Happy Thanksgiving! 125 and holding steady all week. I have promised myself not to freak if the scale goes up a pound tomorrow since dinner is not until 5 pm.

Regarding the gym: I know they say not to exercise on this diet but I have from day one because I went hiking for vacation. I haven't been in this good of physical condition in over 10 years.

Ann Leslie: I hear what you are saying about food. I used food to insulate myself from extraordinary negative situations I was confronted with over five years. I had an epiphany in June when the last burden was lifted from my shoulders and I began this diet. Also it was really hot and I could not stand to wear spanx and cover up my pudginess any more. I decided enough was enough and so my journey began. I am down 30 lbs. on my petite frame and that is a lot.

Hang in there everyone.

LillyLover, the way I interpreted the reasoning behind 2 milk days following Thanksgiving is that in essence whether you follow their Thanksgiving protocol or just cheat, they recommend starting back with 2 milk days as if it were the absolute beginning of your program. Milk days generally produce more detoxifying and cleansing anyway.

So, for anyone who decides to either cheat or follow their holiday protocol, you still need to follow it with 2 milk days!

Since I am not strong enough to limit portions and essentially not overeat beyond being full, I have decided not to go off of AW today. I am going to 2 Thanksgiving dinners, and I know for a fact that it will be easier for me just to not touch anything, than try to sample and limit portions.

The same prinicpal applies to alcoholics. One drink is never enough. With food, for me, one portion is never enough.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. I hope you have plenty for which to be thankful!

So I know we all survived!

For me, dinner at a friend's home with my mom and husband. We brought the wine. They are cooks and bakers. I managed to eat a little of several things and skipped the potatoes and stuffing but had a sliver of two desserts.

All told 1 1/2 pounds up and I can't complain. I think it will be off by Monday latest. We ate between 5-8 which is good for a lb. just because it was late.

And we have 4 weeks before we need to worry abou the next holiday, LOL!

Hey everyone.

Annleslie thats a really good idea. I am exactly the same way you are. Very proud of you.

Sophie: 1 and a half is nothing you'll be back to 125 in no time.

Lilly: Congrats on your weight loss i am really really proud of you!! How does it feel now that your so close to goal? Is it what you though you would look like or would you lower your weight more?

Well everyone after horrible week after horrible week i am down to 135 lbs! WHich is beyond amazing! My goal now is 120 lbs or 125 depends on how i feel. So hopefully ill be there by the end of December. I want to ring in the new years at 125 lbs. I know everyone told me not to do too many milk days but i did three and tomorrow ill go ahead and do veggie again. Also today i am another city and jut got here. Its my best freinds birthday for the whole weekend. 3 days of partying eating cake and drinking. However i have decided to ignore all the food and just stick with the tequila shots lol. and instead of three days i ma just going to enjoy tonight and head back home tomorrow or sunday.
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

Hey everyone! You all have been so quiet. WEll i have some horrible news. After 3 days of too much parting and eating whole grocery store i have gained 7 lbs. And i refuse to wigh myself. I hope your all ding better then me.

lose 25 - Do not beat yourslf up - you have plenty of time to reach your goal.

I am back to bouncing between 125-126 but I am having a good week so far and no distractions. What keeps me motivated is trying on clothes that did not fit forever and now are too big.

For me, going below my goal of 130 (with clothes on) was good because I have a buffer zone. I would like to increase it a few more lbs. by Christmas.

On another note, I have been working out and my blood pressure has dropped to where it was when I was in my 20s and skinny (around 110 lbs.)

I won't have blood work until my phyiscal in February but I am really curious and I am really excited. Besides the weight and how I look in my clothes, I am healthier.

Oh yeah... I have been quiet because I was an utter *disaster* this past week. I am not even getting ON the scale until I have a good week, then I'll see the damage.. yikes.

Onward and upward, though!

Hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving. We put our tree up, and decorated the house... my hubby even bought some *insanely* tacky "yard garbage", as he likes to call it, and now we have a tacky wire santa in our front yard. Luckily- we had a wind storm today and it fell over..

..aww...

