Hey there, everyone.
I've been here before, lurking around and have finally decided to join up and contribute!

So.. about me. My name is Amanda. I'm a 25 year old mother to two boys. (I love my kids, but damn, child bearing really does a number on your body. Add in that I had two cesareans and ugh, my midsection has seen better days.) I started my weight loss in November at 212.7lbs a size 16/17 jeans. Since then I've gotten down to 168.4lbs and a size 11/12 jeans. I've been pretty consistent with the loss, but I feel like I could be doing better.

More in depth: I've always been horrible about emotional eating and in the past two years my marriage has fallen apart, the stress of the two boys plus just life in general had me hating myself and over-eating. I like to think I've gotten to a great place mentally and I'm now getting there physically. My (soon to be ex) husband and I are in a weird limbo situation where we're living together, but leading entirely separate lives until I find consistent work and we can both afford to live apart. (Weird, yeah, but it seems to be working so far.)
I tend to have a great outlook on life, but it hasn't always been that way. I love getting outside, I sew my own dresses/skirts, I love to bake and cook, I can bake or cook anything. I don't eat a lot of red meat/pork. I will read anything you recommend! I also really, really enjoy video games and Star Wars.

Anyway, thanks for looking at my introductory post! I look forward to encouraging and supporting the rest of you. =) (And getting to 25 posts so I can share pictures.)

Congratulations on your weight loss so far. Sounds like you're dealing with a lot! Welcome good luck finding a stable job and getting out on your owner, I bet you'll be much happier when things fall into place! What method are you using? Calorie counting or something else?

I am new as well and also lurk!! You have done really well so far. Like you I am looking forward to completing my minimum posts. You sound so positive keep up the good work.

Welcome; you've come a long way aleady. Congrats. Good luck on the rest of your journey.

I'm doing the same thing with my boyfriend/the father of my son <3


Congratulations on your weight loss. You're a huge inspiration to me, just like all the other ladies on this site :3

It seems we have a lot in common, if you need a buddy, let me know

Thank you very much! Yes, I'm sure life will be much easier once things are stable.

Honestly, my biggest issue was portion control and not actually monitoring what I was eating. For the first few months I would log everything I ate on my phone in an app called "Calorie Counter," and that has taught me what appropriate sized meals/snacks should look like. I've gotten away from logging everything (busy busy.) But I still take note of the calories in everything I eat. I also cut out processed foods entirely.. If I want something sweet, I bake it from scratch and know the ingredients of everything I eat. I already very rarely ate meat, but now I've moved almost completely into vegetarian meals (But I don't really recommend this as a form of dieting, if you like meat, you should learn to eat meat in correct portions, etc. I just personally don't eat a lot of it!)... I think cutting out the white flour and avoiding processed or pre-packaged foods is what really helps, though. I can tell a difference in my over-all feeling of health if I have a "lazy day" and sit around eating doritos or something, haha. I've done the minimum for exercising, though I do wear a pedometer every day and will walk at least 8,000 steps, usually I get 10-11k. My goal before my birthday in July is to get 15k every day.
... whew. Sorry, that turned into much more information than I thought it'd be, but maybe something in there can help you, too!

Thank you! This is the first forum I've actually joined, usually I lurk indefinitely, haha =)

Thank you very much, same to you! Doing things in increments of 10 is a brilliant way of looking at things, it is probably a lot less overwhelming.

I will gladly be your buddy! I'd never turn down the chance of friendship, especially if we have similar goals and obviously can relate to one another given our situations. =)

If you count calories and all of that you should join SparkPeople for sure, just by the way :]
I like to cook, too. And they have a really great feature where you just enter in your recipe and it tells you the calories and enters it into your counter.