Uggggggh! I am having a rough week. :( My scale is so darn stuck to the exact 10th of a pound at 205.4, it is really beginning to depress me. This may be the first week since I started 12 weeks ago that I don't see a loss, and last week I only lost 0.8#, so I was hoping for a little more this week to keep up with my 2# weight loss per week goal. I'm having a hard time getting excited about my workouts and my eating plan when the scale is stalled out. I could eat a lot more and exercise a lot less if I wanted to maintain this weight. Makes me feel all this work is pointless. I know I sould probably stay off the scale for a few days, but it is just so tempting in the morning, thinking I will feel much better if it is lower, NOT! I officially weigh and measure on Sunday, so I hope to see at least some inches gone. If I had to analyze myself, I would probably pin my problem on hormones, expected TOM next week, but I have never had such a hard time before. :?: I usually go up a little a day or two before, but never stall out like this 10 days before!!!!! I have in my mind that I want to be 195 by time I leave for my vacation on April 2, and maybe that is too much pressure, but I don't think that is an unreasonable goal either. . . The reasonable side of me knows this will eventually pass and I will see a change soon, but I have this other side of me that wants to give up and say to heck with it, I will never get below 205, so why try so hard? Sorry for the rant, I am just very frustrated!

jomatho - I think that after a significant loss, your body sometimes needs some time to adjust. 25 pounds is a big deal! I sometimes zigzag my calories to jump start my metabolism, that may help you. Also, if you're exercising, I guarantee that even if your scale is stuck, you're losing inches. Do you take your measurements regularly? I measure myself every two weeks - so even if my scale and I are fighting, I can tell that I'm still shrinking. And the measurements are really what matter, right? I mean, nobody is going to know what the scale says except you, they're only seeing the inches you're losing. And 10 days feels like forever for me too, but I see that a lot of people here will stall for a month at a time sometimes. But every single one of them eventually started losing again. Just stick with it, I'm sure you'll see a change soon. Also, (last thing I promise!) have you been drinking a lot of water? A lot of people seem to retain water before TOM, and the only way to combat that is to start guzzling more!

jomatho, you can not give up now. You have come waaay too far. You are doing great! You said it yourself, this *will* eventually pass. You can do this! You can, you can, you can. Patience :)

Hi all! Glad to see everyone chugging away! I'm doing really well, I love calorie counting! It makes me feel like I have so much more control over what I'm doing with my body. And love love loving strength training too! I'm actually, get this, looking forward to going to the gym. It's a pretty awesome feeling.

I orginally had a goal of 175 lbs from 188 lbs but I may be adjusting that goal depending on what I see on the scale on Feb 28th (marking my first month of calorie counting). I think it's likely I'll be around 182 on Monday, so really my real goal for St. Patty's day is to have a firm foothold in the 170s! Considering a "normal" BMI for me is 179, I think that's a worthwhile milestone to shoot for!

Keep at it girls, we've still got time!

btw, music i don't think it's necessary for you to start a new thread at all. It's easy enough to jump to the last page of the thread. :)

He everyone!

Jomatho, don't let the first wall bring you down. Look at how far you've come! We are all going to have those moments. As women our bodies do weird things sometimes. At the beginning of this week I was up 5 pounds. And remember that you were the one who posted not to give up. And I am saying the same to you. While the loss may not have been as big as you wanted, it is still a loss and still deserves to be celebrated. Why not take a little time to actually reward yourself? You have made significant strides.

Prepping, its great that you are getting so close to your goal! :cp: It's great that you may need to readjust because you are doing so well!

mdchick, I actually front a band. I sing, and every so often I play bass when we do a cover gig. You can actually see me (in all my chubby frontperson glory) on youtube if you search 7envy. :-) I can't help it. I'm a self promoter... We do a pretty good cover of White Rabbit and Piece of My Heart though... btw - you are so gonna hit your goal! Congrats!

Lluvyblu, how are you doing? I know you were having a tough time a few days ago, and I hope everything has turned around for you.

We are all doing great! just to let you all know (and I am sure you know this too) I was reading an article that people who are regularly involved with message boards tend to lose more weight than their unsupported counterparts. So keep checking in!

Thanks everyone!

Thanks for all the support everyone! It means a lot. I did not give up. I kept on my eating plan, kept with the exercise program. The only thing I changed is that I ate a little more the last couple days due to being ravenous both days. I officially weigh on Sunday, but have finally seen a little downward progress in my daily weights. I wonder if eating more made me drop a little, or if I would have dropped more if I had stayed in the lower range of my plan? I will never know, but am glad to not see "that number" again and don't care to ever see it again. Keeping fingers crossed for tomorrow.

Hey everyone! Just a quick check in here. Thanks so much everyone for the encouragement earlier this week.

SW: 204
CW: 196.75
GW: 188 ~ 15 pounds by St. Patty's Day

jomatho - I think sometimes eating more jump starts your metabolism and can help you lose. I'm not sure if that's a proven medical thing, but it's been true for me before. Congrats for not giving up, and for getting to a lower weight!!

music - you are really, really, really good! You have an amazing voice, and great... I don't know the word... range? Haha I don't know if that's the right "music word" for it, but you're voice sounds great really low and really high (and everywhere in between).

lluvy - less than a pound until your out of the "obese" classification! you're doing awesome!

I have absolutely NO motivation right now - I should be getting my butt kicked by Jillian Michaels right now, but I can't get up the energy to put in the DVD. Hopefully I can talk myself into it within the next hour or so... I'm not going to be able to lose the last 5 pounds of this challenge sitting on the couch all day!

