Um, well, it seems to be a stomach-flu aided whoosh week for me. I'm officially down to 304 lbs. as of this morning.

I am...speechless? No.

Surprised? Sort of.

Giddy with unrealistic expectations? Yes, that's it!

Congrats Geo! It's hard to find the bright side of stomach flu but I think you just did...

gotta love a good stomach flu to make you drop a few pounds. always gotta be optimistic jane, I'm with you, I feel so far away from 299 it's not even funny. ****, the last time I probably "saw" 299 (I never saw it, didn't step on a scale for probably 10 years) was in high school. always the fat girl, yada yada. regardless, need to get out of this rut. we had to put the dog down a few weeks ago because he had cancer we didn't know of. he literally just collapsed on the floor, his gums were white, and he crapped all over the floor without even moving a muscle while he was laying there. rushed him to the doggy ER and they said he had a ruptured tumor. this was a rottweiler that never once acted more than a year old, regardless of him being 9. he was my husband's baby, only my dog for two years but it's still lonely without him. we ate like absolute sh*% between being sad and not caring and traveling. and now fall semester is about to start. bring on the convenience eating!

Jane -- we all have a long way to go to get to 299, and truthfully, I'll probably keep posting here once I do hit it because everyone in this thread truly understands what it's like to need to lose a couple of small humans to get to goal. Anyway, I love your posts.

Georgia -- you crack me up -- a thread all your own or a blog. Sorry about the stomach flu, but thrilled for you with the weight loss. Silver lining.

Wheezypi -- Losing a dog is like losing a family member -- or at least it always is for me. Hope that things get easier for you on that front.

I'm still struggling with getting back into my groove with trying to lose weight. I have gained almost 15 pounds in the last few weeks. And mentally, I haven't been in the game for a long time. But, I'm working on getting my act together. It dawned on me last night that I started this with going on intermittent fasting -- having an eating window from noon to 8 PM. This was as I was reaching for the Cheerios last night at 8:15. So, I'm going to get back into my cycle of limiting my eating to an 8 hour window.

Laughing at myself -- how many diets am I on? I'm doing IF. I'm counting calories. I'm limiting my carbs. And some days I go to 5:2. It's a good thing I'm feeling better because I need my energy just to manage my eating plan!

You guys are awesome

Radiojane - I've done my fair share of lurking on the boards and I am always rooting for you whether you know it or not. I've been there and I know what it feels like to be so far away from 299, but dude, YOU GOT THIS. You've done so well, and actually it makes me get emotional to think about how all of us 300+ ladies have been faring.

The whoosh has begun. We're now entering day 2 of the big whoosh -- I've never had one that lasted this long or was this strong. Definitely gave me that umpf I needed to get me mentally back in the game. Geez, what does that say that I'm thrilled to basically be living in the bathroom?

Go Betsy! Go Betsy! Go Betsy! (Really, we need a little "whoosh" emoticon here!)

I hear ya with juggling all the things you're doing to lose weight. But once it becomes the groove, it won't be so emotionally stressful. It just takes a long time for it to become the groove! I'm over three years into playing around with my lifestyle. It's just now feeling like "this is how I roll". And I still "cheat". But I don't look at it as cheating. It's a momentary choice.

I've encountered a couple ideas of interest to me in the last day and I thought I'd share. I'm into science stuff and playing with calories and macronutrients, so just letting you know that's what this is all about.

I read an interesting thing this week. In The Venus Factor 12-Week Weight Fat Loss System, they do intermittent fasting, keeping calories really low five days and then do a re-feed at RMR. They found that most women struggle with eating low calories beyond three to five days. When I considered that for myself, I could see how that's exactly what I seemed to do when left to my own devices. I stay "on track" from M-F with IF, very restricted with starchy carbs and eat well on my plan (lots of veggies, good healthy fats and proteins) during the week, then basically park myself on the sofa with a variety of starchy carbs for a couple days. I then kick myself on Mondays for having fallen off the wagon and I muscle my way through the next five days again.

I also spoke with Laurel Mellin over the phone yesterday. She runs the EBT telegroup I participate in. I told her that I'd lost 5 lbs. while I was sick with the flu and I was struggling to not overeat afterwards because I didn't want to gain any of it back. She's been studying the brain and why we go to eating (and other behaviors) to deal with stress. She said I have a window of three days that I need to work on, to infuse my days with real joy in order to combat the desire to overeat. My body was really stressed with the stomach flu that I had and my body and brain want to help me get past it all. And the body pushes for overeating for three days after the flu. Now, I don't need to overeat in order to get back to a healthy weight, so Laurel said that making positive community connections that keep me feeling joyful will help me reduce stress and stay on track.