(bah humbug LOL!)

More anon
Christine

Thanks Sophie. I am back down to 137 from 142 thank god. I should be bale to get down to 135 by at least friday or saturday.
Helden momi know how you feel. I avoided the scale for afew days also when i cheated like crazy. But i am back on track now and every cheat needs a least a week or 5 days to get back to where you were. Lets have a great and perfect december. Because november was a disaster for me! I only lost 5 lbs .

Heres to a perfect perfect december cheers!

Hey everyone! I've been AWOL because it's finally exam time at school, and things are just getting really hectic. I'm finally back at my pre-Thanksgiving weight, 128! It stinks though because if I hadn't cheated so much last week, I could probably be in transition by now, or at least really really close. I'm hoping to actually be transitioning by Christmas. I lost about 12 pounds in November, which isn't that bad considering I cheated more than once.

I mentioned this in another thread, but I can't help but mention it again...I fit into a size 27 (waist) denim skirt!! I couldn't believe it. It's actually kind of loose now.

HeldenMommy and Lose25, I can definitely relate to the scale-phobia after a cheat. I HAD to weigh myself the morning after Thanksgiving though, because I really wanted to make sure I saw how bad it was. I needed to be accountable to myself. I plot my weight on a graph, and seeing that massive spike really taught me a lesson. It's the first major spike I've had since starting my weight loss journey in September.

It's so great to see that everyone's getting back on track though!! The holidays are just a doozy when it comes to food, so any kind of willpower helps!

I've been reading this thread for awhile and thought I would jumpin and say hi!
I am officially 6 days in! I feel amazing...not sure why but I am full of energy and generally feel good! I have had 5 perfect days, but today we had a staff christmas luncheon and I didn't want to tell everyone what I was doing so I ordered french onion soup no bread, no cheese,had 2 spoonfuls and said it wasn't too good then after lunch went and ordered sugar free vanilla latte with whole milk.
I just had to tell somebody...
Anyways,haven't been on the scale yet but an wearing a size down. I'll check my weight on the 9th day.
Friday is another christmas party, it will be a veggie/fruit day, thinkI can do this one...

HeldenMommy, you always make me laugh. I think many of us can relate to staying away from this thread when we encounter a failure of sorts. And, like LillyLover said, when we mess up, we know the scale will show it, so we avoid it.

Welcome, Bemibest! It sounds like you were cut out for this program, since you are doing so well. Just remember that AW rewards you by how much effort you invest and you will see that scale move down.

FlaminRed, welcome, too! I suppose you could create your own bead patches. The beads are quite small (silver, I think) and encased in a pouch made from 2 small squares of that white medical tape (I can't recall what it is called). Then a bandaid is placed over the bead pouch to add extra adhesive and make it more stationary behind your ear. The only problem I foresee with anyone following the diet without paying initial fees is that you won't know where to put your beads since bead placement is unique for each person and based upon your weight (this info came directly from Barbara, so I know it's accurate). And, please don't even consider following the diet without any beads at all because your body WILL go into starvation mode and hold onto your fat thinking it needs it to survive, and eventually cause the Yo-Yo effect that we've encountered with past diets when we reduced calories.

Many vegetables are natural fat burners, but here are a few very best options:

1. Celery - contains a form of calcium that stimulates the endocrine system to produce fat-burning hormones;
2. Asparagus - contains a metabolism-stimulating chemical; and
3. Cucumbers - stimulate the kidneys to clean out wastes caused by the metabolic breakdown of food.

Next vegetable day, I am going to eat the above!

I just wanted to share a tasty dish that I had on a recent vegetable day.

16 oz bag of frozen green beans
8 oz (1 c) vegetable broth
16 oz jar of Herdez Salsa

Cook to desired tenderness.
This portion lasts 2 vegetable days.

I love adding tomatoes to my vegetables because they have so much flavor and generally don't require additional salt. In case you don't know, the ingredients in Herdez Salsa are simply tomatoes, onions, serrano peppers, salt and cilantro. It just tastes so fresh. Compare it to a jar of Pace or Ortega, and you'll see a big difference.