WELCOME !!!

We are a group of individuals who weigh or have weighed 300+, or near there. This group was formed to provide a place for others like us to find support and hope. We are aware of the distinct problems that come with weighing over 300 lbs.

We want to invite everyone to join us in our journey.
We share laughter and tears.
We share what works for us and what doesn't.
We often use a "Topic of the Day" for discussion.

Motivational Monday
Tuesday Tips
Wednesday Wish List .. and What you are doing to obtain it.
Thankful Thursday
FUN Friday ... don't wait until you lose your weight.
Sit-up Saturdays - any physical activity
Share your Success Sunday

These are not required topics ...just ideas to share. We often find them very helpful. We also share heartaches and fears ... joys and celebrations.

We have several extra threads going on simutaneously such as Monthly Challenges, Weekly Weigh-ins, Recipes, Bios, and more. Please feel free to check them all out.

We have found this thread to be more than just a support group...
we have found it to become a home. We invite you to join us.

WELCOME!

I know you'll all agree that we are really thankful for the free services here at 3FC. The sisters offer all of this support and information with no charges to us. There are a couple of ways though that we can help out.

If you are thinking about buying anything at Amazon, why not help out 3FC at the same time? You can do this by clicking on the button for Amazon on any page in the forum, or by clicking on the button on the main 3FC page at www.3fatchicks.com . A portion of your purchase price will be given to 3FC by Amazon. It doesn't increase your price at all, but it does help out 3FC. You can use any of the Amazon.com links that you see on the site in order to help contribute to the site.

Also, BTW, in case you didn't know it, you can view the message boards "ad free" for a minimal charge. I think it's like $15 for 6 months. A very small investment to be rid of the annoying ads and make your pages load quicker.

There have been some concerns expressed by the powers that be about copyright infringement. So please, if you are directly quoting someone else or printing an article in whole or in part, please give credit where credit is due!!!!

Brandnewme: You are such a sweet heart. Thank you so much for the pm invite. I am doing better now.

Sharon: I hope you feel better. When you are done with TOM I hope your weight is where you hope and expect it to be.

ZedAus: Celebrate this birthday girl. You have so very much to celebrate. You are so close to the ultimate goal!

Garnetfairy: Congrats on -1. I am so impressed with all the time you are doing on the eliptical. You must be in great cardio shape! So sorry your dad is being a pooh head. It is worse when you have to live with them. Hang in there.

Xena: UGH! Good luck with taxes. I got ours done in February so I'm glad that is over with.

Brenda: Man if your water drinking thing you heard is right I will have to be drinking 102 glasses of water a day! Maybe if I do that I will pee myself thin!

Val: Give Simon a hug for me for the toe lickin offer. My furbabies do a great job of it. Nothing like puppy love.

Wyllenn: I am so happy for you! Congrats on meeting your second mini goal! You go girl.

Amy: I hope that your Nat will find it in himself to see how much you need him and need to be with him no matter what size. Maybe you guys could join ww or a gym together.

Kirsikka: I hope you are continuing to pull out of your funk. Just keep on posting and I know one of these lovely ladies will say something to help you back to your feet. They help me all the time.

JIllybean: HUGS to you honey.

Lilion: You always seem to work so hard. Do you ever have a day of just kickin back? I bet your home inside and out are beautiful! Happy Anniversary too.

Nancy: Thanks for the encouragment. I agree with you about setting dates to have certain amounts of weight lost by. It is too painful if you don't reach them.

Kayley: So glad that you had a great time.

Dolfingirl: HI

Catherine, Ammi, Mom2five, futurediva, Julee, Christine and any other ladies I missed, we miss you and hope you are all doing well.

Blessings,
Dogpal

this is from my photo shoot on friday night.

Hey everyone...

I hope you all had a good monday. I am sorry I haven't been replying to you individually. I am still getting the hang of things lol. I did weigh today and it actually showed I gained 5 pounds. 335. BUT its that certain time of the month and I know I weigh more during that time. I mentioned that I drink about 64 oz of water a day...well I for sure could proably drink way more than that. Drinking water is not to hard for me...I always drink a lot of water...but I was also drinking a lot of coke! lol I really can't wait to get a treadmill. It will be a while from now before I get it...but I know that will help me so much. And I for sure will use it! The one thing I am not sure of..most of the treadmills I see say it holds max 300 pounds. And we can't afford the really expensive one. I saw one online at sears I liked that was around 700. But it said max weight 300. Do you guys think it will be ok if I use it? I don't want to break it.Well once again you girls have been great..thanks for being so supportive.

