Wildflower, I am currently 138 on the nose and I am still eating 1575 averaged from calorie cycling. Have you tried this yet? Not everyone sees the same results of course, but it seems to be the ONLY way I can consistently lose weight. When I started try to lose again back in Jan, it took me several weeks to find my right calorie intake, but once I began cycling with the 1575, the weight just started coming off. I've been on this calorie schedule since about 147 lbs, so that is good that I haven't really had to change it yet. I am only losing about 1 lb per week now as opposed to the 2 lbs that were coming off in the beginning, but I am more comfortable where I am now and don't mind the wait as much.

It may be something you could give a try for a couple of weeks and see what happens. BTW, I am not exercising, like, at all. I have suffered yet another injury from exercise and so that may contribute to the only 1 lb per week loss as well.

Niecy - I did try calorie cycling briefly in the past but back then it was too hard for me to do the low days. Now that my metabolism has adjusted a bit, it's getting easier for me to get a few days around 1200 but I don't think I can go under that, which I think I would have to do to average at 1200-1300 a week. Most of those plans have 900 calorie days to do that.

On the weekends I typically do have a cheat meal which is sometimes a few slices of pizza and a few glasses of wine. I try to eat smaller meals the rest of the day to balance it out. I've done this since I started dieting and it didn't impact my 2 lbs per week loss back then...but my weight loss has changed to about a 1-2 a month and now the last few months I haven't seen much change at all.

I'll look into the calorie cycling again, thanks for the reminder!!!

You are welcome; and just a side note, I don't do 1200 days at all...I do one "very low" day @ 1260, the other "low" day is 1410 and the rest fall between 1575 and 1900.

I'm sure ONE day I will have to make an adjustment, but I really want to ride this schedule out as long as possible, I rarely feel like I am starving and all the other days make up for that 1260

Hi, I'm brand spanking new here. Figured this would be a good place to start, since I'm desperately hoping to be out of the 130's soon!

I count calories. I'm actually getting out of a dark period where my eating became a little disordered, I didn't eat anything one day due to a rather nasty hangover from a cheat day and, lo and behold, I was down over a pound and a half the next day. I was thrilled and went from my healthy 1200-1400 calories and exercise to eating 1000, then 800, then 500... then eating 500 but burning off 500 on the treadmill. SO UNHEALTHY. Also, so NOT me!! I found that I felt even WORSE about myself after prying 10 pounds off of me that way, I felt bigger than I did when I started dieting!

I'm sorry, I went on a tangent, anyway -- back to slowly and healthily losing and feeling good about what I'm doing, and being cheerful instead of homicidal. I'm a little up since I stopped my random little episode, which I'm okay with, so I'm at 133lbs. Hoping to be 125lbs by May 30th since my wonderful, supportive boyfriend and I have a week long vacation planned in Pasedena!

Great to meet everyone!

I'm also working to get out of the 130s! My goal is 125 by may 6, so I've gotta work quickly, but I think I might already be down to around 128, won't be weighing in until sunday.

Yesterday I wasn't able to exercise and I stuck to around 1200 calories... but now I'm realizing that it's just not enough food for me. Today I woke up starving and have just needed carbs all day long. After a big high calorie bowl of granola I'm feeling satasfied finally! I know I can lose weight when I'm around 1400, but it's so hard to get out of the mindset that less calories = more weight loss. From now on I'll aim for 1400 on days when I don't work out, and around 1600 on days that I do.

Today I'm headed to an intense yoga session after a two week hiatus, so excited to get back into a regular yoga routine. And hopefully sunday I'll be out of this thread and onto the 120s!

This is my very first post. I started losing weight the second week of February, I was 147. I'm now weighing 135.4 and have been cycling my calories. I do 1200 or so for three days and then a day at between 1400-1600. I workout a bit in the morning before I have eaten anything and it seems to be working well for me. I'd like to get to 120-125 and see how I feel at that weight. Good luck to all! We can do this! I have two weeks until a Mexico vacation and want to look decent on the beach!

I hate TOM. A lot. I'm up to 134.
*looks at conversation above her and decides to join in*
Ahem. I'm not a counter of calories, but as I understand, the human body has a BMR aka a base metabolic rate. This referees to the minimum calories one needs, admittedly it is not completely accurate and will of course be influenced by factors not taken into account by the formula-I digress.
The BMR is the amount of calories burned by living. If you stayed in bed all day (and weren't ill) you'd burn this. Most calculators I've seen put me at about 1400-1500 calories a day, just by living. Once I start moving around I need another few hundred to maintain.
The BMR rises with height and weight. It is subject to fluctuation due to low calorie diets (think an ED or a concentration camp or insanely low cal. diet or "cleanse") the human body, as flexible as it is, will lower the BMR if too few calories are consumed. Along with this lowering, it will stop non completely vital processes like thinking as well as organ failure and ect.
I swear I had a point when I started writing this, but it has turned into my geek showing. I'll edit this if I remember if I has anything of more interest to say.

EDIT: I remembered my point! I wanted to welcome Dorian5 and give her my congratulations on deciding to lose weight in a healthy manner.
Also: I belong to a bodybuilding forum, and many of the people there who are trying to "bulk" have the opposite problems that we do here. I woman mentioned that if she eats less than 2500 calories she starts losing. She is 5'6" and 137 lbs of muscle-17% body fat or similar. Her BMR is very high due to all of the muscle she has because muscle, even when unused, burn calories.
Part of my love of that forum is the disproving of the "low weight high reps" myth about weightlifting. I'm going to pimp stumptuous.com here, because there article about that is fab.
Look here (copy and paste) www . stumptuous.com/lies-in-the-gym! (Don't you love the heading pic? I want her hair. And arms.)
Also, TOM sucks. I ache all over, and am cranky and sluggish. Bleh.

Hey everyone! I'm new to this thread...I'm usuallys in the 20-something thread but needed something to make me accountable to get me out of the 130's! Theres a 130's thread in the 20s-something but not many people post! I hope you dont mind!!

As of today I'm 131.2 ..I'm really hoping I can see 129 within the next 2 weeks! That would be great!!

Thanks Esenin! I'm hoping my momentary brainlessness didn't set me too far back and that I can bounce back quickly. Luckily, I'm already down a little from the 133.0lbs today and I'm sitting at 132.6lbs. I've had 1420 calories today, and had about 1360 yesterday, and I feel so much stronger and happier. Even the boyfriend, whom I never let in on the fact that I had started being so stupid about food, mentioned that he was thrilled I was in better spirits lately. Hah, guess that's what no food does to you. :X

PS Esenin, my ignorance is showing, I am totally enthralled with that site you posted with the chick with rad hair -- I think weight training is something I need to find myself interested in pronto, I basically believed all of those misconceptions.

Oh yeah! I always love helping ; )
(Crazy how some things are taken as facts: we never bother to double-check, right?)

It's really strange for me to be posting here because I still have a hard time considering myself a featherweight but I would LOVE to be out of the 130s soon.

My scale has been bouncing between 130.6-131 the last week or so but I'm going to keep on pushing! 120s would be amazing

I look forward to bonding with more of you!

I'm working on getting out of the 130s too. I weighed 135.8 this morning. I joined this site one week ago, and have been eating low calorie and exercising every day. Good luck to everyone. I will be so happy when I get into the 120s. It'll happen.

Goodness gracious I'm so anxious to get away from the 130's already. This morning I was 132.6. I'm sure it's going to take me another month or two to see 129, but I'm just so close I can taste it!

I feel the exact same way! I never ever thought I would be posting in this forum. We're glad to have you!