350+ pounds Support for Men & Women

CassieBinTC · January 2018

I have searched for a current board for people starting their journey at over 350+ pounds and have not successfully found one. This board is for men and women.

Please post about your journey and goals here and we can support each other.

CassieBinTC · January 2018

My name is Cassie. I am a 37 year old single mother.

My starting weight was 393 on June 8, 2017. As of December 31, 2017 I was down to 316 pounds. I couldn't believe I was actually doing this and lost 77 pounds in less than 7 months. All on my own!

I am looking for support from both men and women. We call all do this if you put your mind to it. I tried to follow Keto as much as possible but the biggest thing for me as been portion control. I did all the classes at Kaiser to undergo surgery but have not fully decided that is the route to go as I am still doing OK on my own.

crazykatlady820 · January 2018

Hey! I'm Kat. I'm 35 and I started in October at 330 (Not quite 350+, but I was on my way there for sure.). I'm at 298-299 now. First time I've seen a number under 300 in 4 or 5 years.

The key for me is giving up alcohol because I am an alcoholic and binge drinking 3+ nights a week. So, not only did I consume a few thousand calories a week in alcohol, but my alcohol binges were always followed by food binges.

I am focused on instilling healthy habits in my life with weight loss as the byproduct of those habits. I eat at a sustainable deficit, try to walk 5 times a week, and I just try to get up and get out into the world more. That's about it. I've never made it this far because I was never able to admit I was an alcoholic and subsequently give up alcohol. But I really had no other choice. Alcohol or get my life back. So, I've been sober since Oct. 13th and I have no regrets about making that choice.

van8ive · January 2018

Hello there! I started out at 390 and got all the way down to 290 and over the past 6 months have gained back to 329! Consistency is key! I followed Keto for a while too, but found myself "cheating" the plan too often.

I love the gym, but I LOVE food. Striving to overcome binge eating for good.

Good luck!!!

Tami_in_Idaho · January 2018

I am 46 and started out at 387 in 2012. I lost down to 317 (lowest since high school) and then got pregnant. I gained 40 pounds during my pregnancy and have since gained back almost all the rest. In June, 2017 I decided to get back on track (at 378 pounds). I gave up soda, white bread, white rice and energy drinks over the last few months. I lost 20 pounds during the last half of 2017 and look forward to taking the rest off. I have decided NO fast food for 2018 and started this year off with a 4 day juice fast.

CassieBinTC · January 2018

@crazykatlady820 you've got this. It took me a very long time to realize I have to get my life back as well. Keep up the excellent work with your sobriety. I have leaned mastering one thing at a time is key. Which is kind of where I am right now. We are all here for each other.

CassieBinTC · January 2018

@van8ive How long did it take you to loose the 100 pounds? I tried to follow Keto as much as possible but I feel like missing things like apples kills me. You will get those 39 pound lost soon. Just keep working at it. We are all here for each other, we can do this!!!!

CassieBinTC · January 2018

@Tami_in_Idaho congrats on your new addition. Giving up soda was the big on for me too. I was addicted to Dr. Pepper and honestly there would be days I would have only Dr. Pepper and no water. I started my journey in June 2017 too. The last couple months I was having soda's here and there. So my 2018 resolution is no regular soda. I know if I cut myself off completely I will go back. We are all here for each other. We got this.

beautifulgypsymess · January 2018

I could definitely use some accountability buddies. coming back to MFP after being gone for over a year. I've gained a buttload of weight and need to get back on track.

CassieBinTC · January 2018

@beautifulgypsymess we are all in the same boat. We got each other!

van8ive · January 2018

@CassieBinTC the 100 pounds was over about two years! How is everyone doing going into the 2nd week of the year?

Savage_Feast · January 2018

I’m female, 36 years old, 397 pounds, and started following keto today.

sarahchmielarz · January 2018

I messaged Cassie before joining as I have not quite hit 350, but I feel like my journey has so much more in common with you all than with someone trying to lose 25 pounds. So, here goes...

I'm Sarah and I'm 36 (almost 37) and from Chicago.

