2 cute: all you can eat buffets....ugh such an american vice!!! it's insane...we have four chinese food restaurants in town, and they're ALL "all you can eat." one place charges five dollars for all you can eat chinese food...how dangerous is that???

Good morning ladies, I am still hanging in there. I am still OP and hopefully have a good report for the 2x2 challenge.

Still doing the Dr. thing also. UGH! More today. Will check back later today and see how all of you are doing. Iwillbe

Oh man, I do not do being sick well. Since I moved to Florida 10 years ago, I can count on one hand the number of times I've been down with something. I've got every orrifice clogged, I can't hear, and am generally weak. I hate being a wuss.

I'm going to have to give myself permission to stay in bed, and try to start again when I feel better, without beating myself up too bad.

Catherine

Good Mornin' Ladies

Catherine: So sorry you're not well...Take care, drink some chicken soup! and hope you feel better fast!

Terri: Sounds like you have more than enough on your plate without worrying about your weight too. Personally, I'd try to maintain and wait until things settle down a bit before moving off your plateau. On the up side, exercise is great stress relief.

Well, today is WI day. We'll see if refusing to eat even one cookie at snack day yesterday paid off! Keep your fingers crossed for me!

This Thursday, I'm thankful I have the ability to come here and chat with ladies in the same boat as me!

Time to work!
Lilion

Hello all!

I stayed home from work today...decided to take a sick day and see if it'll help me finally get over this cold. I slept until 8am...it was awesome (since I am usually out the door and headed for work at 5:30). I can occasionally even breath through BOTH nostrils...ahh, it's the little things

Well, it's almost 10, and I am still in my pajamas, so I suppose I should get dressed Then, I'm off to Ruby Tuesday to see if I can snag myself a part-time job for Mon-Thurs nights. I both hope I do and hope I don't...I really need the $$, but I also don't want to give up my bible study, chorale, and TOPS. Have to wait and see how it goes at the restaurant and see what the big someone-up-there has planned for me--bigger debt and fun, or decreasing debt and work

Well, have a great day everyone!

Mornin!

OMG yesterday was NOT very good. 1st time since I restarted I fell prey to B.K. Didn't eat anything green either.

..... S**t, now I have a bacon craving.

I'm going to have to watch my hands today and keep them busy and AWAY from foods that aren't OP.

says: STAY AWAY FROM THE DRIVE THRU!!!

Terri ... I am so sorry your BIL is not recuperating and thus so much turmoil in your life too. Just be sure you take time for yourself. The more stress in your life... the more you need to get in that exercise and healthy eating. {{{ HUGS }}}

Catherine ... thanks for the picture. I am so happy you are now able to say good bye to your old chair. You have made such great progress !!!!
My husband and I had that crud your suffering with. I was lucky and got to spend one entire day in bed and got well much faster than hubby ... so don't beat yourself up... take advantage knowing you will speed up your recovery.

Synn... Hopefully since you have to take medication anyway...it is nice that it might aid in your weight loss efforts.

Melissa ... LOL glad you found your way back to us.
I actually have been VERY good at AYCE buffets since last Sept. .... but ...
It is still like playing Russian Roulette ... especially if there alone with no witnesses. LOL

Iwillbe ... congrats on your good week. I like those 2x2's. Much more doable for me.

Lilian... whether you lose weight or not this week does NOT determine if it was worth passing on that cookie. Your health was worth it... you developing new LONGGG term habits made it worth it. Learning to say NO is worth it.
Sometimes the scale is not our friend even when we have been good.
Don't give it that much power to determine if it was worth it.
YOU ARE WORTH IT !!!

THANKFUL THURSDAY !!!
I am thankful for this group.
I am thankful for new beginnings.
I am thankful for my health (even with my probems... it could always be worse)
I am thankful for my husbancd. (can't always say that 0
I am thankful for Spring
I am thankful for my husband's job. LOL
I am thankful for cell phones.

I have got to get faster at posting. Three people posted before I got mine written and submitted. LOL

Jill ... sorry you are sick. Been there ... done that.
Nyquil is wonderful for sleeping at night.

J-ann ...Put yesterday in the past where it belongs.
Today is a new day .. a new beginning.

Synn.. I won't be joining in your food journal online. I do mine in my journal.

Okay .. hopefully no one posted while I did this one.
If you did ... I will save my reply for tonight.
Make it a GOOD day !!!!

