hello! tips on losing weight needed

Hi There!

I find when I eat really healthy food. My hunger is satisfied because my body is getting what it needs.

It takes a few days to feel the change, but then you really start to feel the benefits.

I start off the day with plain oatmeal and then I add apples, bananas and other fruits to the bowl depending on what I have in fresh fruit that day. The fruit is steamed right along with the oatmeal in the microwave. This holds me until Lunch.

Avoiding sugar helps to cut cravings as well. You don't miss it after awhile. You can still fit it in for snacks when you have room in your calorie allotment for the day.

The misconception is that you don't eat on diets. You eat as much, if not more than you use to, it is just that you cut out higher calorie foods that are not healthy choices for your meal plan.

Eating tons of beans, fruit, veggies, protein and fiber do fill you up while you are losing weight.

Good luck to you and welcome to the site:flowerforyou:

Connie Lynn

Yogurt and fruit helps for me. :happy:
I get the dairy that I need and the health benifit of the fruit. Sometimes I use the yogurt AS a fruit dip.
An apple has only 70 to 100 Cals in it and the yogurt has only 70 cals in the whole cup.(If you use low fat.) I only use 1/4 cup when I am dipping. :smooched:
There are TONS of tricks however. But starving yourself is not one of them.
Belive it or not.... The BEST way to lose weight is to eat. 6 times a day mini meals.
Low in fat, and not fried.
Doing little things as goals day by day week by week until you get there.
Like the first week your goal can be to not eat any fast food.
The first day is to drink your 8, cups of water at the LEAST every day.
Make exercise a game. yesterday I walked 1 mile today I will try for a mile and a half. (This is easier if you have a pedometor. which you can get from Target for 9.00 to 19.00 for a more technical one.
--Diann...

Just take it one day at a time.
Make healthier choices for meals your family needs it too. I started 3 weeks ago and started looking at what I ate and HOLY!!! then I started looking at what my family ate and you know if they don't start now they will have a weight problem later. My husband is good cuz he will eat anything I make for him.
Work out any way you can. There are lots of good work out DVDs you can get if you don't want to go to the gym.
Take it slow. Do what you can and don't give up and drink lots of water

Welcome and best of luck to you! I try feeding my family the same foods that I am eating...it's easier for me to control my portions and still feel satisfied when we are all eating the same foods, then I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything!

People are giving excellent advice!! I went into settings and created space for 6 meals, breakfast, morning snack, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner, evening snack. I usually eat 5 of the 6 but some days I need all 6, some days only 4. NEVER less than 4 times a day. I plan to have 300 calories for each meal time and 100 for each snack time. That puts me at 1200 calories for the day and it's extremely hard to stay within the 300 calorie limit. So I exercise, at least 300 calories worth a day, which is usually my elliptical machine and weights, but could include dancing, chopping firewood, heavy house cleaning, rearranging furniture, etc (every exercise counts at this point) and I use the calories to bump up the meals to 400 calories, which is easy to do.

To make sure I'm accurate, I keep a real tablespoon, measuring cups, and an ounce scale on the counter. Then I read the actual serving size and stick to it. For the first week I simply made choices I wanted to make and recorded everything, without worrying about calories or fat or fiber or salt or anything like that. At the end of the week, I reviewed what I had done and started making adjustments. Now I use corn tortillas instead of flour because they are much lower in fat. I also buy fat free cream cheese. When I put peanut butter on celery, I only use one tablespoon instead of two. I buy Progresso soup for the first time and switched to vegetarian chili, all because of calories and fat.

I do not make seperate meals for my family except that I do try to take into consideration the likes and dislikes of everyone. My daughter does not eat red meat, my husband hates chicken, I have an exchange student from Italy that would have tomatoes and pasta for the entire 10 months she's here and be perfectly happy. They have plenty of opportunites to eat away from home or make something for themselves. Your kids might be younger, mine are teens and hubby was on the road for 200 days last year. He can eat all the TACO BELL he wants when he's gone.

You'll find a lot of suggestions and support here. Just keep reading. For me, I don't believe much in the concepts of motivation, self control or will power and my posts will reflect that. I believe that the way to success is through behavior modification on a daily basis. On the days you don't want to do the right thing, do it anyway, and don't use a bunch of excuses as to why you made the choices you did. Best of luck on your journey and welcome to the group.