I started this year at my heaviest 315.5 and today I am at 312.1 (as I told Cassie in my message, this feels like a miracle). My numbers (A1C, BP, etc.) are scaring the crap out of me and I know that if I don't get serious about this there will be real consequences. This is the first time I've ever felt truly scared about what my future held - I am usually VERY optimistic and confident (and in most ways, I still am!), but this is really getting to me - maybe that's a good thing.

I have had really good success in logging food and exercising, but somewhere along the line, I always manage to fall off the wagon. I REALLY don't want to do that again this time - I want this to be the last time I have to start over or try again. So I am trying something new and reaching out to you guys through this thread so that I have people who get where I'm coming from and where I want to go. I hope you guys can help keep me motivated and accountable and I promise to try to do the same for you!

crazykatlady820 · January 2018

I forgot to mention that you gals can add me if you would like!

Aside from weight loss what are your goals for this year?

I want to start running and be able to run/jog for 30 minutes. I walk quite a bit now and ran for 5 minutes the other day. I used to be a runner so this is a really important goal for me. I also want to do a 5K. And go camping more... we used to love to go camping, but haven't done it in a long time because I didn't want to do anything at my weight.

NicoleVT83 · January 2018

Hello! I’m Nicole, 34 from Vermont. I started at 434lbs In June of 2016. Made it to 333 in 1 year, then I slacked during summer and fall and gained about 30 pounds back.

NicoleVT83 · January 2018

I’m back and pushing forward. First goal is to get back to where I was and continue from there. Would love like minded friends along the way. I log and post daily.

timwrx98 · January 2018

Hi my name's Tim and I was at 349 in November 2016 and am now down to 218, I haven't followed a particular diet but just cut out sugar and processed foods and religiously count my calories every day always trying to keep a 500 - 1000 calorie deficit.
I started exercising by walking my dog every night and making sure I got my 10,000 step goal on my fitbit, this was really hard at first but got easier as I exercised more and the weight started coming off, after a while I started jogging a bit during my walks and this got easier as well. I joined a local Parkrun group who do 5km every Saturday morning, you do it at your own pace, walk or run and I gradually got better and was running more than I walked. I can now run the entire 5km (about 3miles) in 26 minutes and I feel healthier and fitter at 44 years old than I ever have even as a kid.
Still a bit to go but eating healthy and exercising is now a way of life for me so I know I will get to my goal eventually.

Mclaughlin1723 · January 2018

Hello, My name is Judy. I'm starting my journey again. Last year I tried to lose weight by going on the keto diet and did pretty well but it's a lifestyle that I couldn't keep up. I had lost around 22 pounds and gotten down to about 296. Unfortunately I let myself go and gained it all back and here I am starting again at my heaviest weight of 356 pounds. Just here in the past week I've cut my calories down and have gone to the gym a few times and I've already lost 10 pounds.

Sheenabug4699 · January 2018

Hello my name is Sheena and after having my first child I am ready to start losing weight.She is now 2 years old and I am 32. I currently weigh 331 pounds. Wow that was hard for me. I have never openly admitted my weight to strangers. Before I got pregnant I weighed 280 pounds. The lowest I can ever remember being. I was watching what I ate and working out for 2 hours a day. I felt great. Whith my pregnancies I gained 70 pounds. I was recently diagnosis with type 2 diabetes. I had let it go so long that I had damaged my kidneys and was required to take alot of meds to get it under cotrol. As of right now I am working on trying to log everything I eat and the excersie I do get in. My mom passed away in July and I just want to be around for my daughter and be able to run and play with her. Hopefully I can make some friends that will hold me accountable and develope into lasting relationships.

sarahchmielarz · January 2018

It feels great to see that we're not alone on this journey! I hope everyone is having a good week. I have officially lost five pounds as of today and it feels really good and motivating. I hope that I can keep up this positive attitude. This weekend I'm going to start adding more activity and exercise into my schedule - I know the food part is the biggest, but I also know that to truly be healthier I need to get more activity into my day! Your stories are really motivating - I hope that I'll be able to follow in @timwrx98 shoes and be able to run a 5k in an under 10 minute mile one day!

pugsrmypatronus · January 2018

Hey y'all! I was so happy to find this message today as who can't use a little extra support. My name is Liz and I'm 30 and live in Virginia. I started actually tracking a couple of weeks ago and started at 355 and today I weighed in at 343.7 so that was exciting! I have a disease called Fabry disease which causes brain, heart and kidney issues so I'm really trying to lose weight to reduce any extra factors for issues like a stroke as I already have a high risk beyond my weight. With my disease, I have a whole bunch of random health issues like joint pain, nausea and fatigue so right now, I'm just focusing on the diet but hope to add exercise in at some point. As I have a history of an eating disorder, I'm just trying to keep myself balanced and not too stressed out about it all as that's usually my downfall in the past. Hope everyone is having a great week so far!

