[MoodyMama]

Hi everyone. Im new to this site and do not belong to anything like this. So im new to the experience also. Im looking for someone thats similar to me in their weightloss struggles. I am hypo-thyroid. I know alot of people say they are, Im looking for somebody else who has been diagnosed with this and on medication or handling it alternatively. Not a self diagnosed person. no offense. I am 25 yrs old and a mother of a 3 1/2 yr old daughter and a 2 yr old son. I was married young at 19 and still happily married by some miracle I suppose Im in a size 14 and weigh 198lbs. I've been fighting my weight since I was 20. I build muscle easily but losing fat is ridiculously hard. If I work and work at it with NO cheating at all I can usually lose about 5lbs a month. I work out 4x/week aerobic and 3x/week strength training. Im on a 1400 calorie diet. Im having a HARD time kicking the coca-cola habit and I cant switch to diet because Im allergic to every form of artificial sweetner except splenda. but splenda based coke isnt good I just need some help and encouragement and if your like me at all please contact me. even if your just a stay at home mom with young insane children I could use some company. my husband is not really supportive in my weightloss because he likes the voluptuous look and doesnt want me to lose weight which sounds awesome right? but no its not. think of the episode of malcolm in the middle where lois is prego and hal is pouring whole milk and syrup into her cereal cuz he likes her big butt He's a hottie that does not have a weight problem at all. I feel like the wife of the guy that all the girls look at and say "well, she must have a great personality" or "why is HE with HER?" Also I must mention that Im a younger sister of a totally gorgeous play-mate look alike sister who doesnt work out or eat right. So thats hard. Plus my mother is an older version of my sister and we're all very close. They dont understand why Im overweight considering I eat better than them and workout religously, which I dont either, but you know, I guess thats life. I look forward to meeting whoever replys

[djstorey]

Welcome to the site. I'm hypo also. Actually diagnosed with Graves disease in '93 after my 2nd son was born. After being treated twice with radioactive iodine, I seem to be cured of that but now I'm hypo thyroid.

Being hypo I guess can make it hard to lose weight from what I've read, although I do believe it can be done. I've lost 84 lb myself and I really can't tell you if it's been harder or not. How does one compare?

Anyways, don't give up because of your thyroid! You really can do this. Once thing I noticed is that you are eating 1400 calories, weigh in at 196 and work out quite a bit. Be careful! With thyroid problems you are already fighting your metabolism and by not eating enough you could end up lowering it even more. I weigh just a bit less than you and do aerobics and walking 5-6 days a week and a little strength training everyday and lose weight the best on around 1600-1700 calories per day. Now I realize that every person is different but just keep that in mind. I try really hard to watch my deficits to keep me eating properly. I try for an average deficit per week of 7000 calories. It seems that everytime I go lower I hit another plateau!

Good luck with your journey! There is a lot of help here and a lot of very nice people.

[MoodyMama]

Thank you for your reply and info. Thats great you've lost so much weight. I've just handed a food journal to a nutritionist and she said that I need to be on at least 1600 calories too and thats why Im having so much trouble losing, my body thinks its starving. So now I have to eat more, OH DARN!
Thanks again!

[djstorey]

Glad to hear you talked to a nutritionist. It would be horrible to have your metabolism get slower! I try really hard to keep mine working well. Exercising, getting enough calories, and eating smaller, healthy meals every few hours seems to help. I even sometimes will "cycle" my calories. One day I will only eat 1500 and then next I will have 1700 for example, just making sure I average out to between 1600-1700. That way, I have some higher calorie days to hopefully boost my metabolism and the lower days to bring my calorie count down. I don't do this all the time but just use it as needed. Some people on this board cycle on a regular basis and swear by it.

Anyways, good luck with what you are doing. Read around the boards here and see what groups might interest you and join in! It's nice to have encouragement and people are really nice here.

You can also pm me if you want or if you have questions.