Just wanted to say Hello to everyone. I am busy today but I will try to post more later. I am going to my Brother's in Central, KY this weekend. So I have to pack That is the biggest thing I hate about going out of town. Its the packing.

Hope everyone has a very good day!

I was all excited when I found a really cute pink and black track suit on clearance this weekend. It was the last one they had left and it fit me, so I snagged it right up. I proclaimed it my official workout outfit, so I've been wearing it every morning and have even been getting compliments on it.

See, I do a before school program for kids, and I get to the YMCA about 6:30, and I drive the kids to their schools an hour later. I get back to the Y a little after 8:00, so that's my workout time.

The past few days I've forgotten to bring my MP3 player, so I was excited to have it with me today.

Then one of the skinny little ladies behind the front desk sneered at me and pointed out I was wearing the same clothes for the past three days, and asked me if I bothered washing them.

Well, of course I wash my clothes every day, but I was mortified, none the less.

And now that I think about it, sometimes I stand up there and chat with her if I don't have any kids right away, and she never says anything about all the thin people going through that have the same workout clothes every day. I think she made that assumption about me solely based on my size. Like a lot of people do. Oh, she's fat, so she must be a lazy slob. But you guys know the drill. We've all been through it. But it doesn't get any easier, does it?

So I went back to my work room to set everything up for the arriving kids. Why did I let her comment get to me? I felt totally self-concious, wondering if everyone was thinking the same thing as her. I totally lost the will to work out.

But by the time I was on my way back to the Y, I'm thinking, oh to heck with it. If I let something like this keep me from working out, I'm never gonna get anywhere. Besides, I had my music with me. Jeff spent good money on this MP3 player, and I asked for it specifically because I knew it would motivate me to work out more. So that's exactly what I did. I went for a whole 45 minutes today as opposed to the usual 20 I've been doing the rest of the week. I want to work myself up to an hour, and maybe start swimming every other day. But one step at a time, right?

At any rate, I think it's time to pick up some more track suits.

Hi All - I'm brooding about my own problems today, so not much to reply except:

Esmaurade - I wish we could start a new sticky titled "Snappy Comebacks to Imperfect Morons". Yes, we all know the drill about how lazy and stupid we are. I often think of great comebacks to those kind of comments.... 2 minutes AFTER I've left the scene of the crime. Good job on getting back on track quickly-- feeling bad after a remark like that is normal, but don't ever let any negative people gain control over your positive actions.

Happy day to all - Ruby

So since I am new I would like to give a bit of background info about me(if that's ok)...it might get a bit long. LOL

I am 27 years old, and a mom to 4 beautiful kids whom I homeschool. I grew up thinking i was fat, mostly because my body type is solid(or thick, or whatever you want to call it), I usually have a lot of muscle. In high school i went up and down a bit but was around 140 for a good portion of it(I thought i was fat...ww said i should weight between 108 and 115~i think they have revised thier goal weight structure since then, I could not be healthy at that low weight).

I got pregnant at 19(weighed about 200 pounds by then), and gained 80 pounds. When my ds was 7 months old I got pregnant again...this time i only gained 20...but i had put on a bit after ds was born. After Maddy was born I got down to 225 or so. People started noticing me, and people that I saw after not seeing them for a while told me how great I looked...all of a sudden I was really big again. Got preggers, lost the baby...then got up to about 300.
I didn't gain any weight with my third child, then I gained about 20 pounds with Violet...which I have since lost. I was 330 a week after she was born(3 months ago), and I'm 304.5 now. I joined curves...and have come to some realizations very recently about my husbands place in all this. My hubby is very overweight too(i worry the most about him because diabetes and heart problems already run rampant through his family), but he is just not ready to address it. He has a huge problem with sweets(hides the food and binges on it when no one is around). We had started the sbd last month and I worked my *** off...stayed op and found out he had been "cheating" the whole time. I was crushed and felt betrayed, and mad...so I said screw it. I just recently realized that it wasn't me he was cheating, it was himself. I can't take responsibility for him( i do in many other areas...another story though)and his success/failure, and it doesn't matter what he does, it matters what I do, what I need to do for my health and children. So long story short I am doing this for me, and have little support at home. I think he may be scared (as am i) to loose the weight. Being big can give lots of excuses, and I have been hiding behind them for too long.
There is so much more but this is so long already. lol

I would be all for a food diary thread.

