i was just wondering if you guys could give me some advice. i started in the beginning of October, and lost 16 pounds so far. the only problem is, i dont see it anywhere and its really starting to get to me., when other people say "oh yeah i lost 15 pounds"!! usually, you can see it. but my 16pounds (to me) shows no where. my family said they can deffinetly see it in my legs, and my stomach, but i dont. basically what im asking you is to just give me some advice. i workout for atleast 30/45 minutes a day. i go to curves, its a 30minute exercise program and i just work my butt off there. then when i get home, i have the wii, and i do jillian michaels fitness ultimatium for about 15, or 20 minutes. ive been watching what i eat so much. i have a bowl of cereal in the morning, a granola bar for lunch and then i have a lean cuisine, cambells 70calorie soup, and a salad for dinner. i usually dont eat lunch during the week because of school, and i dont like ANY of the lunches plus my lunch is at 10 in the morning! but during the weekend for lunch i'll have a lean cuisin. i know im being impatient, i just want to know if im doing the right things. i started at 217, around october 7, and today i am 201. my goal weight is to be 150, by the summer time. is that too outrageous? im not sure about weight loss or anything, this is my first time REALLY trying.

16 pounds is great progress. I know where you are coming from because in the beginning I could hardly see a difference. Have you taken any progress pictures? Just stay with it and eventually you will see the difference! Our mind loves to play tricks on us.

It doesn't sound like you are eating very much. I don't know if I could survive the day if I only had cereal and a granola bar for breakfast and lunch. How are your energy levels?

I definitely think 150 is doable by summer if you find a way that's healthy and sustainable. Definitely don't eat too little calories depending on your activity level, height and weight!

I've yo-yo dieted for years always giving it my "all" for the first few months but it became way too hard to stay with my program because it was too restrictive and depriving. My journey this time only was possible because I found a way to make permanent lifestyle changes! Hopefully you find some program that's the same for you!

Congrats on losing 16lbs!

Here's the thing about people who lose weight: Some of us, (me included) absolutely CANNOT see the changes when we look in the mirror. At my highest weight, I thought I looked the same way I do right now. However, when I go back and look at pictures, I can DEFINITELY see a difference. Try taking some before and after pictures. I take mine every 10lbs. I actually can see a slight difference in the pictures, but none at all in the mirror.

Also, it sounds like you aren't eating enough. I try to eat at least 300 calories in the morning. I usually eat a bowl of Better Oats Oatmeal, which has more grains and a heartier texture than Quaker, along with a couple of cooked egg whites and a glass of milk. That usually tides me over until noon or later.

Even if you're eating lunch at 10am, try getting in some fresh veggies and protein. Pack your lunches instead of buying them at the school. Things like celery and hummus, chicken breast sandwiches on whole wheat (my bread only has 50 calories per slice) fresh fruits and even whole wheat pasta dishes, can be eaten cold. Getting one of those insulated lunch bags with reusable frozen blocks to keep your food fresh would be a wonderful investment!

Watch your sodium! Those frozen dinners and canned soups, even the diet ones, are full of sodium, which will make you retain water. That, and they really aren't all that pleasant. :/ There are lots of very simple recipes you can make that are totally healthy. I like the Biggest Loser's Family Cookbook. It gives you desserts, main dishes and sides and even beverages, to work with. I haven't had a recipe from there I didn't like yet.

All in all, you have to make sure you're feeding your body enough to maintain your weight loss as well as keep feeling good while losing. I turn into a royal ***** when I don't eat enough. I feel sick, get migraines and I could chew the head off an angry ex-con without blinking. I try to eat between 1300 and 1500 calories per day. Sometimes I go below 1300, but never below 1200 without the starving side effects, LOL. As long as I stick to that, I lose consistently. I try to work out as much as I can, but I'm fairly limited on what I can do because of kids and physical limitations.

It might not be super fast weight loss, but it's done using a diet and work out plan that I can see myself doing for forever. Because, really, I want to keep healthy and thin for forever, LOL.

Good luck!

