nina- you may try calorie cycling. Eating a higher amount of cals one day lower amount the next, etc. to trick your body a little bit. You could also be eating too few calories....adding exercise always helps give an extra weight loss boost! Hang in there, slow and steady wins the race :)

Thanks Linds. I will try calorie cycling. Should I switch around my calories everyday or once in 2 days?

My husband & I went to this Chinese buffet last night for dinner. I mostly stuck to the boiled shrimp and soft-shelled crabs. I guess all the sodium in the seafood and MSG has made me retain water today. I am up to 146 :(

Nina: I hear you on the water retention. I had hoped to have a happy weigh in today, since the prior one was 4 days ago during TOM and I have been on plan and exercising lots. But nope, up 1.5 lbs. Sigh. I am also blaming my salty dinner last night for causing this, since the alternative (actual weight gain) is too confusing and depressing to accept.

I have been measuring my hips/waist and oddly have not really lost any inches even though I've lost about 10 lbs (maybe 2 inches off my waist right away, or my stomach just went down a little because it wasn't so full of food - hah! It happened pretty quickly and then stalled so maybe the original measurement was not accurate). People have commented on my weight loss though...I think I am losing weight from the area above my waist, and my face maybe - which I didn't measure.

I'm teetering between 142 - 144 as well. Well to be fair, I went up for a few weeks around the holidays to 147 so maybe coming back down to an average of 143 is progress.

(There was one day after a night of drinking my scale said "140" but after the next day of normal eating it was gone.)

Here is what I'm doing:

1) Got a new scale. I thought the old one was broken and therefore stuck at 143. It probably wasn't broken, but the new one looks cooler.

2) Committed to eating vegetarian a minimum of 5 days/week. I only eat poultry, lamb, and seafood to begin with, but that gives me lots of options to make bad choices if I keep those in my diet 7 days/week, like sneaking in some Wendy's Spicy chicken nuggets. :o

3) Moving my butt for at least 4 - 5 miles a day on the treadmill, 5 days/week. I also wear a pedometer so my goal is to hit 15K+ a day. I can usually do it with a combination of walking around town and the gym, but it has been so frigid outside I've had to up my time on the treadmill.

Hi othodiva,

It looks like we have the almost same stats. I am almost 5'6" and I weighed 154lbs at my heaviest. For the past 4 years, I would come close to 140 but have never been able to go past it. I am really determined to get to the 130's this time around.

Losing from the face is the best! :)

Yeah, I have those full cheek bones...someone at my office told my my chin looked pointier. Ha.

Despite my hips not going down, I managed to drop a size in pants sort of...I am perhaps in between, but a lot of my pants feel too big now and some of the ones that were too tight fit ok.

Hey ladies. I'm still fighting to get below the 145 mark. its the lowest number that i've seen so far this month. TOM just came, so im hoping that after a couple days my weight will drop a little, which is usually what happens, but i was at 148 this morning. I'm definitly not going to make my goal to be out of the 140's by the end of january, but im still going to shoot for my 137 by february.
Im getting super frustrated with this. But i know i can do it cuz i did it a year ago, gained it back, and now ill do it again (and not gain it back lol)

I am still bouncing around...140.0 this morning.

I really hope to be 138 within the next week and a half. While I have seen many 139 days, I am not sure I am truly out of the 140's yet as I keep bouncing back up to 140/141/even 142 one day during TOM.

I've was totally off plan last week due to a business trip...so this week I am restarting and have done really well keeping my calories low. I am hoping my "off plan" weeks raised my metabolism and now that I've restrarted I will lose more easily. I lost so easily the first month I was dieting and then the weight loss really started to slow...then I sort of gave up and ate whatever I wanted. Luckily (very luckily) I didn't gain during this "time off plan" but I've been bouncing around 139/140/141 since Christmas!!! Jeez, I need to stop this already and start losing again!!!

I've been reading up on body building and the idea of a "refeed week" or "refeed day" each week. It seems as reducing calories slows your metabolism and causes your body to adjust that you should take a break from eating so low calorie once a week or some even advocate one week a month. It's not a "cheat" and it doesn't mean you can binge all day on whatever. It means you should eat at a higher calorie level than normal.

If I can ever get back on plan for a significant amount of time I'll be able to tell you if this theory works! Given that I was at a plateau / very slowed weight loss for such a long time, I am hoping taking this break will kick start things for me.