I'm already stressed because I ate over RMR a couple days ago (by nearly 500 calories), and I totally overate starchy carbs for the last three days. Already up 2 lbs. While I was sick, I was off my vitamins and not eating nearly enough veggies. I was not exercising or getting out of the house. I wasn't talking to people face to face. I am nutritionally and emotionally depleted.

So today's plan is to get a shower, get dressed and get out of the house! I am all out of vegetables, so I need to do some grocery shopping. I will be calling and talking to some of my good friends and hopefully we'll get to laughing and having fun. I'm going to take my dog for a walk, have some fun at the dog park and take her to the self-serve groomers for a long-needed bath! Then get my car cleaned.

Hoping to get those two pounds off again soon! Because I think it's just water weight from the extra carbs.

Ciao! Have a great day!

Georgia, the go Betsy worked.....down 5 pounds in two days. But it's fat loss, not water!!!! (It's a happy place here in Betsyland.) I have a vision for what a whoosh emoticon would look like.....and we probably know why there isn't one!

Loved your comments on how our bodies react to wanting to eat for emotional comfort and how to avoid letting that happen. Great insights. I had a great day yesterday (other than stopping 5 times in 7 hours to go to the bathroom!) with a trip to Mt. Rainier. I'm not particularly religious, but am very spiritual, and that mountain fulfills me spiritually. Anyway.....I was happy. Didn't pig out although I didn't count calories either. Had a really good day. So, once again the chickies have helped me to gain insight into what makes me tick.

I'm not to where you are Georgia with this being my life style, but I'm further along than I have been on previous attempts. And I can live with that.

Off to the gym and today's fun activity in this summer's You-will-get-this-house-and-yard-whipped-into-shape marathon is to stain the railing and posts on the stairs leading up from the street to the back yard. I'm beginning to wonder if all this new found energy is a good thing. Of course it is. Think positive thoughts. Enjoy being able to accomplish this and not pay to have it done. Wander through the garden and pick some beans.

Do you all talk to yourselves, too? OK. Have a great day!

I talk to myself constantly. Right now I'm cursing the fact that my living room is ripped apart with no flooring and it will be at least a another week before the contractor (that was supposed to be there yesterday) comes.

I ate really badly yesterday, and I had a 2 pound jump on the scale, which puts me up 5 pounds. I refuse to gain. Most of it has to be water, but I need to find a way to balance my eating better until I'm home from all my trips and can knuckle down and get back on track.

Oh Jane, Virtual hugs to deal with the frustration with the contractor! I would say that contractors should be made to live in an unfinished house with a cranky woman waiting for it to get fixed, but in their lingo, that's just called living at home with your wife!

Frustration, illness and stress all capsize our efforts to focus on what we want to achieve. And once it is resolved, something else steps in to take it's place and keep me in a stressful state. Grrrr!

For me, I have finally learned that when I make a conscious effort to appreciate the joyful moments of my day, it becomes a habit, and the stressful stuff, while it's still there and it still affects me, it isn't the state my brain wants to remain in any longer. Because stress isn't just the moment of a difficult occurrence, it's a state of being that our brains remain in with almost no effort. And for me, that always leads to eating off plan. But looking for the good stuff in my day, like emotionally connecting with all of you, playing with my dog, enjoying the sunshine and not-so-hot temperatures outside (like I am today), smelling the freshly-cut grass (after the gardeners leave), hearing a good joke and laughing till I snort, getting a really good night's sleep, it all helps my brain trigger positive dopamine responses. And then I don't feel like self-medicating in the kitchen.

Betsy, I used to talk to myself all the time, but then someone invented the Internet forum.

Betsy Woohoo! I knew you could do it!

Mt. Rainier really is beautiful. I felt happy as I read about how much you enjoyed it. I flew past it a couple times, coming in and out of Seattle a few weeks ago. Gorgeous! I'm really hoping my son gets a job in Seattle and moves there in the next year so I can fly up more often. I've not actually been to Mt. Rainier, just flew or drove past it. Might be fun to do a little hiking up there.

On the new-found energy, I have scared myself so much with it that it has been an issue for me. I'd get so scared that I would go back to overeating just so I wouldn't have to deal with it. I have had HUGE expectations of myself, and I am guilty of using my weight to manage my ambitions.

