Women 200lb+, Let's Make March Meaningful!!!

Happy St Patrick's Day!!!! ☘️

I had a "moment" yesterday. Around lunch time I felt stressed, annoyed, etc. and went into a mini binge. First, my habits I've been building seemed to stick because even on a binge I weighed out my chips and pretzels. Second, I had my fill... granted it was 3 Red Vines, 2 Reese's mystery shapes, a kit kat bar, a serving of chips, a serving of pretzels, and whipped cream cheese for a "dip." But once I hit a point where I was done... I was done. I logged it all. Reevaluated the rest of my day. Made adjustments. And I still finished below my 1800 calorie boundary.

I still don't know my exact trigger that made me feel like I needed all the junk but I stopped as soon as I felt done and didn't let it mess up the rest of my day. I ate within my boundaries. I still went to Zumba class. I still stopped for the day at 8pm.

Pulling myself back from the edge of what could have been a really bad calorie day feels like a huge win. My blood sugar was higher than I want and I didn't bother to weigh this morning. But it's only one day and I still stuck to my calorie and time boundaries and I still got exercise.

@mling84 I feel that. My A1C is strictly diet and exercise controlled. If I have a month or two of not logging or not staying on track that number definitely reflects it. Congrats on putting back the donut holes!

@KrekolAnjel Great job getting to the gym!

@UrFavoriteMelissa Welcome! This is a great group. So glad you found us.

SW: 299
CW: 286

Goals for March:
⬇️ lose 2-3 pounds
💪 walk 5000+ steps every day
🥛 meal prep/plan on Sundays
🤩 ride my bike and have a picnic in the park
🧹 spring clean
💵 renew credential

I could really use some accountability buddies. Below is my WhatsApp. I also have an Apple Watch for challenges.

QUESTION TO THE GROUP: I took my measurements today and although my weight has remained constant for 5 months, my measurements are larger than 2 months ago. Could I be holding fluid?

UrFavoriteMelissa wrote: »

Hi everyone! I am starting over for like the fifth time. I get close to my goal weight and then boom I totally sabotage any progress I’ve made and end back at my start weight. Happy to have found a motivating group to keep up with.

Welcome Melissa.

Good morning everyone, happy Saturday!

Saturday weigh in day:

Christina
34 years old
5'4"

SW: 220ish
Re-SW (Feb 2022): 200.4
UGW: 150

SW 3/1: 175 (176 average)
3/4: 174.8 (175.5 average)
3/11: 173.6 (175 average)
3/18: 174.4 (174.8 average)

🍀 March Goals! 🍀

🍀 March GW (average): 174

💚Log everything in grams ✅
💚Do at least three fitness classes a week ✅
💚More than 100g protein every day ✅
💚No doomscrolling after 7PM each night ✅
💚At least 64oz of water a day ✅

Look at all that green for March. My biggest wins this week (which is a thing I'm going to start doing, I like thinking about what worked) were that I 1) ensured I met my protein goal, and 2) my biceps are GREAT right now. Which is what comes with protein and working out with weights, but man, I love having visible biceps again. I'll have to take a picture next time I remember, last night I saw them just out of the shower, so no pics, haha.

Things to improve on for next week: make smarter choices about snacks. If I'm going to eat more because I'm hungry, I can make sure those snacks have protein and fiber, instead of chocolate and sugar (although those things are great, and definitely have their place! For example, I try to have something sweet with my coffee every morning. This morning, it's one ferrero rocher). That way, hopefully even while eating when hungry, I can keep my calories a little lower.

I find honoring my body when it's telling me things is so important, even if that means my progress will be slower. I just have to honor my BODY and not my HEAD, which is likely to say things like "there's this great cheesecake here, let's have another piece." Whereas my body is likely to say "hey man I feel real weak right now, you should eat something."

Today is poles class and then a booty class called "hard *kitten*"

After I'm done with gym and the kids are done with gymnastics, I'm going to be making cheeseburgers with my new bob's burgers cookbook, and I may be skipping the bun to save calories. Especially since the cookbook has a homemade fries recipe and Whatsisface and I drink a beer together on Saturdays We'll see.

Tag party time!
@UrFavoriteMelissa welcome to the best thread on MFP!

@pamperedlinny this is a great response to One of Those Days, we've all had one. Congratulations on taking the reins back immediately!

@BarbMessimer hi! Welcome! Advice about appetite and plateaus: Let's see, ooh, I came across an article yesterday I meant to share: it's a kind of sateity ranking. When you find that you're hungry, prioritize protein (good for muscle building) and fiber (good for being "regular," sorry TMI). Both keep you fuller (most of the time- for some people, whole grains keep them fuller, experiment with what works for you!).

It's also worthwhile to see what times of day you're hungriest. For me, I know I like to snack when I'm home at night, so I try to keep almost half of my calories for after work every day, so that I have room to snack where I know I'll want to snack. Then just make sure you structure your day so that you have the calories where and when you need them.

