Hi all and welcome!
I saw this thread early this morning. I am also like you ladies entering my 47th year in August. I've been at 3FC for about 2 months or so and find the information on here wonderful. There's so much that it is confusing so when I find threads that I like, I just add them to my favorites so they're easier to find.
Harpandflute - wow, you have overcome TONS in your life. I so hear you about the food, though. I have been a closet eater
forever. Somehow I guess I think that if no one sees me eating a party bag of m&ms that the calories won't stick! What dopey, half-baked reasoning is that??? Don't know, I just know that my hardest time for the food part has always, always been at night. Mindless munching and mindless TV; God they go hand in hand, don't they?.
I gained most of my excess poundage after my kids were born. Got back to my normal 130 lbs. after the first was born but forget about after the 2nd and 3rd. After my son (2nd kid) was born, I
gained 10 lbs. due to stress eating (bags and bags of sunchips -- really crunching them hard) Oh, and my husband got laid off and his new job he worked 4pm-12am. We "knew" something was off w/our son but doc after doc said the usual "all babies are different" crap. Well, after countless doctors we finally got the dx (but not until he was 6) we'd figured out on our own - atypical autism. Behavior problems out the wahzoo. He's 13 now. On a scale of 1-10 the stress factor was (and frequently still is) a 15. So . . . I ate. Oh, and I'm a wonderful cook and baker so double whammy for me!
Anyway, long story short I'm trying to get a total of 40+ lbs. off. What I've found this time, thought, is
support. This site is just full of info. Read, read, read and then some. What I found
this time around, and what I've always believed, is that this whole weight loss/eating right/ lifestyle change is about 90% mental. I knew at Christmas that I had to do
something 'cause I literally thought I was going to blow a gasket. So I mentally got myself ready. Weeks of pep talks and positive thinking before I changed anything. Thought about it
alaot. The not eating at night was by far the hardest but after the first couple of weeks of
just doing it, it actually got easier. I've also done tons of reading and have changed the way (in addition to the what) I eat. I grew up w/the "1200 calories a day" diet mentality. I've thrown that out the window. I eat about 1500 calories a day -- some days more, some days less. I eat every 3 hours or so to pop my metabolism. I try to eat the good stuff -- we all know about the protein, good carbs and fats, and tons of water. Now when I first read the "frequent, small meals" stuff I thought "ooo goodie; pop on the doritios feed bag and have at it". Uuuuhhhh,
no. I'll take my total calories for the day and divvy them up into 5 or 6 smaller meals. For exercise I started out on the treadmill walking then running. Ok,
I thought it was running. Ummm, a slow jog is more like it. Got
bored out of my skull doing this for nearly an hour M-F, for 7 weeks or so. So about a month ago I stopped and started lifting weights. AWESOME is the only word I can use to describe how much I enjoy weights. Had tried them briefly in the past but never lasted more than a week or two. I've added a 3 day treadmill run - yes, really running - back in but change the pace constantly - faster overall pace then intervalling up really fast for 30 secs then back down, off and on throughtout the workout - and am only on the thing for 30 minutes. Walk the dog as frequently as possible. And it is slowly, slowly starting to work.
I've learned (again, alot of it from this site) to constantly tweak, change and improve whatever I'm doing. If I start to feel like I'm in a rut, whether it be the food or the exercise or both - I'll change
something. I've also learned that you can have your homemade chocolate cake with frosting and eat it too; just not the whole thing at one sitting!
Work it into your days calories and enjoy it!
I hope you stick around here. I've joined several threads and frequently the people fade away. So I find new threads! I'm around for the long haul.
Jo
I'm a lurker here. I'm not 47 til September. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
But I like to see what you folks are up to.
