Hi everyone! My name is Tandi, and I'm 22. I live in the thumb of MI where it is currently very cold and very boring. My boyfriend of three years and I live together, and 10 months ago we had our beautiful daughter, Brooklyn. That's where most of my weight problems started. I have struggled with weight my whole life, but now looking back on my high school days when I thought I was enormous, [weighting in at 125-135] I was actually quite lean for my 5'7 body. I currently weigh 166 and am ready to be done with it! I just haven't been able to lose all the weight form my pregnancy and it's killing me. At my heaviest during pregnancy I weighed 191, and a few weeks after delivery I was left at 185 still. The first 15ish lbs weren't terrible to lose but now I'm at this standstill that is getting the best of me. It's below 0 here most days [we live on lake huron] so going outside is next to impossible. There aren't any gyms here, and before I moved here thats how I lost the begining of my weight. I persuaded my coworkers to join me in a biggest loser competition which is going to help alot I think. My biggest downfall is that I'm a snacker; when I'm bored, when I'm tired, when I'm stressed, and I have alot of it considering I'm a mom, a full time student, and work full time as an assistant manager at a department store. I just want to be the girl who fits into the clothes that I put on the mannikens, and if anyone wants to join me in that journey I will love you forever! Well I guess I've rambled to much!
TTFN!

Welcome! I too live in an area w/o gyms or anything else thats close. It's not quite as cold here, but I was determined last week to get some kind of exercise. So I bundled up & took off--only planned on walking for 20 minutes & I ended up walking for an hour and a half! As cold as it was, it felt good just to get out & do something for myself (I have a little girl 2) Maybe you could try some exercise videos? That was suggested to me, though i've yet to try it. I'm a big snacker too. The biggest thing that has helped me is chewing sugarfree gum. I always make sure i'm stocked up! Now i'm rambling Well hope to encourage on your journey!

It's so nice to hear someone has the same problem as me! I told my boyfriend yesterday actually that I was going to go for a walk even though it was cold and woke up this morning to a blizzard! MI weather is sooo unreliable! I've really though about trying the gum thing, I'll keep that in mind.as for workout dvd's i have two. One is a carmen elektra aerobic one that I love and that totally kicks my butt, and the other is a dance of the inches one that is goofy but I have a blast doing, only when I get home from work I spend like two hours online doing homework, then I can't persuade myself to get up and do anything because I'm tired. I've heard acai supplements offer alot of energy so i'm thinking of trying that... thanks for the support!

That's one of my biggest problems, being tired. Just having the energy to get up & do something is hard sometimes. I don't know how you do it with work, school, and everything else. Way to go for you! What's the dancing off inches video you were talking about? Sounds fun, I might like to try that. So how are you doing on your diet today? This is my 3rd day and amazingly i'm not hungry right now! Hope that keeps up!7;

Well today I'm doing okish on it, I ate a lean cuisine meal for lunch and some macaroni with tomatoes for dinner, but totally splurged on ice cream :-( but it's just the begining... umm the dvd is just called dance off the inches, it's like a wal mart special or something, it was only $7, but it's fun, it gets your heart pumping, and has some great toning exercises at the end. I would definetly check it out!and that's awesome that you're doing so well keep it up!

What about in the morning? Would you be able to wake up little earlier and work out? I am a single mom, work full time, go to school full time..and it's about an hour one way to work. Add the snow, over 3 hours I spend in the car just to go to work and home... (I live in MI too...)
So I sure don't have enough time to work out, and of course no energy, either. But I try to wake up 30 minutes early and either do a dvd or run (I run at home in front of TV... no work out machine..and it IS cold here too :P). I actually got the idea of running at home from Walk Away The Pounds dvd. This way, even if you get tired or busy in the evening or afternoon, you still did work out in the morning..

The cold in MI is a bad deal, isn't it? lol. Waking up half an hour earlier is a great idea, and I have thought of it before...Problem is, I'm terrible at waking up in the morning... I know it's a lame lame excuse, but I've just never been one for waking up any earlier than I have to, and I like to shower at night so my hair is ready to flatiron in the morning before work, if I worked out in the morning I'd have to shower and blowdry my hair before work adding another hour to getting ready... I guess I just need to get up and work out evenwhen I don't feel like it. I've found when I used to go to the gym, that once I got there the tiredness/not wanting to be there disappeared.I bet it would work out the same way here. I'm going to start trying monday when my biggest loser competition at work starts-wish me luck!

heehee i feel so bad for you! i live in TX and we are in our like two weeks of cold weather and i can't stop whining about it! :P but whether or not i'm a baby is beside the point... i know what you mean about not getting out to workout! so my solution was i bought myself a mini stair stepper and i use it while i watch tv!

anyway, nice to mee you! hope i see you around