Thanks for your input's. The thing is with me though, im not all that hungry during the day because i am at school, learning, and not thinking about food, you know? i leave my house at 630 am, and come home at 3 and go straight to the gym. i spend a half hour at the gym, and i am home by 345, which then i go and do my wii workouts. by that time, its around 430, i shower, do all my homework, which leads me to about 530, 6 and i eat my dinner then. my point is not to show you my schedule all day, its just to show that i have no time during the day to even think about being hungry, and i find myself now that i have stuck with this diet for a month 1/2 now, that im not even hungry after breakfast until dinner time. after dinner, i just relax finally, and go to bed at nine. on the weekends, i usually wont eat breakfast bc i don't wake up until 11, or 12, and ill just have a lean cuisine. for dinner ( on the weekends ) it all just depends on my mood. ill have a salad, and soup. or ill have a lean cuisine, and salad. about the sodium thing, yes i have heard that! but i am making sure throughout my day at school i am drinking water. i usually drink a bottle a day, is that enough, or should i be drinking more? thanks so much for replying =)

i know what you mean about wanting to "see" the loss...this is the best advice...take all of your measurements now...right now...neck, bust, stomach, hips, thigs, calves, arms, wrists, etc...as many measurements as you want...then pick on outfit and photograph yourself in it, preferably in front of a white door, or white wall...from all 4 angles...front, back, and both sides...

then...when you lose your next 15 lbs...measure everything again...using the same tape measure...and photgraph yourself again, in the same clothes...and the same spot....

you will be amazed!!!

it will motivate you...and make you smile...then just keep doing what you are doing....you are doing outstanding!!!

I hear ya on not seeing it. I still think I look the exact same way I did at my high weight - impossible, but I look in the mirror and wonder why I don't look any better.

Occasionally, you'll catch a glimpse of yourself somewhere you don't expect it - a ninja window, a security monitor, that kind of thing - and see the difference. It can take a really long time for what you expect to see in the mirror to reconcile what's actually there, but it will happen.

I agree with Pint Sized Terror on this. You need to eat a more whole foods based diet. Think of your body as a machine. Yeah, you might have been overeating before you started dieting, and now you have drastically cut the calories, but that is only half of what you need to do. Cut those calories, yes, but put in the quality foods that your body needs to burn fat more efficiently. The only fresh fruit or vegetable I see in your plan is a salad. Please tell me it is not iceberg lettuce cause that stuff might as well be toilet paper. Yes, making the changes to eat better during the day might be hard, but consider it as loving your body. I am not a fan of sodium-laden, preservative type food and quite frankly, I think that crap preserves your fat cells.

Think of yourself like a car. Should you put in the most generic gas, or Chevron with Techron??? Think of this with the foods you eat. Research the superfoods, and incorporate them into your diet.

Chica, if you ramped up your eating plan like you've already done with exercise, the weight will start to fall off. Trust me.

It is much more difficult to see the loss in ourselves. Remember it is coming from all over your body. Measurements wiil show the differance, If you are going to Curves they will take your measurements monthly. I think you will be pleasamtly surprised to see the differance.

I'd like to say that your weight loss is actually excellent.

If you're interested in tweaking your current plan, I'd suggest: Eat more fresh fruit or veggies...an orange or an apple doesn't take a whole lot of planning. I also used to depend on Lean Cuisine so that calorie counting would be easier. Maybe you can just have something else once or twice a week. I actually like to have some steel cut oats for lunch once in a while. Or, I'll eat a Greek yogurt with thawed out frozen dark cherries. Yum! I sometimes get these bagels called Perfect 10 that have a lot of protein but only 140 calories. I'll have that with some red onion and laughing cow cheese (35 calories per wedge). Canned soup isn't that healthy either. It's not just the sodium....it's the metal and BPA that leaches into the soup. Here's an article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26852192...82201#40682201

I'd recommend at least buying the organic soups in cartons that they sell in health food stores or Trader Joe's. They also sell them in most supermarkets in their natural food aisle. A lot of them are only 100 calories per cup and it's really easy to doctor them up by adding your own steamed veggies (cauliflower is awesome in there, for example). Another idea I have for a quick meal is egg whites. I fry up some cut up veggies (bell pepper, onion, cilantro, mushrooms, etc.) and then I add a cup of egg whites. I put that on top of a Perfect 10 bagel or some very healthy whole grain bread (I can actually see the seeds in the bread) and that is extremely filling....I may even top it with some fresh salsa.

Maybe you could work out a little bit more? Instead of 30 minutes, could you do 45? Since you just started, work up gradually, but it would be a good thing to do eventually. I also recommend some strength training. That way, you burn calories while you rest and sleep. I really like Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred dvd because I'm sore for days after so I know I'm increasing muscle mass.

Honestly, you're doing really great. I know how frustrating it is. Most of the time, people (me included) quit because they don't feel that their results are fast enough, considering all the hard work. Well, if you think about it, it took time to put the weight on so it'll take time for it to come off too.

Just hang in there and it'll happen....slow and steady wins the race.

It took me about 40 pounds of loss to really notice. Other people are just starting to comment that they are noticing with me at 60 pounds loss. Granted I started out much higher then you... I think you are doing great. Also, as you build muscle with your workout you will see more results. When I first started I was working out with a trainer and ater 3-4 months I found that b/c of having more muscles I was burning more calories during the day and weight loss sped up. Give it a bit more time.

