Hi everyone!

Thanks for reading my first post on this amazing forum! I just thought I would put up a post as I am in some need of support. Here's a little about me:

I'm in my early 20s, and I have struggled with my weight since I was young. Being on the larger size is in my family. I have always been big, and for the most part, I have accepted it as being part of who I was. I dont have self esteem issues or body image issues, I have always been the loud and proud fat girl.

A friend of mine is currently undertaking her own weightloss journey since the birth of her son. She has lost a whopping 33kg, just through eating healthy and exercising. I am so proud of her! I told her what I had decided to do. She is really excited for me!

So I wont be alone on my journey; a girlfriend of mine is also determined to lose weight. She is the polar opposite of me. While we were both bullied throughout our lives for our weight, we handled it differently. I accepted my weight as being who I was, I have more confidence and self-respect so when people bullied me, I wore my weight problems like an armour, so that soon, the bullies got tired of trying to use it t hurt me. My friend is the opposite. While we are the same age, she is still bullied about her weight, mostly by her own family. She is really self conscious, has no self esteem and thinks she is hideous, and that no man will want her. I know its not true, she is lovely! But she wants to do this too, and I feel it will be a big boost to her self esteem, and the exercise will make her feel better.

So why am I posting? Well, I'll be honest, I am scared. I am scared nothing will happen if I try really hard, as hard as I can. I am scared of how my mental state will be if I exercise and watch what I eat for an extended period and nothing happens. I am scared of dropping a huge amount of weight and losing my sense of self and identity. I am scared I am in over my head. I am also scared of telling people what I am doing. Like I want the support, but I know if I dont lose weight, the people I have told wll be disappointed and will judge me for it. I kinda feel a bit alone?

So why am I going on this journey? Because I dont want to die young. I want to be healthy and active. I want to prove the haters that I can lose weight. And I also want to start a family in the next few years. I want to see my babies grow up, and I want to set a good example.

I really dont know what I am getting myself into, I am robably going to ask a lot of dumb questions, and no doubt there will be times when I need help, so any advice is appreciated! Thanks for reading, please feel free to tell me a bit about your journey? We are all in this together!

Welcome, any change is scary, you've got your friends and have found a great supportive online community.

Give yourself enough time to see results and if something doesn't seem to be working for you, try something else. You can see by the number of forums here that there are many plans and programs for losing weight and getting healthy. There isn't a one size fits all, so be open to adjusting your plan as you go along.

Best of luck to you

Change is scary. And making a commitment to change yourself? It's hard! And people fail! But I don't believe you will. You sound like a strong person with a good support system, and more importantly, you like yourself. Which is the most important thing. So here's the deal. You are amazing as you are. And you are so amazing that you're willing to go to some trouble to ensure you can be around and healthy and happy for even longer. There's no downside there. And since you're starting from a healthy mental space, just remember to stay there. You don't need to lose weight to meet any deadlines and you don't need to be an instant marathon runner. You just need to be you--the healthiest version of you that you can manage. Good luck!

Good luck and welcome!!! Congratulations on making the decision to change!

Read "The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl" by the Australian Shauna Reed, who lost 175 pounds the long and imperfect way. It's quite a charming book and should get you into the groove.

F.

When I first joined this message board, I was 294 and got up to 300 but since I started my weight loss journey all over again on Jan. 16th I am now 297 so I've lost 3 pounds so far but anyway since you said you wanted to know about our journey I thought I would tell you about mine and since I did I just wanted to end this message by saying Welcome 2 The Board, I look forward to learning more about you. Take Care and Good luck on your weight loss journey.

I just read a quote today that said, "Failure is not the opposite of success. It is part of success." It's highly doubtful that you'll see no change with effort, but you may have failures along the journey. The important thing is to not let them be permanent setbacks. Keep moving forward.

I'm also someone who was pretty confident, and I didn't dislike myself how I was. My decision to lose weight stemmed from developing high blood pressure at 32. And I'm not talking borderline high blood pressure. I'm talking 160/110, blow out the blood vessels in your brain and have a stroke kind of high blood pressure. Scary stuff. I knew I needed to do something about what I could do something about (since I couldn't change my genes). So I decided to lose weight and become more active.

It can be frustrating at times. You'll do everything right, and the scale won't budge. Or your weight will go up. But that's just how it is. There's a dozen reasons why that can happen. But the important thing is to keep at it. Because more often than not, it'll go down again. And especially if you're doing it for your health, even if you don't see as much change in your weight as you'd like, you will be improving you health. And that's always worth it.

These were fears that kept me not only stuck but gaining for a very, very long time. I'm now 50 and just getting unstuck, so I'm tell you from experience, if you are successful and lose weight, you will be the same exact person you are today. You are not a number on the scale. You are a mind, soul, and heart. Be the "loud, proud girl" and drop the physical qualifiers.

