[eesabella]

Hello Everyone!

I am 26 years old and I'm looking for a diet buddy! I was at my heaviest three years ago - 175 pounds. I have slowly (VERY slowly) lost 15 of it. On July 23 of this year I quit smoking cold turkey and am going strong (go me!). I was 163 pounds when I quit. I tackled quitting smoking as a lifestyle change, not just one change to my life. I have been working out and eating healthier for the last year and when I quit smoking I put more into it and quit caffeine and eating refined sugar. I lost 8 pounds - bringing me down to 155!

I slacked off a bit over the last few weeks - I continued to work out, but I ate stuff I knew I shouldn't. I started watching it again for 2 weeks and expected to have dropped a few more pounds. I don't own a scale and only weigh myself at my parent's house - when I weighed myself on Saturday I was shocked to see I had gained back 5 pounds!! Putting me at 160. Since I expected to see a loss from 155, it really upset me!

Anyway! I would love to buddy up with someone! I've never had a buddy for dieting before! If anyone is interested, lemme know!

Thanks!

Eesabella

[Suzanne 3FC]

Congratulations on losing 15 pounds It sounds like you are learning what your body needs. Good luck, and I hope you find a weight loss buddy soon. There are a lot of great people here!

[eesabella]

It really seems like a great forum! I've noticed that there is a very positive air in here!

[sjdphc]

Congrats on the weight loss and quitting smoking! Exactly what did you do to lose the weight?

[eesabella]

Hi Sj!

I'm assuming you're asking about what I did to lose weight while quitting smoking... nothing too successful since I gained most of it back! Mostly I just cut out things - refined sugar, white flour, white rice, etc... drank extra water. Tried not to stuff myself at meals - I didn't count calories or anything. Upped my fruit and vegetable intake. Come to think of it, I have been eating less veggies than those first couple of months when I quit - that could be part of why I gained back some of the weight! I had already been semi-watching what I ate and exercising since December 2004. When I quit smoking I started working out a lot more.

I had experimented with yoga a bit before I quit, but as soon as I quit I added longer yoga regiments. I also upped my cardio! I do aerobic DVDs - all the good cheesy ones Denise Austin, the old time 8 min. series, Quickfix Dance, Crunch Cardio Salsa, The Firm. I use a book, Basic Yoga by Susannah Marriot to practice and a DVD. The DVD I do is REEEALLY cool - Yoga Shakti. The woman in it, Shiva Rhea is inspirational for a lot of reasons. The DVD has this clip of her doing a "flow" - totally amazing - beautiful, her body is perfect. I watch it often to keep me from slacking off on working out! Wish I had an inspirational piece for not overeating!!

The first 15 that I lost slowly... in case that's what you meant that started with an office competition. We went by who lost the higher percentage of body fat. I didn't work out, I just cut out the junk in my diet. It was SOOO easy to do - at the time I was eating junk all the time. Fast food, sweets, no fiber, etc... I was raised to eat healthfully, so I just went back to eating the way I was raised and I won the competition! Stuck with that way of eating for the most part - didn't lose anymore or gain it back! So I guess I really did lose it fast, I just had a really long plateau!

I don't know if that's how specific you wanted me to get!! I bet there are other people on this forum with much better info on how they lost weight! As far as not gaining when quitting smoking, I am the Queen I'm pretty proud of that!