You're doing fantastic--sixteen pounds is an excellent start!

You won't see that weight loss on yourself nearly as easily as you can feel it. Do you have some non-stretchy clothes in your closet that you can try on and really feel how much looser they are? In a t-shirt, I can't really tell, but I have this one skirt with an unforgiving waistband that used to be tight on me and now hangs. Whenever I feel like my fourteen pounds isn't showing anywhere, I just whip on that skirt and stare in the mirror and mentally yell, "LOOK! Look at the inches of slack fabric you can now grab!"

Since I didn't take pictures or measurements when I started on October 19, I don't have another yardstick by which to measure my progress. Clothing, though, works well. Give it a try; you'll soon start finding stuff in your closet that you may have stopped wearing because it was getting too tight, but which now fits you great. It's like getting new clothes when that happens.

Keep up that exercise, too--nice work sticking with it like you have been!

150 by summer time isn't outrageously impossible but unfortunately most people don't lose weight consistently like clockwork. I think most dieters whose weight loss efforts take place over the long term experience setbacks, backslides, plateaus, and things. Just take it slow and do what you think will work for you that you can keep doing for as long as it takes. Your current food plan may work with busy school - I say "if it ain't broke don't fix it" - but what about school breaks, weekends, etc?

As for "seeing" progress, trust other people. It takes a long time before you can see changes in yourself. But the fit of clothing and tape measurements don't lie if you want more "concrete" evidence.

You're doing quite well so far. Maybe eventually you'll get interested in experimenting with cooking fresh foods. It's nothing fancy - you can dump some vegetables in a frying pan and make a mean stir fry, then dump in an egg or two and make a super-filling scramble. Stuff like that.

16 pounds is nothing to sneeze at! You're doing great.

I just have a couple of comments. First, I have a hard time seeing the difference in myself. I keep clothing from my highest weight, take measurements, and compare before pictures and current (and not ones in baggy clothes- put on something tight and then try on that outfit every 10 pounds). The thing is I didn't notice the weight when I put it on. I still don't feel as large as I am. I look at pictures and video of myself and am shocked that I'm not still that size 12 person I've been most of my life. However, I've lost weight and although it seems like very little weight I have pictures that say otherwise. I have clothing that used to fit or be tight and now is falling off. I still have a difficult time seeing the "real me" in the mirror. I'm either larger than I think I am (and am shocked that I don't fit into those jeans that I thought I could) or I'm smaller (tried on that ball gown from last year and I can pinch a handful of fabric! My belt holes have gone from the end of the belt all the way to the middle. I ran out of holes and bought a new belt. I still look in the mirror and can't see huge differences, but the difference in inches from the last holes to the first holes is huge. You need objective feedback.

Finally, Sometimes it takes a while for the differences to be apparent. I think about it in terms of toilet paper. I know... unusual. The larger the roll the less difference taking a sheet off makes. The smaller the roll the bigger the difference. On a full roll, the sheet only goes around once. On a small roll the sheet goes around a couple of times. It's still the same size sheet. OR you can think about it in terms of buckets of water. If you have one bucket of water and you add another, then you have doubled your buckets of water. If you have a bath tub and you add a bucket of water, you won't even notice the addition of the new water. Same size bucket, just the smaller your container, the more noticeable.

I hear from others that the difference in clothing size for larger or plus size clothing is 15 pounds to the next size, but the difference in sizes for the smaller sizes (size 4 and 6) could be as low as 5-7 pounds. It's harder to say you dropped a size now, but it will be easier later.

Keep scooping those buckets of water!

thank you all for taking the time to give me advice! all the info really helped. i think i will start taking some fruit to school to get some more calories, i just recently downloaded a calorie counter app and found out im only eating 800cal. a day. which i know isnt healthy, and can put my body into starvation mode. i have heard about that, but i am not familar with what it 'really' means. my idea of it is, is it telling me im going to gain weight? let me know. anyway, i did get 'professionaly' measured today at curves. i am going to go by that, and keep watching my inches go down! by the way, when do you weigh yourself? everyday, once a week, or once a month? i started out doing it everyday, and i just found myself constantly putting bad thoughts in my head bc one day itd go up up, then down, then down again, then up. so i now do it once a month, or once every two weeks. all your advice is really appreciated =) ty!!

I weigh everyday. I need that accountability. I only count a pound as lost after seeing the same number 2 days in a row. I like to know what is going on and adjust my eating appropriately. If I am staying the same weight then I try to make adjustments... am I drinking enough water? did I eat something salty? too much meat clogging me up? Sometimes I up my fluid intake to clean my system or have a veggie day with no meat or drink a cleansing teas at bedtime if I have to get things moving. Hope that helps.