This question came up on another thread and I thought it might be fun to throw out -

Do you remember the exact date that you started on your LAST diet and changed your life forever?

For me, June 1, 2001 is the day that I walked into my gym at 257 pounds (scared and humbled by years of diet failures) and never looked back. I'm sure I'll never forget that date as long as I live ... how about you guys? Was it a gradual transition into a healthy lifestyle or is there a definite date permanently etched in your mind?

I stepped into Weight Watchers on July 25, 2000 (I have a brain for dates... ).

Anyway, I joined because I thought I should be doing something about my weight...Didn't take it too seriously... then I got to goal... who knew... I am still learning though.

Cheers!

Ali

I don't remember the exact date, but I know it was late March/early April last year, because baby dd was about 2 months. It was before easter too, because by then I'd already bought the double stroller and was walking several times per week with the girls. A big part of my motivation was having literally nothing but mat. clothes and jogging pants to wear.

Not the day, but it was June 2002 when I got really out of breath trying to tie my tennis shoes and realized that I wasn't even 40 and if I can't breath to tie my shoes now, what's it gonna be like 10 years from now.

Monday, March 18th, 2002 - after a weekend when I realized none of my jeans fit and I started wearing my husband's jeans.

Late August/early September 2002. My DD was just starting Kindergarten and my Mom was out for an extended visit from CA. It started off with me pretending that I don't usually eat like a pig while my mom was visiting (as if I was pulling one over on her ). And it ended with me realizing that I had dropped a few pounds while she was here, and the choice was mine whether to continue or not. It was a turning point in my life, and at the time I didn't fully appreciate the magnitude of my power of choice. It would have been so easy to go back to my "normal" way of life when her visit was over. I can't help but wonder "what if" I had chosen a different path? Realistically, where would I be today? The thought still gives me pause, even now, and that thought alone is enough to make me put my fork down when I should, or go exercise when I really don't feel like it.

Beverly

Friday, September 7, 2001 was the day I walked into my Jenny Craig center for a re-joining appointment. I actually started the program on Sunday, September 9. Then, of course, that Tuesday was 9/11.

I don't know that I'd remember the dates if it weren't for 9/11 AND the fact that Sept 7 is my best friend's birthday. But, I'd definitely remember it was Sept 2001.

I don't remember that actual date but it was April of 2003.
Maybe some of you know the funeral pants story but maybe some of you don't and maybe it would help someone ... so here I go again.

We had to go to a funeral. I had two pairs of black pants a size 8 and a size 12. I didn't even consider the 8's. The 12's were those kind that do up in the pocket, over lapped, with two buttons. I had already moved the buttons. They didn't even meet. I had to loop an elastic band through the button hole and around the last button. I kept my coat on the whole time.
Afterward, we stopped at Tim Hortons and I had a small black decaf only. By the end of April, I was walking every day.

I gotta amend my date too, cause I later was talking to someone else who's also doing the healthy eating/exercise and has lost 58 pounds. I keep mixing the day I started eating healthy and the day I started exercising, since I didn't start them together. I actually decided to lose the weight in August of 2002. It was June of 2003 that I began exercise. Ahh well, it's not the only thing I'm mixing up today. I need to head back to bed. LOL

September 1st, 2003. I basically woke up and realised i was treating my body and mind like utter crap and it had to change. And it did.

Livi

July 24, 2001. The day after I got back from 3 weeks in England, and couldn't zip my size 18 jeans for the return trip. I felt dreadful during most of the trip and was convinced I was diabetic. I wasn't, but it was and is a very real possibility because I had gestational diabetes. My father and step-mother, neither of whom were obese, had each lost about 15 pounds on SugarBusters, so I figured if they could do it, I could do it. I was the most surprised of all when the weight started coming off. I was also exercising (cardio and lifting full body circuits) like mad. I had no stated goal since I really didn't think I could actually lose a significant amount. When I found 3FC in September 2001, everyone on the SugarBusters forum was putting their starting/current/goal weights in their signature, so I put down the last weight that I could remember comfortably maintaining before I started feeling fat. How's that for a well thought goal?

Mel

January 1999. I had taken 2 back to back trips in late October/early November 1998 - a family visit and then a Carribean cruise. I was appalled when I got the photos back - it was not the body I saw in the mirror (talk about self-delusion). I tried just maintaining through the holidays 1998, and joined WW with everyone else in January. By the next Christmas I had lost 46 lbs, and by June of 2000, 67 lbs. I went from a size 22 to a size 12. I managed to maintain this until late fall 2001 when it all started creeping back on, until I found myself back to within 10 lbs of my original staring weight (though since I exercised off and on, I'm not back to those 22s!) I'm working my way down again, and like a popular saying here in Alaska, I *promise* I won't have to lose it again. (It's the oilfield workers saying: "Please just give me one more oil boom. I promise I won't pi$$ it away again. )

Just want you guys to know that time flies when your having fun.
Feb 16, 1992.
Seems like such a long time ago but also like yesterday. My daughter turned 2 on Feb 15, that night we watched the video of the party. I saw myself, and was devasted.
That was the begin of this journey and I am grateful to have taken it.

I dont have a clue to the date, but I remember the circumstance. I went to the doctor and saw my all time high recorded weight of almost 250, and that woke me up.

I consider my weight loss to be the last phase of a recovery process similar to alcoholism, compulsive shopping, etc. I had just gained 50 pounds in 6 months and figured I needed to discover why I ate 'like that' before losing the weight yet again - I knew it wasnt just because I liked to eat food. There was something deeper. So I slowly figured out my personal puzzle, normalized my relationship with food, and with that the bingeing stopped, and I began to slowly lose weight on and off over afew years. This latest (and last) phase of wl started about 4-5 months ago.

In another post someplace someone mentioned that my process is different than most others. This is very true. When I was much younger I would have thought because I was odd woman out, that I was doing it wrong and would have probably stopped what I was doing and changed over to what the rest were doing. But I no longer feel this way thank goodness, and I do what works for me. There is no right or wrong, just different. Something about finding one's own path....

Jan

Hi,

I started last spring, end og may 2004. I quit work on 30 april 2004. I was sick from work, sick from keeping on to it on a diet of sugar and caffeine and sick from the extra weight it had given me over the past 20 years, and I started excercising and checking my food 1 month later.

rabbit