I don't think anyone remembers me.

On New Year's Day, 2007, I posted here about how I was going to lose sooooooooooo much weight. I signed up with a local gym, was VERY motivated and lost 25 lbs in six months (not much but better than nothing!). Then, I slid right off the scales, out of the bandwagon and back to my old habits. I cancelled my gym membership, began to eat like crazy and before I knew it was up 5 lbs and counting. As of today, I am now 7 lbs up from June, 2007 and I dare not visualize myself after Jan 1, 2008.

I have had some stressful situations this year. We bought our first home in April, 2007 and moved into it over a month and a half. Then, our daughter was diagnosed with a speech delay and had to have neurological evaluation to rule out autism. My inlaws and I fell out, then I cut off my toxic NM, too, because she thought she could tell me how to treat my evil inlaws. My marriage has been strained the whole year, and the depression is KILLING.

But I want to try AGAIN. I am now a whopping 161 lbs (up from a proud 154 lbs in June) and I want to see if I can try again and go back... not just to 154 but to 115 lbs - my weight just before I got married.

I am only 5'3" and come from a family of tall, thin people. So I get picked on during gatherings and celebrations about being the obese kid on the block. Well, it's good that most of them have been cut off and will no longer be able to pick on me again.

I don't want to sound whiny, but I am trying so hard not to cry. Why me?

I joined back in July so I obviously I wasn't here for that post of yours. But I just wanted to say you're doing well and making wise decisions if you're cutting out toxic people in your life. I've had to do that myself this past year and half. This year for example I am not going to my dad's side of the family for Christmas. They in fact had their Christmas today. And it's just better I have as little contact with them as possible because they depress me. This past summer I also made the decision not to be friends with three girls and it caused a lot of problems to say the least at my husband's job since those girls had boyfriends/husbands that actually worked with my husband and it caused problems with my marriage as well and I was also harassed by these girls which was extremely nerve wracking as well but I was unable to make a police report since they never actually followed me or physically threatened me but I was firm about my decision and it has actually benefited me in several ways. I also quit my job working for my mom as well since we have a great social relationship but when there's anything that needs to be done we just don't mesh well. I am the happiest I've been in a long time and I've had the self confidence to believe in myself and I got a great job just recently which before I would have never applied for. So things might look bad now but as you get through your stressful times hopefully you'll see that your stressful times were in fact a lot easier to deal with because you didn't have the toxic people in your life anymore to whine or make you feel bad about yourself. I know I sure have.

dhvaya....don't be so hard on yourself. You only gained back 7 pounds with all that you've been thru....that's great!!! I started out wanting to lose 66 pounds, starting on New Years Day 2006. By June I had lost 33 pounds, then i met my boyfriend. I quit excersizing, counting my calories and started eating out ALOT. I ended up putting on about 7 pounds between June and December. Do you think I thought i was a failure??? NO. I just got rededicated this New Years and now I've lost 35 pounds this year. Not how much I'd like to have lost but ya know what???? I was another 35 pounds. I still have 6 to go to make my original goal from 2006 and about another 16 to make my 2007 goal. Maybe it is taking alittle longer than i wanted...but ya know what?? who cares?? As long as i do it because i want to and on my own terms. You are not a failure for putting a couple pounds back on. And we would love to have you back, rededicated this coming year to lose a few more. And if you don't make goal this year....at least what you do lose is more than if you don't try. In other words, WELCOME BACK HOME!!!!!!

Thanks, ladies!

I am so glad to be back here. Just coming here and posting again makes me feel motivated. I really want to lose these 45 lbs in 2008. No more ifs, buts, whines and "why me?!"s

Can you both share your favorite weight loss tips with me? Diet tips? Exercise tips?

Thanks!

-Dhvaya

Girl, you are SO lucky to only need to lose 45 pounds!! I have another 80 pounds to lose!!

My advice is this: plan your meals in advance, definitely spend an hour or two one weekend afternoon cooking up a week's worth of meals so all you have to do after work is put the pre-planned meal in the oven or microwave

I'd also exercise 5-6 days a week for sure (I do a minimum of 45 minutes, not counting warming up or cooling down). Make sure it's an activity you love to do so it'll easy to stick with... like walking, or jogging, kickboxing, etc.

And definitely start watching "The Biggest Loser" when the new season begins on January 1st. It's a weekly reality tv show on weight loss. Tape each episode, watch it during the week when you need motivation, and that'll help you on your journey to losing those pesky 45 pounds!

I second the meal planning. I would never have been able to lose the weight if i didn't plan my meals in advance. I would alot of times go ahead and plug in my food plan the day before in my fitday account so i would have a feel for what the next day would hold for me calorie wise. I made sure i had a healthy breakfast and lunch planned out and 2 snacks and a good idea of what I would be having for dinner. I usually ate the same things for breakfast, lunch and snacks everyday so i knew what kind of calorie range i had left for dinner.

And excersize is very important to. I always took a 30 minute walk on my lunch break and never thought about going to the gym after work. I just knew to get changed and get in my car and drive there. If i thought about it, i'd find plenty of excuses to not go. (I really need to get back to that next week too....been slacking in the excersize catagory myself lately.)

Really...the most important thing about weightloss, I think, is planning. Planning what you can eat, that you like and can stick with without it feeling like you are dieting, and planning on an excersize routine you can stick with and enjoy. I actually had found a class I really enjoyed going to. It is hard but when i am in there....i feel so great knowing that i am working my body hard.

Those are my tips...now i need to implement my own tips back into my life because the past 2 or 3 months, i've been slipping off my own plan. Thankfully, still losing about 2 pounds a month, but normally i lose about 5 a month...so...time to get my nose back to the grindstone!!! lol.

Good luck in 2008!!!!

Thanks, ladies, for the meal planning idea.

That IS currently one of my "biggies". I'm an emotional eater and when I'm stressed / depressed -- which is often -- I tend to kick my "plans" aside and binge! I'm trying so hard to control that binge instinct.

I used to do WW, but fell off that bandwagon, too. I'm thinking of the South Beach diet. Have any of you here tried it?

Also, what about exercise in the winter? I live in a 925 sq.ft house with an attached, tandem, 2-car garage, so I don't have much space for a treadmill at home. And it's freezing outside, so frequent walks are out of question. How do you ladies manage to stay on top of your fitness regime?

TIA!

if you are worried about falling off the wagon. i suggest you avoid south beach diet and all other low carb plans as well. with low carb diets you have a greater chance of falling off the cheating and binging. and the effects are much greater. and in my opinion having a low carb lifestyle for life is realistic.
and i know they say south beach isn't a carb diet. but it is. i was on south beach for about 6 months. and i honestly would not try it again. before i started south beach diet i wasn't a binge eater. now i am a binge eater. if i even have a peice of candy i go into a binge cycle.

Hey dhvaya! Welcome back!

You'll have to try a program to find out whether it will work for you. There's a lot of variation. 3FC has reviews of lots of programs--go to the 3FC main page and click the "Diets" tab in the purple bar. You can get an idea of how they differ.

When choosing a plan, you need to find one that fits well with your life. Does the program require special foods or a lot of cooking? If you don't cook, that could become a problem--but if you like cooking, it would be fine. Do you like the support of others? Weight Watchers and other programs with meetings might be good. Read up, do some research.

As for exercise, a gym membership at the local Y might work--or, there are tons of exercise videos that take you through a workout right in your living room with no special equipment. Walk Away The Pounds is one that 3FC members often mention. And, an inexpensive pair of hand weights can help you to strengthen and tone your upper body muscles, and they take up little space.

Good luck!
Jay