Fingers crossed...can't wait to be out of the 140's for EVER.

I'd KILL to be out of the 140's. I haven't been in the 130's since I was 16 years old, eesh.

144 today. I'm hoping I'll be 140 by Valentine's Day, at least. Hopefully sooner.

So... I just hit my goal yesterday morning. Did a post about it... and came in at 141 today.
Ahhhhhhhh!!!
I've been contemplating trying to lose another 5 or 10 lbs but at this rate? I mean, seriously???

I was down to 136, but yesterday at the doc's I weighed 142. Now granted, it was at the end of the day, clothes, TOM, post vacation-pig outs and lots of sodium..... So, I'm thinking I'm probably right around 140. Grrrrr..... I'm not weighing myself at home until next weekend. My doctor called me petite. I said to her "I don't really think you can call someone who's 5'7" and 142 lbs petite." She said "Ok, maybe not petite, but you're skinny." If she was a guy, I would have professed my love. Lol! Anyway, I've undone 2/3rds of what I've done in the last 3 months. I feel like it's going to take me until the end of the summer to get under 135. So frustrating.

WE have to push each other below 145!! This is a tough set-point. The body seems to fight for every pound in the 140's! Sheesh!

But we will win! :carrot:

You sound like me! I dont know what I will do when I see 13X.. but I definitely think it deserves a National Holiday! It just seems such a HUGE accomplishment for me that its hard to even think that I coud get there!

What have you been doing to get yourself down to 144? Calorie counting and exercise?

Why ARE the 140's so tough? I sped to the bottom of them (going from 152 to 143 in about a month) and then just stalled...the next 3 pounds took almost 2 months and I hit 139 right before Christmas. But as I said, I keep bouncing back up. I was 140.2 this morning.

My body loves certain weights and one is 142...I stayed at 142 for several years despite eating whatever I wanted to eat...every time I weighed I was exactly 142. I even started doing loads of exercise and went down a pants size and still stayed at 142. It was akward because everyone was commenting on my "weightloss" when there wasn't any!!!

I did break out to about 135 by upping my exercise again and going vegan. But I quickly shot back up to 150 (my heavy weight) when i stopped the exercise due to gradschool and not having any time for it all.

I haven't been anything less than the 130's since I don't know when. Maybe 2004. In college it was easy for me to stay at 115, but I was eating a pretty small / limited diet due to having no time or money for food (lots of skipped meals, lots of salad, a granola bar was a meal for me, stuff like that) I don't know that it will ever be that easy for me again.

I swear, I can't understand it either.. I know a have plenty of fat left on these thighs that my body could take from but it insists on holding on until it cant anymore. I have been eating mostly vegetables because I just dont have a taste for meat. I still eat fish and crab every so often.. and mostly because I feel guilty about maybe not having enough protein. But turkey, chicken, etc just makes me not feel so great afterward. Bleh! So I have been trying to do what my body wants instead of forcuing myself to eat something because "XYX"...

In a few weeks I plan to try Amy's Kitchen Diet and see if that helps me. Portion controlled..and takes the guess work out of thinking about what to eat for a couple of weeks. There are a couple of different plans, so maybe I can take a stab at the vegan plan and see how I like that. I am all for sshaking things up. I have pretty much had to do that during MY WHOLE weightloss journey just to get where I am now!

That's why I constantly log on here and search through to see what has worked for others. I understand everyone is different, but to me... if I stay that the same weight for far too long, then I feel like a CHANGE is needed..

I have been bouncing between 144.5 and 145.5 daily and it is making me crazy. I just want to never see 145 again and every time I think it's gone, it rears its ugly head.

Me too! The last few weighins I have been at 145-146 and its killing me! The old me would have found a quick fad diet to lose a few pounds quick but I try my best not to do that and just stick to my plan... but sheeessh! The 140's really tests a girl's patience! :dizzy:

Hi nina125!

About numbers that our bodies love... mine is 142.6. I think I've seen that number most frequently over the last 5 years. I wanted to give up and make it my new comfortable weight for my 30s (I'm 31) but my younger brother (still in his early 20s) gave me a loving scolding for being lazy. So here I am, at it again, trying to huff back to 135 and hopefully stay there until we decide to have kids in the next year or two. I'm already scared of the weight gain that comes from being pregnant. I think I can share that on here. I dare not mention this fear front of my friends because they will think I'm nuts.