Congratulations on your success so far! Sometimes, after a lot of losing, you might consider kind of "resetting" yourself by purposefully eating what you believe are your maintenance calories for a week or two, then you'll be more motivated to start losing again, after you've been purposefully eating a little more. There's a thread in here somewhere, titled "of refeeds and diet breaks" that can tell you all about it. Just search for it in the mfp discussions.

Your measurements might also be bigger even though weight is the same because if you've been doing any resistance training, your muscles might have grown a little bit! We call that "newbie gains," and it gets harder to build muscle after you've been doing it for a while, but in the beginning, it's a little easier to "shock" the muscles into growing.

I hope to see a lot more of you in this thread, as your big loss is such a huge inspiration.

@Keto_Sonia I love that you've got spring cleaning as one of your goals, it should be one of mine welcome!

@KrekolAnjel oh man, breakfast potluck sounds awesome! And congratulations on facing the temptations head on! I see you friend requested me, but I don't use this app for logging, I just use the community, so I wouldn't be a good friend. Thank you though I use MacroFactor for logging.

@Rzilient hi, welcome! Congratulations on your progress! you sound like you have exactly the right mindset, and weekends are difficult for everyone. If you'd like to lean into having more calories on the weekend every weekend, you could see if you can stand to reduce your calories a little more during the week to "bank" some extra calories for the weekend. That's what I do, and it works out for me, but it's not for everyone. Something to consider.

I think that's everybody, have a good Saturday, everyone!

@pamperedlinny Great job on the turnaround yesterday!!! thank you for sharing, it is a needed reminder on how unexpected food intake can be course corrected!

@CupcakeCrusoe - is there a way to turn notifications on or saving this group? Instead of having find it everytime not to mention scroll through the whole thing to see if anyone replied ,?

Happy weekend everyone!

I usually think weekends are for "fun foods" and food as reward since I "worked hard all week." But my thinking is shifting to weekends are for recharging, creativity, fun learning, social connections. those things feed and nourish me better than binging/overeating


Victories from yesterday:
1. completed my goal of 2x strength training for this week
2. I skipped out on the Safeway sale on their bakery cakes (that is $5 saved that I would normally spend with this sale)
3. Declined an invitation to go out to lunch with a friend for today since I am going out to lunch tomorrow with another friend. I felt I am more likely to be triggered into overeating/cravings if I went out to eat 2x this weekend and also needed today to catch up on things.

Gratitude for today:
1. I am grateful for a roof over my head
2. I am grateful for the opportunities to catch up on things this weekend
3. I am grateful for my healing

My name is Mary, 65 from Pennsylvania.
Been MIA for a few months but still logging in everyday since I started MFP 5/14/21.

Unfortunately lost my mojo and gained a lot back but not all Thank God! Need to get back on track and focused. I bought a NEW to me, gently used, Commercial PreCor EFX 835 Elliptical. It was delivered the beginning of November, as others here know I wore my previous 10+ year old one out from my extensive workouts. Back up to 150 minutes on my 3 days off per week.

Good to see some familiar names here and glad to see some new ones too!

Heaviest weight 255 lbs, twice. :-(
9/14/20-255 lbs
5/14/21-232.2 lbs
4/6/22- 147.6 lbs (107.4 lbs lost) I did NOT have a surgery. Did Keto.
8/1/22- 167.2 lbs
12/1/22-198 lbs
1/1/23- 213.4 lbs
2/1/23- 207.4 lbs
3/1/23-201 lbs Yippee!

3/5/23- 200 lbs Elliptical Thurs, Fri & Sun 150 minutes for just over 10 miles each session. Finally glad to see a drop. I was hoping for Onederland though. Oh well, it's inevitable. Can't complain about 7.4 lbs since 2/1, in 4 1/2 weeks.
3/12-23- 205 lbs. Too many carbs lately. Elliptical HIIT setting on Friday & today (Babysitting on Sat) 150 minutes each day, just over 10 miles each day.

3/19/23- 206 lbs Having trouble keeping my carbs low like before. :-( Elliptical HIIT setting on Thursday, Friday & today (my off work days) 150 minutes each session for 10+ miles each.

Happy Sunday everyone!

I was over calories goal by 500 on Saturday and today (Sunday). I am feeling discouraged and ashamed right now. thinking "why can't I just get it together." Weekends are hard for me to stay on track

trying to put in perspective that I am in a general calorie deficit for this past week though even with being over yesterday and today and that I followed through on healthy actions that are usually difficult for me. I refuse to entertain further judgmental thoughts about myself because that only fuels unhealthy stress and shortcut behaviors.

So here's what I would like to improve on for this coming week:
1. Choose one candy bar/sweets I really want and would enjoy instead of buying multiples at the store. When I buy multiples, I feel compelled to eat "a little" of each esp in the middle of the night. the anxiety of having multiple sweets around at this point is enough to cancel out any enjoyment anyway.
2. Support my body in recouping/recharging by not eating in the middle of the night, even if it is within calorie goals
3. Challenge negative thoughts/false beliefs about my being overweight

Victories from this past week:
1. Signed up for a glass blowing class as a non food reward/fun
2. Followed through on strength training goal
3. took 10 min walks on my lunch when weather/time permitted
4. Passed on a lot of junk foods on sale at the store I would normally buy
5.Practiced re-directing from all or nothing thinking.