Hi All!

jomatho and mdchick, I am so happy that you have found where you need to be. I knew you would see brighter days!

So, I played my gig. And I was beaten by a very frail, pretty, tiny, skinny girl singer. Ouch. I can't begin to tell you how I feel. I know that if I had lost the weight before that I would have won. But she has the showmanship that I would have were I thinner. I know that I hold back because I am heavy. I stand in my own way. We placed 3rd in the battle, but I know that if I was thinner we would have taken first. I can't even say how awful I feel. If some guys beat us, or someone who wasn't a girl who would blow over with a strong wind beat me it wouldn't matter. But here I am. Doing everything I can to lose weight, and just when I start to feel like I'm making progress, here is skinny minnie to crappily sing her way to stardom.

This industry makes me feel like ****. I would normally censor that, but it really does sometimes. I am trying so hard and I know that I would have won if I was just at my goal weight.

Ok. I am pretty sure that this is the most honest and embarrassing that I have ever put out there. But maybe what I need to do is own up to how I really feel about myself.

I feel awful. And we placed 3rd out of 10 bands. I should be happy. Everyone else in my band is. But I feel terrible.

So thanks for listening. I really needed to get that out. Being a chubby girl in showbiz is super tough sometimes. No one would put me in third as a fat accountant....or maybe they would...

I feel better.

Thanks for reading this...if you've gotten this far.

WOW! I've been absent from this thread for awhile, but you ladies seem to still be chugging along with their weight loss. I'm so proud of you all for sticking to your plans. You're truly an inspiration.
jomatho-Congratulations! I'm a calorie-counter, too, and while I love its benefits, I also have gotten stuck and frustrated. I'm so glad you're seeing some movement on the scale again. Way to go!
Musicangel- HUGS! Lots and lots of hugs to you, dear. I'm so sorry about what you're going through-- I've struggled with similar, except not with showbiz. I've been trying to get some of my writing published and have entered a lot of contests only to lose to a twig-woman who couldn't write as well as I could. Once, I even had a freelancing job lined up that would feature a picture of my face next to my article. I sent my photo in, and then got a very polite e-mail saying that the magazine had decided not to feature my selection, after all. It's so humiliating and frustrating to be judged because of your weight! I bet you could out-sing that girl, though, and once you lose all of your weight, you'll have talent to go with your skinniness while she will not. You're already beautiful inside and out, and I know that you'll succeed in your goal. You just have to keep moving forward.
As for me, ladies, these last couple of weeks have been rocky... I had a "cold" I just couldn't kick, but apparently I underestimated how bad the symptoms were. It turns out that I had bronchitis that was well on its way to pneumonia. To top this all off, I'm on 3 prescriptions at the moment. The side effects of TWO of these (sterioids) are increased hunger. So not only am I coughing my lungs out right now, but I'm also ravenous. Grrrrr. I guess the medicine is speeding up my metabolism, though, because after not losing for a week, I dropped 3 and a half pounds this week!
SW: 195.0
CW: 182.0

Hey our Lady, Thanks for the kind words. I'm so glad to hear back from you! You're doing an amazing job despite the setbacks that life throws at you.

Sometimes I let this stuff build up and get to me a little bit too much. My skin is usually a bit thicker. But the girl that won was good. I guess these are my issues that I need to work through. Sometimes it is tough to be onstage with my inner critique going mad. It makes me feel a bit better that others have experienced situations where you felt like that too.

Thanks again for all of the support in my late night, somewhat melodramatic rant. I don't often like to let out how I really feel. And now I feel a bit like I'm a whiny, diva-y baby.

Thanks for listening and have a strong weekend!

This weeks updated stats:
SW: 214
CW: 204.6
GW: 199

I was at 203 the last couple days, as evidenced by my ticker, but today I saw a jump, possibly due to PMS and I also woke up with very sore muscles, so I am sure I have some water gain from that too. Not stressing too much, hopefully I will see that pound plus some more gone after TOM this week. So only -0.8 from last Sunday to this Sunday. Bleh. Same as last week. Bleh, bleh. This too shall pass. . . Going to be really close whether I make my goal or not, :crossed: Only two more Sunday weigh ins, but St. Patty's day isn't until that following Thursday, so I have a chance, we'll see. . .

MusicAngel, :hug: so sorry about the gig and how it made you feel. It sucks that this society is so thin obsessed. That's a tough industry to be in too. Remember this feeling right now and try to use it as motivation.

Hugs all around! Thanks for sharing your stories/feelings Our Lady Bonbon and Musicangel. We all have times where we feel that our weight is holding us back. Unfortunately, sometimes it's because of what *other* people think of us. Like we don't feel bad about our body images enough on our own...
I'm having a pretty good day so far. TOM has arrived but I've decided to make this an opportunity to see a major loss when it's over. I'm not even going to pay attention to what my scale says until TOM is completely done. Just gonna work out, eat well, drink LOTS of water and hope for the best.

Grrr!! I'm so frustrated!! I started 30 Day Shred yesterday, and did Day 2 today. But this morning, my scale was at 177.8!!! Thats 3 pounds up from yesterday!!! I know it's not actual fat poundage, but it's still going to take a while to come back off. I drank a ton of water yesterday, like usual, and ate within my calories for the day. This is reeeeeeeally frustrating.

175.8 today, so going back in the right direction. Only 1 pound up from my lowest - hopefully with all the water I'm glugging I'll be back there tomorrow or Thursday.

How has everyone else been doing?