The number I want to see is 134.5 but I don't know why the scale refuses to agree with me. :devil:

Don't trust the doctor's scales, they're all screwed up. I've always been told to stick to the one scale. 5'7" and 142 is a pretty good weight. Of course, 135 is better but if you've been there before, you can do it again. And it's not going to take you till the summer.

i need to say I belong in this group too. About 5 years ago, I was my heaviest at 173 (I am only 5"2"). Last February 09 I got to my lowest in a long time, that being 148. I was really fairly happy there (at age 61). Well Christmas and the holidays came and went and low and behold I went back up to 156. For the past month, I have been working really hard exercising and calorie counting/ carb avoiding and am down to 152 (as of yesterday). I am working on getting down to 139 by this summer (hopefully before). So I will definitely be watching and participating in this thread. (I love all of your tickers-I cound not figure out how to make one for myself). Good luck to all of us.

Orthodiva, I'm with you on the weight gain during pregnancy. I am struggling to lose for my wedding, and we plan to start trying to get pregnant in the next 2 years (I am also 31). I feel like as soon as I get to my wedding goal, within the next year or two I'll be pregnant and up to 200...

I've never been much over 150 no matter how little I exercise/how much I eat, yet I think pregnancy will change that. Don't think I'm crazy, but it's one reason I want to be below my goal, so when/if I do get preggo I have some more wiggle room to gain.

Just calorie counting and eating mostly healthy foods (whole grains, lean meats, fish, lots of veggies, fruit when I crave sugar, all water). I'd like to say that I'm exercising often, but I'd be lying. I must have some amazing metabolism, because I'm losing a lot of weight whether or not I exercise.

****, I even had a three month period where I got complacent and started eating unhealthy again- out to eat with friends, coke every few days, ice cream, etc, and I was still losing weight, albeit much, much slower.

Hopefully I won't get caught up around the 140-145 mark, though, because that seems to be where most women start to plateau. I just want to be in the 130's... I don't even care if it's 139, it makes all the difference in the world to me! :P

The thing with pregnancy weight is a lot of it is psychological.

I found out I was pregnant in March 2007, after I had gone from 213 to 144 - ALMOST at my then goal weight of 140.

My brain went "Yay - I don't have to diet any more and I don't have to look thin!!" So I went stupid, blamed all my weekly weight gain on being pregnant and by the end of the first three months, instead of the recommended 4 lb gain, I had gained 25 lb!

After that, I ate far more sensibly and gained pretty much the recommended amount for the rest of my pregnancy, but that was on top of the stupid gain, so at the end I had to lose it again!

If you can keep on top of it for the first three months, eat at your maintenance level, as a pea sized baby does not need twice your daily amount of calories, then you should manage to gain a sensible amount.

I have had two pregnancies and pigged my way through both of them so it's easy for me to SAY, not so easy to do.

It took me nine months to lose my pregnancy weight after my second pregnancy - nine months on and nine months off. If I ever do get pregnant again I will be VERY careful not to put that much on again.

yay! back down to 145 this morning after TOM finally left. unfortunately, 5 more pounds til im out of the 140's and i work all weekend so no time to go to the gym.
I agree that the 140's are a pain in the butt. I was thinking back on this time last year, when was pretty much in the same spot as i am now, and it seems like once i got into the 130's they went by really fast, but the 140's werent like that.
so i guess we just gotta keep going. i feel like my body wants to let go of the extra weight, i just need to get more strict about my eating, cuz thats where i seem to always sabotage myself.
Hope you ladies are doing good, im off to work :)

Today I am super encouraged..
________________________________
Jan.1st(156) Jan.29(151)YEAH!!!
My mini goals this week are to continue spinning classes 6 times (again) this week. I even did two spinning classes one day this week! I am going to add some more exercising after spinning by doing my DVDs-got some by Joel Harper-at home.
My motto is"Progess-not perfection"

hey everyone! i've been gone from from this board for the last few weeks but I'm definitely stuck in the 140s..every few days its one step forward and two steps back for me. I feel like I always sabotage myself. Yesterday I was freaking jumping for joy. I was 138.8..today 140.00 but I ate a bunch of candy and brownies so I know it did it to myself. Everytime I hit 138-139 I end up backing up to 140-141. I'm stuck in a horrible cycle. I wanted to be 137 this month so that I could confidently feel out of the 140s but now today on the last day of the month I end up at 140. This is my body's comfortable weight and its a struggle to get out of here. :-/ I don't know...just feeling down today.