Respectful feedback and shares about your own experiences welcomed on being over calorie goal! ❤

Good morning everyone!

176.4 today, but it's not fat, I'm very sore from my workout Saturday. I do need to buckle down still, though.

Today is busy- work and errands and the gym. Chair conditioning, chair choreo, and then a chair tricks class, going to be at the gym super late.

I'm going to try my protein powder by itself with water as a snack, probably going to be awful, we'll see. I might have to snatch one of Whatsisface's Dr. Pepper zero sugars this morning, I'm so tired and need extra caffeine.

Tag party time!
@swimmom_1 as usual, amazing workouts. And give yourself a little slack about carbs, they're hard to avoid. Maybe it's time for a change in strategy?

@BarbMessimer if you just type @ and then the name of the person, you notify them that you mentioned them in a post, which is as close to a reply function as we get, haha.

@mling84 if it helps you, I am over my calorie goal most weekends. And it slows my progress, but as long as I keep it within bounds, it doesn't stop my progress. For me, the important number is my maintenance calories number. As long as I'm not over the maintenance calories number, I know on any given day that I haven't eaten enough to gain weight.

But even if I did go over the number by a little bit, that doesn't mean that I'm going to gain weight, provided my deficit for the rest of the week was big enough to cancel out how much over maintenance calories I went. Here's a good infographic.

a word of caution about this- if you go over on the weekends and didn't mean to, better just to get back on the normal plan rather than try to compensate the next day with lower calories. If you try to compensate, you'll just be super hungry and start a binge-restrict-binge-restrict cycle in my experience. But if you want to make calorie cycling a thing, it's something I do- keep my week calories lower so I can have more on Friday-Saturday-Sunday. Thinking of weekly average calories rather than the day-to-day.

You're doing good, thinking about all this.

@coffeeandtruecrime I love your handle! Have I seen you around here before?

I love the one-bag life, and try to live it whenever possible. It's gotten much harder with kids, but soon I'll be shipping up to Boston for Spring Break with Whatsisface, and I intend to one-bag for that trip.

Have a great day, everyone!

@coffeeandtruecrime I love your handle! Have I seen you around here before?

I love the one-bag life, and try to live it whenever possible. It's gotten much harder with kids, but soon I'll be shipping up to Boston for Spring Break with Whatsisface, and I intend to one-bag for that trip.

Thanks, I only started being active in Feburary so maybe not lol.

I've only just been introduced to it, but I am not give big on clothes or anything like yet I will still try to bring my whole room with me before now and it was just a mess. So, this is me making sure I don't bring too much lol. That sounds so fun!

@coffeeandtruecrime Are you going anywhere fun? I’m horrible at packing everything in just one small bag.

I'm going to San Diego and Portland I'm hoping to be successful because it will be my first time trying this, but I plan on praticing packing that way I can see how I can make things fit and if I can leave things behind.

@BarbMessimer exactly like that.

Also you can quote your last entry and I take out the 2 quotes and then add my new info. So then it isn't shaded in grey.

Good morning!

I didn’t get to Zumba last night. I forgot that my husband’s office is doing a Taco Tuesday thing and I was volunteered to make a tray of Spanish Rice for about a dozen people. Afterward, I just sat again. However, I still kept to my calories while making my daughter one of her favorite dinners. She LOVES Orange Chicken and I had one of the frozen entrée things of it in the freezer. Orange Chicken, Basmati Rice, and steamed Broccoli.

I had my first mammogram yesterday. That was an interesting experience. Someone I used to know had told me once about the time they were getting theirs when the power went out for whatever reason. They were at a medical center and not an actual hospital so the generator only turned on lights, exit signs, etc… not machinery. She was stuck in it for about 30 minutes. I’ve lived with that irrational fear of it happening to me for about a decade. Is it sad that I was sure mine was at a small hospital and not a tiny medical center????

I have my bi-weekly Ladies Bible Study tonight at church. Often I either don’t know what the dinner is in advance or the dinner is something really high calorie or rich. This time we’re having a homemade salad bar, grilled chicken, and homemade dressings. The salad dressing is going to be the only real problem this time so I’m just taking some from home. I’m so happy that the plan is for a lighter meal option for once. Those ladies running it can cook so well and it makes keeping to tiny portions and calorie counting so hard.

@mling84 Barb Raveling wrote 2 bible studies about our approach to food, binging, and truth journaling. The first one is Taste for Truth and the second one is Freedom from Emotional Eating. If you aren’t looking to do a bible study, she also posted what exactly truth journaling looks like on her website. It’s just a one page read and it really spells out how to do it, what it looks like. https://barbraveling.com/how-to-truth-journal/