I am thankful for:
my amazing children
my husband, who tries. lol
finding this amazing group
curves
my mom(she is the strongest most wonderful woman i know)
knitting
my friend Leetah, and all the mom's in my mom's group
my health(i have not really suffered from my weight yet)
clean water
and a roof over my head

Thanks for being here!!
Debi

For Thankful Thursday, I am thankful that I it didn't snow last night and that I didn't have to clean off my car this morning, and that I'm finally over the crud that has Catherine and Jillybean in its grips. Two - three? - weeks ago I had the flu, the actual flu, complete with body aches, fever, chills, the absolute inability to sleep more than 20 minutes at a time secondary to the chills/fever, and really awful, aching chest and it was awful. I struggled with the same guilt over the interruption in my plans. I stayed home from work for four days and was still pretty miserable for another period, and even when I was feeling better I still had too much chest congestion for aerobic exercise, and I was really nervous that I would slide down a no-activity slippery slope, but I made myself get back in the habit as soon as I was feeling better, and the fear that I would stop sort of gave me renewed commitment, if that makes sense - so give yourselves permission to get better, please.

synn - I would probably participate in the food log, on occasion. I don't journal food everyday, just on days when I know I'm going to have challenges and want to keep myself on track or as a check when I'm feeling confident to make sure that I'm on track, but on those days I'd be happy to have a place to post.

esmaraude - Have you called the Y's director or ombudsperson or front desk manager about that skinny front desk lady? If she feels free to treat you like that, well, she might treat someone else - someone with a little less strength and confidence than you have - the same way, and actually succeed in discouraging them from going to the Y. I think that most people like that are a bit too... I dunno, sociopathic? ... to feel ashamed about treating someone else like that, but maybe the Y shouldn't have her at the front desk if she's that awful

Oh, btw, I picked up egg and jelly bean jello molds at jello.com last night for $3.50 each. I thought it'd be nice to have something sweet and Easter-y that isn't absolutely deadly at Easter. There are warnings, though, that children under 5 shouldn't eat them without supervision, and that no one should swallow them whole, so chew, people, chew! The deadline for "guaranteed" arrival before Easter w/free shipping was 3/8/05, but I ordered w/free shipping anyway (not paying $10.00 each, I'm just not), and am just hoping that the molds arrive in time. I figure they will, and if not, I can have sugar-free jello jelly beans and eggs for orthodox Easter instead.

Thankful Thursday...
I am thankful for Jason, my wonderful and supportive BF whom I love with all my heart. It was his idea for us to do WW together...now we're both losing, supporting each other and better off for it all.
I am thankful for my wonderful office manager Shula, who has also decided to do Core with me. We keep each other going, trade recipes, make lunch together each day and in general make life easier on each other.
I am thankful for my health...although I have my share of back problems and other little goodies, I am realizing how much worse it could be.
I am thankful for my job and the kids in my program.

I am also now going to apologize for all the moaning I did last week about only losing .3 lbs. I moaned to BF all week that I thought I was having a bad week...when lo and behold I stepped on the scale this morning to see that I was down another 6.8 lbs. I actually jumped up and down and squealed, then decided that was a bad idea, because my pants were falling off of me.

I have a waistline again. I can see lines in my face. I saw a picture of me taken last week and was actually not repulsed! My bras are loose. I am not winded when I get up the stairs at work..and I am now carrying a backpack every day, which of course adds some weight. I am at 290 lbs...I have lost about 2 1/2 years worth of weight in 5 weeks. I may faint.

Tonight is opening night and I am starting to get nervous. We had a few little mishaps at dress rehearsal last night but they were all handled well...well enough. I just worry because I tend to micromanage and I like to be AT whatever I am in charge of...which in this case is the box office and the lines before the show outside and the kids working...but since I actually have a little cameo...I have to be backstage in costume and makeup and cannot be there myself...so I have to trust the people to whom these tasks have been delegated, which is really not easy for me. Remember to breathe. I may faint again.

Ok no more fainting...

I'll try to post this weekend but I'm also going to try to hide out and lay low...which might mean no AOL for a few days.

Happy Happy...

OOH...this also means that I met the 2x2 with a 2 week loss of 7.1 lbs!! Does that exempt me from the next 2?? LOL