Also princess~ I like your picture. It looks really good.

Hope you all have a good Tuesday!

michelle

Vicki - My link is www.myspace.com/kayleystar
Although, I already beat you to it, and requested you! Same goes for Amy.

Amy - My blog is preferred list only, but once you accept me, I'll add you to the list. Boy, what you said about being lonely and crying really hit home with me! When I get super lonely, I get depressed, for seemingly no reason at all, and I'll just start to cry. I hate it, and I don't know how to keep myself from doing it. I hate being alone all the time. Where are you and Nat heading to in July? I'm so sorry that you are feeling so down right now, and I can see why! I hope you and Nat get everything worked out, and you make the right decision, whatever that might be.

Kayley--can you "prefer" me on myspace so I can see your blog? I was wondering why it kept telling me I didn't have permission. I was like, but she's already approved as my friend!

michelle--GREAT for you for realizing that there are other factors that make our weight fluctuate instead of getting all upset at seeing a gain on the scale

Thanks for the virtual hugs and support from everyone I'm feeling a bit better today. Now that I work a little closer to home, I leave for work at the same time as Jeff, so we get to see each other in the morning for a little bit, and it's amazing what a difference that little bit of time together (30 minutes or less) can make in starting my day. I used to get up, give him a peck, hop in the shower, then when I was out of the shower, he would go in, and then I would leave before he was done, so I didn't get to see him at all. Now, I get up, take my shower, do whatever while he takes his shower, then we get ready and walk out to our cars together

And to answer a question, no, I haven't really had a talk with Jeff, but things have been sort of coming out in bits and pieces instead of one big thing, if that makes sense. For example, my self-consciousness issues came out over the weekend thanks to the movie incident, and my sadness about lack of friends came out the day before shen he said he was going to go see a movie with his friend instead of with me--it shouldn't have bothered me since the movie looks dumb (Slither), but I got kinda jealous that he had someone else to go see it with when I don't have any friends in the area at all. After I get all in a bad mood about something, I sit and explain why it got to me so much, so things are coming out a little at a time, which I suppose is better than not at all My next topic to conquer is to explain my paranoia to him (although it is already lessening). Jeez, when I was single, I just wanted a boyfriend, and now it's just too complex

First, I'm sorry I haven't been here in ages. I meant to get on here last week and post my exercise and stuff and never got a chance, it seems like I was always doing something, but nothing ever got done. I was sick sick sick over the weekend, and today is the first day I've felt anywhere near "normal" so I'm going to work out here in a little bit. I've had 5 days off! I never intended for that to happen, but it did. I haven't even checked out the damage yet.

Kayley - It sounds like you had a great time at your concert! I'm not sure I've ever heard of any of the bands you are talking about, but I'm glad you enjoyed it!

Princess - the makeup stuff looks like a lot of fun!

Mechelle - As far as max weight on things, if it's a treadmill, I would give it a go. Some of the other things like the gazelle and things that aren't well put together, I wouldn't necessarily try just yet. I have an exercise ball that says the max weight is 300 lbs, but I don't get too crazy on it, I haven't had it pop on me yet, lol.

I hope everyone else is doing well, I'm sorry I have not gone back and read all the posts, I will try, but catching up has never been my strong suit. I will try to keep up now though. I will be moving in May and won't have regular computer access for over a month, so we'll see how that goes, I guess. We are moving back to the other side of the country, gotta love military life!

Mindy

Jill - Consider yourself added
I'm like you, and I don't have many friends at all. I have my friend Susan from school, but we don't really get to HANG OUT, as she's 29, has two kids, and is married. My good friend abandoned me, and that leaves me with no one in the area. My friend Ashley lives 40 miles away.

Mindy - Good to have you back!

Today has been a waste of effort/energy. Once again, we did NOTHING in our English class...my professor is such a space cadet! Now I have two hours before my next class...and nothing to do. I should have just stayed in bed! UGH.

