Hi, my name is Crystal. I'm new to 3fatchicks and I'm looking for support as I try to lose weight. I currently weight 308 lbs. Me and my husband want to start a family and, I suppose I should clarify now, this is a rather more mature subject matter, we have problems being intimate as he is overweight as well. I want to be able to start a family with him, and while we're obviously stuck on the actual conception part as well, I'd much prefer to be at a healthier weight than I am before I become a mother. I've tried dieting before, without much luck, and I currently have a sit down job at a call center. I'm once again trying portion control as well as eating smaller meals more often to help my metabolism. Any pointers, for anything, would be a great help. I just need somewhere to be able to go for people who understand the same struggle and can give support.

Welcome, Crystal!

As luck would have it, my name is Crystal, as well. I definitely understand where you're coming from; I started at a similar weight, and at one point, I was trying to start a family (with my first husband). Being at a higher weight can really effect your fertility, not to mention the logistics of being intimate.

My biggest suggestion to you would be to track your food and beverage intake. A lot of people swear by MyFitnessPal for this. I personally prefer using my fitbit, as it syncs with my physical activity, but you can use anything that's convenient for you. This will help you to identify trends that might not be the healthiest, or places where you can adjust the things you eat to lower the calorie content.

Exactly what Blicca said.

You maybe need to remember that a "diet" can sometimes come with subconscious barriers. For years we have been fed the idea that we can lose 2-10lbs a week on a specific "diet", what we all now call fad diets. But the thing is, you want to lose weight for your health, so no fad diet will be sustainable for you, the way that you want it. You need to basically take on a whole new look at healthy eating. When you take this approach (which is quite slow), you basically embark on a learning journey, of loss and maintenance.

Like Blicca mentioned, most people will track their food on My Fitness Pal or similar style app. I spent a week looking at how I ate, learning to be honest with myself about exactly what food and drink went in my mouth. I decided not to take judgement on the first week, then at the end, look at how I could of made better choices, then started again. I originally aimed to get under 1800 calories, which took a few weeks. Once I did that, I started to drink more water, eat fresher veggies (or frozen options), more meat, more eggs, less starchy foods (pasta, potatoes, rice) less fatty foods (cheese, fried anything, candies). It took me a full year to really learn and understand my body through diet alone. Now I am 44lbs lighter 1 year in, and I never went to the gym once.

This year Is all about the gym, I started to plateau a bit towards the end, I was eating 1350 calories, and I new I shouldnt go under that, so My body was telling me that it was time to get my butt moving. I bought a Fitbit for my xmas, I aimed to hit 8,000 steps everyday (now I hit 10,000 most days, just a month in), I now attend the gym 3 times a week and have upped my calories to 1500 as I burn about 1400 on the days I am at the gym. I can't wait to see the results a few months down the line.

Take on this project, take notes, learn and just embrace everything!
While many people dont get counting calories, it is the quickest way to learn. Then once you reach your goal weight! you will know how to maintain it and never see that weight gain again!

Stick around!

I hope you succeed

Hi Crystal - welcome
all the best with your weight loss journey

My fitness pal is a really good app to track food on
it also comes with a calculator that can work out how many calories you should be eating to loose weight
the other suggestions I have come across with it is that comes with this is try to eat 1 third as fruit 1 third of them as fruit and veg 2nd 3rd as protien and starchy veg such as potato sweet potato yam and corn and the rest as your carbs

Hello Crystal,


I am very new to this site as well actually I just joined today, I have been looking for a site that would allow me to talk to people who are going through the same things I am and I think this site will be of great help. I understand your concern about being at a healthier weight before trying to have children. I am currently 316lbs and I am with my boyfriend who very much wants children. We have been talking about getting married but that won't be for a while because we need to save up the money for a wedding. But after we get married he will for sure want to start a family asap. I know that I will need to be at a healthier weight before getting pregnant and stronger too to make the pregnancy and labor not so bad. But it is so scary. I think it about it often because it worries me. I don't want to only loose the weight to get myself healthier, but I want to make sure that I set a good example of how to be healthy and take care of you body if I do ever wind up having children so that they can do the same and not have to struggle and fight as I have done for most of my life. I can usually loose the weight I have lost a very significant amount 2 times in my life but I can't ever seem to keep it of for more than a few months. Its the lifestyle changes I just get fed up with and fall out of them again and again time after time. But If I am going to start a family I need to find a way to make sure that I can keep up with them for the rest of my life. And I hope being a part of a community like this will allow me to better do so. I currently use the calorie counter on my everyday health. But I am working on getting a fitness bracelet and will probably switch to my fitness pal if the fitness bracelet doesn't sync up with the calorie counter I have a cousin who has a fit bit and loves it. It just makes it so much easier she said to keep track of your activity rather than having to log everything in. I hope that helps. And I really wish you the best of luck.

:-)