, 700 students! definitely stressful and it is hard to fit in exercise. I started the 30 day shred with Jillian Michael's, it's helpful since it's only 30 min! Totally understand how hard it is to fit everything in though!!

I teach high school French in washington state! I'm ALL about packing my own lunches- I try to do it the night before or pack leftovers of veggie-filled dinners from that night. The hardest part is not eating the awesome PTA treats! (They had a chocolate fondue fountain earlier last month!)

HS Science Research on Long Island - no pressure! And I keep hearing about the mysterious quadratic equation song and I have to admit I do not know it. And Im too embarrassed to tell my math dept friends of my ignorance!

I teach 7th grade Math in Oregon. I have 5 teaching periods, but recently handed over three of them to a student teacher. Although my student teacher is doing really well, I am missing teaching my students! Similarly to others, I pack my own lunch (Nile Spice soup and a fruit is one of my favorites) and a snack for the day that I can munch on (like a bag with a cup of dry honey cheerios). Also, I make sure I drink at least two liters of water during the day.

I was a high school English teacher for five years, and now I am an elementary school librarian. As an Englilsh teacher I had a REALLY hard time staying active because my life was consumed by the neverending piles of essays and projects that needed to be graded, and I hit my highest weight during that time. Now that I am in an elementary school, and now that I'm a librarian dealing with everyone in the building instead of just with my own classroom, it is much easier for me to stay active during the day! Elementary school kids definitely keep you on your toes.

I don't really work out, but I do make time for walks with my husband a few times a week, and I keep my activity level on MFP set to "sedentary" (which it's not) instead of "lightly active (which it is) so that I can also log things like cooking and cleaning (which I do often, but not every day). This way, if I have a really lazy day, I know I won't eat too much, but if I have a really active day, I know how many calories all my activity has burned. I don't log the walking around that I do at school, but I'm sure I would earn myself some extra calories if I did!

As far as food, I've had to do some planning ahead to keep things under control, because it is so hard for me to eat healthy if I don't!

For meetings: if I know I'm going to a meeting where there will be snacks, I will skip whatever meal would've been around that time (i.e. if the meeting's in the morning, I count those snacks as breakfast, and if the meeting's in the afternoon, I'll count the snacks as my lunch).

For breakfast: I've started doing things like making whole-wheat fruit/oat/nut muffins on the weekends so that I have something healthy that I can grab and eat in the car on the way to school. Or I'll make some whole-wheat toast or grab the biggest banana I can from the fruit basket on the counter. I'm always in such a hurry that it's rare I have time for a sit-down breakfast!

For lunch: I always bring my lunch unless there's a meeting or event at school that is feeding me. Lunch is usually leftovers from the previous night's dinner. On the days I rely on school to feed me, I do my best to pick the healthiest option I can or to limit my portion sizes as much as I can.

For dinner: My husband and I cook everything from scratch. This is time-consuming and a luxury I couldn't have indulged in when I was an English teacher! We usually try to cook enough that we have at least 1-3 meals' worth of leftovers for later in the week, and we have many meals that we can throw together quickly on the nights that we're too tired/busy for a long cooking session.

As of about two weeks ago, I am within my happy weight range! But, I am shooting for losing another ~3lbs to put me in the center of that range, so that I'll have about 5lbs leeway on either side. That way, the holidays won't kill me next year like they did this time around!