Based on my experience, if you can find a bariatric doctor to help you with a medically supervised weight loss program, do it. Many of these programs have support group meetings where you can discuss common issues and fears.

I cannot stress enough the importance of being mindful about your portions to the point of weighing and measuring everything. I hated the thought and resisted it for decades but when push came to shove, it is the primary tool that has kept me on track for over 12 weeks during which time I've lost 44 pounds.

The second thing I cannot stress enough is keeping a food journal. I hated doing that, too, thinking it was totally unnecessary until I finally put ego aside and just did the work. It is amazing how quickly 1000 calories stacks up during the day. Having an app like MyFitnessPal (the one I use) on your phone allows you to track during the day, helping you maintain awareness of where you are in your calories in vs. calories out.

One of the positive things I like about MyFitnessPal is that, at the end of the day when you click the "finish tracking" button, the program gives you feedback based on your calories and exercise tracking that, "If every day was like today, in 5 weeks you'll weigh ---." Seeing that affirmation gives me perspective on my progress.

So far as telling anyone what you are doing, you don't have to. Again, decades of experience taught me all about the disappointment, self-doubt, etc. Once I decided my weight was my business I chose one friend to offer me support and said to heck with everyone else. It's no one's business what I'm eating or how I'm exercising. If people ask, I keep my responses short without elaborating. Truly, it is no one's business and the fewer people you involve, the less you open yourself to potential sabotage from food-pushers.

I have finally reached a place in my life where I am answering to myself and not worrying about what others think. My advice is for you to take advantage of where you are and your age to do the same thing. Do I ever wish I'd found all these perspectives in my mid-20s? You better believe it! I look back at a life of wasted opportunities when it comes to physical activities I wish I'd done.

Good luck to you on your journey. Take the time to find the tools you need to be successful and put the time you need to use into the effort. You are worth the effort to weigh and measure, and track, and exercise. You are worth the effort to shop wisely, clean and prepare fresh fruits and vegetables, and eat slowly and mindfully. You are worth the effort it will take to learn about healthy eating practices and healthy exercise habits. You ARE WORTH IT! Best of luck to you. You're going to do great.

Thankyou so much for all your support! I am approaching the end of my first week into my journey, and things are going great! I am at the gym 3 times a week and I do pilates twice a week. I have one day of gentle exercise, like walking the dogs at the local oval and one day of rest. I have a couple of questions however:

Portion sizing- how do you do it? I have been eating smaller meals on a smaller plate and I am full most of the time, but I sometimes feel like I am missing out on something? I have never been a big eater of sugary things, but I can feel myself craving it; why?

Also, weighing in- how often do you take progress photos and take your measurements? I was thinking maybe once a month? Any ideas would be great!

I am LOVING working out with my friend! She is really unmotivated and doesnt do the exercise properly, and it makes me even more motivated to do better and go harder at the gym. It also kinda feels good to tell her off for being lazy, which is why we are both in the situation we are now (weightwise). Any tips on keeping her motivated? I promised we would do this together, and I want to help her as much as I can.

Any tips on eating plans? I have learned heaps about food this week and I want to start eating cleaner- I dont really eat much junk food, but I want to go on a clean eating plan, cooking our own food, etc. I live with my friend and her parents, and they are supportive of us eating our foods and stuff, however they have been pretty skeptical/negative about our weightloss journey that we are so new to. Anyway.

Thanks again to everyone who commented, I really appreciate it! If you can think of anything else that might make things a little easier, any tips or anything, please, please let me know, I am open to all suggestions and offers of help. Thankyou so much.

Well this is my take caldawag.

Firstly i want to say that it is refreshing to see someone with a weight problem who doesn't have self esteem issues. Its great you are a strong person and happy with yourself. You have been blessed to have a good family.

Anyway, here's my take.
don't go on any sort of fad diet. Don't do the high protein thing.
You seem not to be a binger or a junk food junkie so just keep on eating what you normally do and eat less of it if its just a case of eating too much.

But i do recommend you learn about nutrition from a nutrition BOOK, not the web. There is so much misinformation out there in the world. Ask the librarian at a library to recommend something or otherwise go with the government dieticians, although i disagree with them about low fat dairy.

Anyway, figure out your maintainenance calories from an online calculator. Its quite easy to use myfitnesspal and there you can count your calories as well if you wish.

Keep a food diary and list everything you eat, quantities as well. Just cups and spoons levelled off for most objectivity or otherwise good set of digital scales. I know its a bit of a pain but you can ditch this once you get familiar with how many calories are in your food.