Mellykay88 · January 2018

Thank you for starting this thread.

My name is Melanie, I’m 29. I started on MFP in December 2016 and I have lost a total of 120 lbs. My highest weight was 471 and I was devastated and disgusted when I stepped on the scale at the doctor and saw that number. I’m down to 350 lbs now and I’ve got a long way to go. The journey has been so great so far! I’ve been overweight since I was 2 years old and I can’t remember a day when I did not think about my weight. Now I think about it, but I feel HOPEFUL for the first time in my entire life. I know that I will reach my goal. It isn’t going to happen overnight, but I’m going to get there and I’m going to enjoy the journey and learning knew things about myself. I started going to the gym a couple of weeks ago (3 weeks ago now, I guess) and I am in love with it! I look forward to hearing everyone’s struggles and supporting one another through this. I’ll send friend requests for those of you who I’m not yet friends with. Having people in my corner has been one of the biggest factors I contribute to making this work this time.

rabidhamster87 · January 2018

Hey everyone! I'm so glad you made this thread. It can be really discouraging to see people struggling to lose 25 or even 50 lbs when I need to lose 8 times that!

I'm going to be 31 at the end of February, I'm 5'8", and I've let myself get up to at least 397 lbs. It was probably more, but I was afraid to weigh for the first week back on the wagon because I didn't want to feel overwhelmed and quit before I even started. I'm 6 weeks in now though and weighed in at 375 today, so I'm on the right track!

I want to lose weight for a lot of reasons, but the biggest motivation for me right now is to have a kid. I'm worried that it will be too hard on my body to carry a baby at this size.... if I even could get pregnant at all! I also want to live longer than my dad who we lost a year and a half ago at the ripe old age of 56.... I've also been shocked at how much money I've saved by taking my lunch to work everyday and buying less groceries in general!

I've worked out a reward system for myself where I can buy something for our future baby worth the amount of weight I've lost in lbs every 10 lbs, so I could spend $10 at 10 lbs, $20 at 20 lbs, etc.

Anyway! I would love to have more friends on this journey who are in the same boat! Feel free to friend me!

CassieBinTC · January 2018

Wow, so many new people, I am happy this is a building safe place for all of us. I hope I get to everyone.

For my update I am finally to my next milestone that I now have lost 81 pounds. I have lost 4 pounds this year so far. I am down to 312. I want 299 so bad, for so many reasons......that is the lowest I remember weighing when I did WW several years ago before I had my daughter. So keeping my fingers crossed I get there by March.

Welcome to all the newbies, I started this thread for everyone because it does in fact get discouraging when everyone around you only needs to loose 30 pounds or less.

@Savage_Feast welcome to the thread. How are you liking Keto so far?

@sarahchmielarz I am glad you decided to join us. We all have the end goal in mind. 3 pounds is freaking awesome. Keep it up you got this.

@crazykatlady820 My goal is to finish the year as healthy as possible. Keep losing pant sizes and get rid of my muffin top.

@NicoleVT83 Welcome to our thread. You are doing amazing. Please keep up the good work and remember you can always come here and vent. I find I lose more when I log everything. At the beginning I was absolutely floored when I logged everything I saw how much crap I was eating.

@timwrx98 First let me say welcome and AMAZING work with your loss. I only just started adding more exercise to my regiment and I have thought about getting a Fitbit to see what I am actually doing. I agree fully this is a new way of life.

@Sanshain17 Welcome Judy and congrats on your 10 pound loss. Keep everything up. I agree Keto is hard. I think I have learned that cutting carbs is always good but as of now I only count calories.

