Mentor Wanted :D

What is it you need mentoring on? You seem to have the mindset already.

- Track your dietary intake
- Eat at a calorie deficit
- Move more

It's obscenely simple.

You'll get differing opinions on the content of your diet, with proponents of differing ways of eating telling you how to go about creating a calorie deficit.

But for me it's very personal. Do whatever makes you happy, something that you can keep up for life and gives you the best chance of compliance.

Teri I think you will have to try and figure out for yourself what works for you. I've been in a similar position before, in my late 20s I found myself with a lot of weight to lose (around 60lbs) and I'd tried diets like WW, low carb, juicing and many others before but never stuck at it.

I also tried counting calories (roughly), exercising a few times a week and each time I'd get some of the weight off, think that everything was now ok as I was 'normal weight' and then it would start to creep back on again.

It was only when I joined MFP 2 years ago that I started to think about what would be sustainable in the long-term rather than the short term. I used the website for about 7 months and lost around 10lbs so didn't get to my goal weight then, but it took a lot of experimentation to find what worked for me. Basically I discovered that what worked was for me to eat moderate calories (ie. eat around 500 calories per day less than my body needed to maintain my weight) and to exercise at least 6 days a week. I had to count calories, weigh and measure my food and stick to that religiously otherwise I wouldn't lose.

You'll find that many on here will try and advise you to eat more to lose weight and do weight training. In my case I tried to eat more and I ended up putting on weight which set me back quite a while.

I then had an accident in 2013 and had to stop exercising and was in a lot of pain with my back. I also stopped calorie counting and of course the weight crept back on. Last year I had a stressful year too as I was still in pain with my back and had an operation planned so I didn't manage to get back on track but this January I re-started my weight loss programme at a weight of 148lbs which is the heaviest I'd been in a while.

This time around I have been doing what I know works for me. In the past I've tried to lose weight too quickly, and while it's great to see the scale go down by 2-3lbs a week, I always found that it was impossible to keep the weight off at the end of the diet. I also had to eat rabbit food to lose that amount of weight and it's not sustainable.

I have now calculated that my body needs about 1550 calories per day to maintain my weight (onling calculators and links you'll find on MFP will calculate what you need to maintain too). That is based on me doing no exercise whatsoever. Obviously if I was to subtract 500 calories from that total which is what I'd need to do to be able to lose 1lb per week without exercise I'd have to eat 1050 calories per day, which is far too little.

What I do instead is try and burn off as many calories as I can every day so that I can eat more. I basically go for a walk for a minimum of 30 minutes, usually 60 minutes most days. I also try and be active around the house (I have a Fitbit activity monitor) and on top of that I do some kind of workout every day too. This is usually from a workout DVD (I'm currently doing Jillian Michaels Body Revolution) but sometimes I use gym machines or go to a Pilates class instead.

By doing this I am able to burn off at least 400 calories extra as a minimum every day. I can therefore add those extra calories burnt onto my 1050 calorie allowance so most weeks I eat and average of 1450 calories per day.

I find this is more than enough food, and I also don't deprive myself of any specific food either, so some days I'll allocate 200-300 calories to crisps, chocolate or other things I really like. I find that this makes it much easier to stick to and I'm not tempted to eat more.

Plus when you start weighing food and logging everything on MFP that goes in your mouth you really will start to feel terrible if you go over your calories.

You can add me as a friend if you want. Just a little info about me, 1600cal/day goal plus whatever exercise. I run and lift. Been learning to include more protein in my diet lately. I lost about 40 lbs between summer 2013 and summer 2014 and took a bit of a break from really dieting, mostly to focus on training for a half marathon and then I got lazy for a bit, but I am back at it now to lose the last 40ish lbs (not totally sure what my goal weight is right now....) I get the whole calorie counting process, but I am not any sort of nutrition and exercise super genius.

There is more info on my profile...

I will be a friend and we can mentor each other. I am 34 with about 100 or more pounds to lose. I think we can be friends and help each other out. Add me as a friend and we can exchange contact information.