Another option if you are an aussie, or brit, is to buy the CSIRO total wellbeing diet book which means you don't have to count calories because it has a good simple system of counting them for you.

however, don't restrict your calories too much because while it may be easy in the short term, it will catch up with you if you lose too fast and then you will get it all back and more.

Once you've figured out your calories for maintenance, just reduce your intake to a little bit less than that. Maybe aim for something like 1/4 kg per week. You will lose fast in the beginning but it will slow down after a bit. My fitness pal can do the calculation for you. And its a calculation that is based on losing weight over time. e.g. i can eat 1650 calories per day with no exercise to lose 250g per week. I don't get hunger problems. And if i do some exercise well its just an extra bonus.

After a time most people start to get sick of doing exercise. Or your routine changes and then everything falls apart so although its great to exercise and get fit, don't make your weight loss dependent on it. If you decide to stop going to the gym etc, you must adjust your calories downwards.

And don't start counting how many calories you burn at the gym. That's a recipe for disaster because there are no accurate measurements for this. Do not make every calorie count.

If you eat healthy sustaining food, you will not be so starving that you are rushing after every spare calorie you can afford.

Also as i said keep a daily food diary. List everything, every tsp of sugar and ever glass of beer or wine. Do not be shy either. We've all done worse than you probably.

Don't delude yourself. things like diet drinks and health bars are not really healthy and they won't help you in the long run. Just eat real food.

Also although i'm a veggie you might like to see what i eat in my food diary to get a sense of how much i can eat each day. Depending on your height, you should be able to eat a bit more than this.

I am currently 74kg and 165cm tall. I"m also 50 so my metabolism is slower.

Distribution of proteins carbs and fats is about 25proteins/ 55 carbs/15 fats and my fitness pal shows you how you are going with that.

If you keep a food diary, people can set your right easily if they can see you are struggling with choices. But best of all you can look back and see where you can tighten up.

Also lots of people on the forums use water to help. It really does help. You don't need to force yourself to drink 8 glasses but you can use water to fend off a bit of premature hunger or to fill you up and its a good substitute for whatever you normally drink that's full of calories.

If you take it slowly you have a better chance of keeping the weight off long term.

This is a learning process and you will probably make mistakes, make some slips and go backwards on occasion. Don't despair. Remain positive. Everything is resolvable if you want it to be resolved.

Good luck on your journey and go easy on your friend.

Thanks Pattience for all your advice! I see I have found a fellow Aussie! I am working on my portion size and I will definitely look into the CSIRO book. I have also added My Fitness Pal to my phone, and I am enjoying learning how to use it. I dont count the calories burned when I go to the gym, but I always try and go a little further in each set, like in Kilometres. At the moment, my average workout is about 10km, comprised of 7km on the bike, 1.5km on the elliptical and 1.5 km on the rowing machine, 3 times a week. I also do a 30 minute pilates session every 2nd day. I dont think I am really hungry, I think its just in my head. I also just tried your water suggestion and it works! Will definitely continue with it instead of reaching for the snacks. Thanks again!

Once a month for photos etc. is certainly fine -- really, it is whatever works for YOU personally. Some people weigh daily or weekly or monthly, or NEVER and just go by how they feel and how their clothes fits! All of it is valid, you just find what works for you! I definitely encourage doing progress photos. Sometimes I just couldn't tell anything had changed until I saw the evidence in a picture! You'll love having those!

You are doing great, and your confidence and enthusiasm are clear in every word you write -- I love it!

Everyone pretty much covered everything except I just wanted to add that it's best not to tell people that you're trying to lose weight. You'll open yourself up to negativity from jealous people, unwanted advice, and misinformation. Just keep it between you and your 2 friends.

If you need advice or have questions always come here. Good luck.

I love how motivated and self confident you are. And doing this on a buddy system is so incredibly helpful. You know yourself and and your friend better than anyone, just please keep in mind that you are 2 totally different people. You already have the confidence she is most likely craving. You have jumped in with both feet and are reveling in the experience. She may not be. Without confidence the gym is incredibly intimidating. While you may be experiencing the mind set of go farther, do more she may still be more focused on "I think everyone is staring". Remember to encourage her along the way, if you make it too much of a competition between the 2 of you the loser will just become discouraged and may ultimately quit.

It sounds like she may need your support more than you need hers. If she lives with her family and they are "supportive" but "doubtful" then she needs you even more.

I really am enjoying all the exercise. I can feel my body changing already, I just hate not being able to eat as much as I liked but I have gotten this way for a reason! As for my friend, her family arent very supportive of us. They dont think we will stick to it. As for my friend, we have had 2 victories this week! Last night she completed the whole pilates dvd for the first time ever! And this morning, she did 10 minutes straight on the rowing machine and didnt give up when it hurt! I am so proud of her and I told her so. She really needs the support, more than I need hers and I am so proud of her!