@Sheenabug4699 Welcome Sheena, I am so sorry for your loss. Hopefully this journey will allow you to eventually stop some of the meds. We are all here for you.

@pugsrmypatronus Welcome Liz, your loss is so awesome, keep it up. I also feel that I stress about all of this too. Please try and relax and use all of us for an outlet.

@Mellykay88 Welcome Melanie, Don't you love MFP? I have to say you are such an inspiration. Keep up what you are doing because you are doing awesome. Congrats on starting to hit the gym. Please keep us posted with your success.

@rabidhamster87 Welcome! I agree with how discouraging it can be mixing with people who don't quite understand what we are all going through. I am sorry to hear about the loss of your father. We are all here for you. What an awesome goal system, can't wait to hear more.

Lastly I was thinking of possibly having a question of the week, what are everyone's thoughts on that?

Keep rocking what you are all doing!!!!

C

NicoleVT83 · January 2018

Yeah I’m into more talking and opinions and feedback. Always looking for new food and recipes ideas, as well as people sharing what is working for them. Weekly results good or bad.

rabidhamster87 · January 2018

I think a question of the week would be a great way to keep everyone involved and talking to each other!

And congratulations on the 81 lbs lost!! That is absolutely nothing to sneeze at. You're knocking it out of the park!

CassieBinTC · January 2018

Question of the week.....

Are you following a specific diet (Keto, Atkins) and if so why? Also, do you find something specific seems to be helping you knock it out of tye park?

Mellykay88 · January 2018

CassieBinTC wrote: »

Question of the week.....

Are you following a specific diet (Keto, Atkins) and if so why? Also, do you find something specific seems to be helping you knock it out of tye park?

I’m not. Different strokes for different folks, but I find CICO (Calories in/Calories out) to be the most sustainable approach for me. I think I can stick to this long term, better than I would if I banned certain foods. I think, for me, the thing that has been different this time, vs all of the other times I’ve tried and quit, is that this time I got on here and actually learned HOW to lose weight. Every other time I thought I had to starve myself to get results... which is absolutely not true. So educating myself on healthy weight loss has been life changing.

rabidhamster87 · January 2018

I'm the same as Melanie. (My name is Rissa btw! Just realized I didn't include it in my intro post!)

CICO works best for me too! I know a lot of people swear by keto and it's supposed to be good for PCOS (which I have,) but I tried it last year and actually gained 10 lbs! It was just a lot harder for me than regular old CICO; CICO makes the most sense to me because I can see the numbers. I know that every pound lost is a 3500 calorie deficit, so I know that if I eat 1000 calories below what I spend in a day I should lose 2 lbs a week! Plus, then I don't feel deprived! If I want to have some candy, I can. I just have to budget for it!

I'm also kind of doing a modified intermittent fasting too. It just happened naturally because I don't like breakfast and I'm not hungry until closer to lunch time at 10:15 am or so, so I figured why force myself to eat if I don't want to? And I don't eat past 8 pm most nights because I don't want to get heartburn and I'm usually hungry as soon as I get home because I ate lunch so early. So, I end up going at least 14 hours without eating pretty much every day.

As far as specific things helping me knock it out of the park... Honestly, I've been blessed/lucky enough to remove several different negative influences from my life recently (a lot of debt and I stopped talking to a really toxic person) and it's just made everything much easier. I think those stressors were literally killing me!

CassieBinTC · January 2018

Nice to meet you Rissa @rabidhamster87!

CassieBinTC · January 2018

For me I have defiantly really been cognoscente of my carbs. I think like Rissa removing negative influences in my life has been huge. In August I officially split up from my husband of 13 years. When it became just my daughter and I that was such a weight lifted off of my shoulders. Plus if we wanted to have a bowl of strawberries for dinner we did and that was that. It shows you how far she and I have come in 6 months. Last night I made stir fry for my dinner and lunch today and when I sat down to eat she was wanting it too even though she had already eaten with her grandparents.

Also to be honest when my ex and I were having our last conversation about what we were doing with our marriage he brought up the fact that my weight was a big issue for him, so now every major milestone I hit is nothing but a even bigger middle finger to him. But now more so it is all for me. So I would have to say that has pushed me most to knock it out of the park.

350+ pounds Support for Men & Women

Replies

Categories