When I first dipped below 300 lbs., I had gone on a big trip. I went to Scotland and England with my best friend for nearly two weeks, then once I returned, I went to the Santa Barbara Writers' Conference for a week. I was so full of myself! Full of ambition and energy! It was my first time at the conference and I met all sorts of new people, made new friends and professional connections, gave out business cards and picked up new clients. One man from Washington D.C. had drinks with me on the last night and was cozying up to me until I let it out that I was 51 years old (he was in his 30s!). I scooted back to my hotel room by myself pretty quick because I was NOT prepared to participate in a last-night-of-the-conference hook-up. And I scared myself, spent too much time wondering if a fat woman had any right to being smart, entertaining, accomplished and successful. I never followed up on my leads and lost touch with people who came looking for me. And STOPPED WRITING! And started eating till I regained nearly 20 lbs. and started feeling sluggish again.

Ya know, I am all those positive things, whether I am over or well under 300 lbs. So, I'm also really unsure of myself because I have weighed over 300 lbs. for over 20 years, and over 200 lbs. for nearly all my adult life. The years I should have been focused on expanding my life experience, really growing and maturing into a confident adult woman and the real me, learning to self-regulate my behavior, oh gosh...I'm going get really mad in a moment and start crying! What a monumental waste of my prime years! This is my biggest regret, that I listened to and believed all the wrong people! People who needed me to be fat, slow and unambitious. And that's why I ate so inappropriately all those years, to shove down the real me.

And here I am on the other side of all that history, just uncovering my real potential and I'm still scared of it, because I don't know where to go with it from here, at 52. When I don't see the plan ahead of me, the plan I want to pursue, I feel stuck and it's very frustrating. And then I want hot dogs. Lots of them!

Oh dear, I do go on... I think I need to call my therapist for a chat.

To all my fellow self-chatters! Don't know about you, but my conversations with myself are sometimes the more intelligent ones during the day. And, I am definitely the only person that can get away with saying something like "You idiot......" Just fill in the blank -- there are so many opportunities for sentence completion.

Jane, I hope your living room gets finished next week. Picture the finished product. Think how beautiful your hardwood floors will look. Think how funny it will be when your doggie goes sliding across the floor. Think about the perfect area rug. And if that doesn't relieve stress, think about whacking the contractor up the side of the head with a 2X4 for putting you through this.

Georgia, I'd say you're still writing and beautifully! You are a thoughtful and complex person. And much too hard on yourself. I imagine that we would be amazed to talk to so many of our friends who have gone through life being at a "normal" weight and finding that they often feel the same way about themselves. Yes, I wish that I hadn't spent most of my adult life weighing well over 300 pounds -- if for no other reason than my health is beginning to pay the price for it.

I imagine that you are a giver -- someone who always finds herself doing for others, picking someone up, offering a shoulder. Well, I think that we don't always get a whole lot back in return emotionally and have used food to fill those voids. And it can become a vicious circle of eating to fill an emotional hole, gaining more weight, losing the ability to do things, eating to fill that hole.....

But, at 52 you've potentially have a lot of time left in your life. You're making the changes. You're in the process of transforming yourself (we all are). And mentally, at 63, I'm the happiest I've ever been in my adult life. I do think that some of the hard part of this life change is that probably for the first time in our lives, we are doing something that is entirely just for us. I am focused on me. I am focused on becoming a healthier me. I am focused on achieving some things that I've always wanted to do. It's a new experience to put me first. Hate to admit it, but I'm kind of enjoying it!

I don't know what it is about this thread, but I have the hardest time finding it! haha

Anyone else consider this the last weekend of Summer? It's still 90 degrees here in Tennessee, but I'm ready for crisp weather, pumpkin coffee, and sweaters.

Have plans for Labor Day weekend? (well, for those in the US) Nothing going on here unfortunately. DH and I are keeping it low key with our brand new chest colds. 2 weeks in to the school season here and already sick. That didn't take long.

I always think of fall as beginning in October... I don't care if its 95 degrees and I'm at the beach, if its October it fall!

I have no plans for Labor Day besides celebrate my mothers birthday (hers is on the 3rd but whatever)

Yes, 2fat2jump, I always think of Labor Day weekend as the end of summer even if we officially have another 2 weeks to go. But then, I don't think of the first two weeks of June as Spring either. Probably has more to do with the school year calendar than anything else for me.

We're finally having rain here -- glorious, cleansing, nurturing rain. Living in the NW, it's hard to imagine that we'd get to the point of wanting it to rain, but yesterday was the first significant amount of rain we've had (at least in our area) since June. Don't get me wrong -- our summers are glorious, and we live for them. But the air smells so fresh this morning, and I'm tired of watering plants to keep them going. There's a nice gentle rain out there this morning. Guess I'll be doing inside activities today (like cleaning the house as it resembles a disaster zone right now!).

No great Labor Day plans other than going up to see my grands. That will be fun, and hopefully it will have stopped raining by then!