Hello all! Thanks for accepting me onto your team.

I'm Traci. 48yo mom of 3 young'uns (8yo daughter, 8yo son, and 5yo daughter). Yes, twins. I'm deep in the thick of it over here, obviously. I'm a former college professor, now a SAHM.

My top weight was 332 back in 2011. I lost it all over about 1.5 years, down to about 130. Got heavy into endurance cycling (centuries) and running and some sprint triathlons. I'm of the "go big or go home" sort. I got pregnant and had my twins in 2013. Lost the minimal baby weight I had gained. Got back into biking, but less running that time around because of an increasingly bum knee that doesn't appreciate long runs. Got pregnant with my youngest and gained much more pregnancy weight that time around. Then spent a good 2+ years in the throes of some serious post-partum depression that nearly killed me. I began to drink. I lost my will to want to be anything to anyone. My OB just told me that it was "baby blues" and all completely normal. It wasn't "baby blues." I was dying, or rather, slowly killing myself. I lost some weight, but not much (all my calories were liquid calories). I gave everything to my children and nothing to myself. I was an empty vessel. Nothing left to give.

I got all the way back up to 264.3 pounds, and for some random reason, on January 18, 2021, I said enough. I realized that if I didn't put myself back into the care equation, nobody would. I needed to model self-care for my children, to help them see that I see myself as valuable too.

I stopped drinking (I limit myself to one single hard seltzer a night, if I want a relaxation, after-bed libation. That's it. Never before their bedtime, and never more than one. I started back on my bike, only able to ride maybe 3 miles before I thought I was going to die. I started weighing my food, tracking my calories, and as happened the first time around, the more I paid attention, the better my choices became. And my body realized that I was back in the game, and it wanted healthier, more real food. You know, actual nutrition. I weigh and track and plan religiously. I weigh every day and record it in a spreadsheet, but I only log my Friday weights on MFP. It helps me to see trends, like PMS weight gain, emotional stuff, etc. I try to exercise about 3-4 days a week right now, but that's rough with my kiddos at home this summer and my husband at work. We don't have family to watch them, so I've not seen a date night or a single day off in years. But my youngest heads to kindergarten in the fall (hopefully, fingers crossed, given current public health trends), and I'm hoping to begin training to get back to century rides. I'm no longer a road biker (too many distracted drivers), but I do enjoy long distance gravel rides. Every pound I lose is one less pound to pedal up all these Pennsylvania hills. I also LOVE to kayak on the weekends. I do all of my exercise alone. I prefer it that way, since I'm an introvert, but I'm also not keen on appointment biking or always worrying about whom I'm slowing down or for whom I need to slow down.

At any rate, I'm at 205ish now, down from 264 in mid-January (still about 80 to go). It's never fast enough, but it's trending in the right direction. I bike upwards of 25-30 miles per ride, 3 times a week (or at least I was until my husband went back to working in the office, so I am at home with kiddos again). I still kayak or bike on the weekends, and I hike and go for walks and swim with them during the week. Journey, not destination. Progress, not perfection. You know what I'm talking about.

KHill875
Friday weight
PW: 142.8
CW: 143.0

I really tried this week to track my food and meal planned healthy meals. I even did the whole roasted spaghetti squash instead of pasta, which my 5 year old noticed something was WAY wrong... Hopefully next week I will start seeing better results.