Well, it seems like my bouncing has moved to 142.5-144. I haven't seen 145 for a few days (knock on wood). Hopefully this is a good downward slide to stay and not the scale messing with me.

I can totally relate to you. For the past 4 years I have been stuck at 142-141 but have never been able to break past it. All I have to do is to smell a chinese takeout and gain all the weight overnight, and then I spend the next month working my butt off to get back to 142. It is so fustrating.

My husband & I have been talking about having kids in the next year or so. And I am determined to break past the 140's because I am scared that I will gain a ton of weight during pregnancy and never be able to lose it. I guess this is kinda like a trial run to show myself that I can lose all this weight. When I tell my family or friends this, they look at me like I belong in a straight jacket! sigh

Thank you everyone for the pregnancy weight tips!

Nina125, that's why I don't tell anyone about my fears about pregnancy weight gain and loss. Everyone has forever told me I don't need to lose weight, but when I do lose weight everyone notices! I guess my weight just creeps up slowly and is evenly distributed so it's hard for anyone except me to discern.

I am currently fighting the chinese takeout issue by going pseudo-vegetarian on weekdays. I'm only letting myself eat meat on the weekends. Otherwise, general tso chicken and his fried chicken cousins were just wrecking the scale for me. In the past I've had rules where I actually had to walk to the restaurant and pick up my food if I was going to eat anything unhealthy. This decreased the ease and temptation from delivery or drive-through. At the time this worked because I had to walk at least 0.5 miles to over 1.5 miles in some cases to get to my favorite fast food places. However this rule doesn't work as well in NYC where I live now since everything is within a few blocks so I had to come up with a new one.

I also bring my lunch to work with me and I bring a lot different food items to hold me through all day. The people where I work order takeout all the time and the whole office smells like Chinese food somedays, but I've been there 1.5 years now and don't feel as tempted anymore.

I'm glad I found this thread! I was stuck in the 140's forever, then I stopped working and went up 150 -ugh, I wanted to DIE! I remembered being on this site years ago, so I'm back again. This time I'm determeined to get this weight off!! I want to be down 5 pounds by Valentines Days and this place gives me the incentive I need. "HOPEFULLY" I'll be out of the 140's by St. Patty's day!

I have been stuck in the 140s since December. I only lost 3 pounds in December and 1.5 in January. When will the 140s leave? I've been bouncing between 146-143 for 2 weeks now, no matter how close I stick to plan! :mad:

143.5 today. I'm bouncing a lot, though, so who knows if tomorrow I'll be back to 145. The bouncing seems to be between lower numbers now, though.

I'm at the beginning of my 2 week no loss stretch (if history is an indicator ofthe future), so I guess I should be comfortable here until mid to late February and then hopefully get into the 130s. That's the way my body seems to roll.

I'm new to the "featherweights" so I thought I'd start by introducing myself on here. I'm 5'2 and as of this morning 149.8 lbs! I started my journey at 215 lbs right after having my 2nd child. I've noticed a lot of people on here not being able to get out of the 140's and that kind of scares me because I had issues getting out of the 150's! But I've upped my exercise from 30-45 minutes a day to 60 minutes a day and have been trying to eat on the LOWER side of my calorie range. Can't wait to get to know you all and hopefully we can break the 140's fast!

139.4 this morning...at least I am at the lower end of my "bouncing around 140"

LOL, i was really hoping to see 138 by today, but since I've been sick the last week and not really on plan I guess I can't complain...when I finally reach 138 I am going to call it and decide I am officially "out of the 140's"

Welcome everyone new!

Hello 140s gang!

A few years ago I lost 50 pounds and settled comfortably around 140-142 pounds and maintained that for a long while. Then over the last 6 months or so I have slowly gained a little weight. Now I'm back at it, hoping to get below 140 pounds before my marathon in May. :)

Someone help me!!!!! I'm stuck and I can't get out of here!

Exercise, count calories, get rest, and what else? What is the KEY!
I have the persistence... I've been patient... But c'mon!!

LET. ME. OUT!

Ha, me too!

All this week I've stuck to 1300 calories...I weighed at 139.2 all week and I was sure 138 would pop up any day. Today - 140.2. :dizzy:

LET ME OUT!!!! AHHHHH!

Is this the caloric amount that got you through the 140's or did you recently drop down to the 1300's?