imagineaballoon

DEFINITELY YOU. What your sister is doing is not only not sustainable, but also downright unhealthy. She is doing her body a real disservice. The only way to "win" the weight loss game is to play it slow and steady. Try not to view your weight loss as your primary motivating factor -- are you eating better? Are you moving…

Girl, I could barely commit to a BOY when I was sixteen, let alone commit to and actually LOSE well over 100 lbs! What an INCREDIBLE achievement! You look amazing, even if you never lose another pound.

Everything about this area sucks hardcore, but eh. It's home. Haha.

Unfortunately. LOL.

That's very helpful, thank you! I have gone from a person who ate two large meals a day (lunch and dinner) to one who eats smaller meals 3x a day with snacks in between, and feel it has made a TREMENDOUS difference, just to my overall well-being. I don't know if I'll get to a place where I do 5-6 actual small meals a day,…

I bought Metabolife several months back, took it for one or two days, and then thought WTF AM I DOING I KNOW BETTER THAN THIS! I was on Metabolife and/or yellow jackets for about two years back when I was 19 and 20, and while I weighed the least I've ever weighed as an adult, I was so incredibly unhealthy. Now, that is…

Just out of curiosity, why would someone who eats clean do 5-6 small meals a day, as opposed to say, 3 moderate meals with several snacks throughout the day? I practice mainly clean eating (not 100% but mostly) and I just don't have it in me to eat frequent small meals. So I do snacks between each main meal and watch my…

Feel free to add me! I am a strict vegetarian that eats some dairy. :)

Annnnnnnnnnd now I think I might love you.

Ahhh you guys are the BEST! This helps soooo much. :D We have a really good warm-up and cool down in place, and we're only out there for just over half an hour, tops. Our program this past week had us running 16 minutes and walking 19 (plus 5 minute warm-up walk.) Based on the information, I'm getting from your posts, I…

I love Greek yogurt for protein boosts -- I get the single cups from Kroger and there are 14g of protein in every cup! Plus the flavored ones are sweetened with stevia. I also have a soy protein powder I use for shakes for when I need an extra kick of protein. As for every day items, brown rice, almond butter, and natural…

Hi!

This is a great group of people, super friendly and very, very supportive and helpful. Feel free to add me if you're looking for friends! :)

I'm in the middle of repeating Week 3 -- a major case of posterior shin splints set me back last week. I can tell you that as someone who was also sedentary practically from BIRTH, I never thought I'd even be able to run three minutes without stopping, but I CAN and I feel GOOD doing it. You'll be amazed how much…

Thanks, both of you! I hope I didn't come across in a nasty way, it's just something I've been feeling and probably has more to do with my own issues than the words you have actually typed. :) I google-fu'd and managed to find a real, live running store about 45 minutes away. As soon as I can get out there, I will, and be…

I feel like it might look like I'm whining there. I'm not. I'm also not calling you out on what is a very helpful post. I just mean, is it every enough to just want to run, and to do it in at least a halfway decent shoe? My budget for shoes this week was around $50 -- I had to get new ones because my old ones have very…

What about the beginning runner who either has no specialty running stores in their area and/or is on a pretty strict budget? This is the situation I find myself in, and to be honest, even though I am 100% sure you didn't mean for it to be, I find posts like this really discouraging -- like I'm failing at this before I…

I discovered an insane love for almond butter last week when I found it on sale at Kroger for almost half off. It is SO GOOD. Half the jar is already gone! I put it on whole wheat toast with banana on top, throw a tablespoon into my protein shakes, and just slather it on a single slice of bread when I need a filling snack.…

I actually JUST wrote a blog post about this very thing last night. Maybe it will help you know you're not the only one. :) http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/imagineaballoon/view/a-major-case-of-the-blah-s-70395

I am a strict vegetarian who doesn't use a lot of dairy. I journal everything I eat, and make most of my meals (not many processed foods), so if you want to look through my entries, they're all open. :)

Honestly, I think as long as you are seeing a general overall trend downward week to week, you're on the right track. It doesn't have to be technical. :D ETA: if you ate heavily this weekend and had a good deal more sodium than normal, 7 lbs. "gain" (temporary) is not out of the realms of possibility. I've read that extra…

You can TOTALLY tell a difference and you look AH-MA-ZING.

Love that link! I see quite a few snack ideas on there I'll be able to use weekly. Thanks for sharing. :D

Love this! I'm a strict vegetarian so some of these didn't apply, but I was happy to see how many of these I already incorporate into my diet on a daily basis, and thankful for the suggestions on ones I don't. Great read -- thanks for posting!

You look so fit and healthy -- a definite inspiration!

Just looking at your diary, I can spot at least a couple of things that are probably contributing to maintaining your current weight: a whole lot of whole milk and a lot of processed foods. If you could even switch to one cup of 1% milk instead of 2 cups of whole milk, you'd eliminate a ton of calories. If you could cook…

It takes a while to get used to what has the most calories -- I had no idea bread had so many, for instance! Don't beat yourself up too much, just take it all in your stride and learn from it. For breakfast -- and I am not a big breakfast person at all -- I generally have either a bowl of oatmeal with soymilk and fresh…

Good luck! :D

I toooootally get that. I want this to be a really successful, lifelong change for my husband and I, too, which is why I was researching the BMR thing this morning. If you're worried about going into starvation mode, which is probably pretty unlikely, you could maybe eat above your daily MFP goal for a week or two and see…

I used this site earlier today to calculate my BMR: http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/ Then used their link to find my daily caloric needs. So, if my BMR is 1540, I then took this line into account: "If you are moderatetely active (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.55" which…