I am so upset I could cry - oh, no wait, I am crying. My assistant (our office admin) just gave me her notice. She wasn't looking but was offered a position she couldn't refuse - she wants to go into film and got a position as an executive assistant for a local film center. Aargh! Not only was she a great employee, I really like her personally. She also has really inspired me to remember my more creative side, which so often gets left behind in the exigencies of making a living. I am SO not happy about this - I hate having to interview and I can't imagine that I will be able to find someone half as good, although you never know. I just needed to vent a bit. This will also mean that I won't be having the time to come here much during the day. Work will be much busier!

I just have to ask - Kayley - where are the pictures?

I am on such a high...just giddy.

I don't know if any of you are sports nuts the ay that I am...but last night was the most amazing night. My basketball team, The University of Florida Gators, won their first ever National Championship. That in and of itself was sweet...but winning it against UCLA...whiche veryone out here roots for...and being the ONLY one out the last few nights pulling for Florida...AHHHHHH!!!

I went to the bar to watch the 2nd half of the game right from work. I needed to get dinnner...and although I am usually a little bit more careful, I let it slide for the night. So I had a chicken burger with cheese, no mayo. Yes I even ate the whole bun. I had spicy wedges with it (potatow edges with thai chili sauce) and then post-game I ceberated with a Bacardi Light & Diet Coke. All in all not the worst binge ever. But WOW!!! What a feeling!!! Having all the people who gave me crap over the last few days call me and apologize and concede was also a good time as well.

HAH!

But enough about that. Nothing new and exciting here. Passover is coming and I hate that. My mother will be here in 13 days and it's making me anxious. Work is work but it's not awful. It's raining again and that's just annoying.

I am also on myspace but I think that I set it up where you actually have to have my whole name to add me...or that's what someone once told me..I dunno. But my scren name there is also JuleeCeeS...so try to add me if you'd like. if it doesn't work, PM me and I will send you my name or I will try to add you.

I want to get online later and order a National Championship tshirt...since I highly doubt they will be coming to the stores out here. I wanted to get my dad to send me one but he is lazy and just sent me the link. They aren't shipping anything from the site until at least the 14th and I have to pay shipping as well. If he got me a shirt, he could buy it today and ship it tomorrow and I would have it by the weekend..but why would I expect him to understand that.

Hapy Tuesday...GO GATORS!!!!

Good morning, all. Just got in from walking my little pooch. It is a lovely day here today and we both enjoyed it. He seemed to really enjoy it because he was stopping to sniff and check things out alot more than usual. Pesky little critter! How am I supposed to get my heart rate up if he's stopping all the time? Oh well, I love him and I can't help but indulge him stopping to "smell the roses".

Yesterday was not a very good day food-wise. I had a major binge last night. I was really wanting this to be the week I got back on track. I have skipped my last 2 WW meetings. I need to go on Sat. come **** or high water, but I am so afraid to step on that scale. I have been bingeing alot in these last couple of weeks.

I think I know what caused this binge. I just don't know what to do to make it better. Yesterday was the day I went to meet a financial planner I am thinking about using. I had worked on Sunday to get all my stuff updated in Quicken (yes, I am an accounting nerd) so I could have some handy-dandy reports to give him so he would have an idea where I was. He gave me great news. He told me I was saving plenty of money and was able to give me an estimate of how much I would have at age 60 (I am 36 now) based on what I have saved til now and if I continue to save at the same rate I currently am. Basically what he told me is I would have plenty. Probably more than enough especially considering I have no kids or anything to take care of. He even suggested the idea of retiring early or saving less and living it up a little more now. I realize I am very blessed to be in the situation I am in. Don't get me wrong, I don't consider myself lucky nor have I had anything handed to me. I have busted my butt through college working 2 or 3 jobs at a time and still maintaining my grades. After that I worked (and continue to work) very difficult and demanding jobs that require long hours and a lot of sacrifice to my personal life to get what I have. So after all this hard work and sacrifice I was so happy to hear that I was headed in the right direction and that at some point in the future I can back off a little bit...slow down, work less, etc. and still have the financial security I want.

So, I leave his office feeling on top of the world. I have worked so hard at a profession that, if I am being honest, I really don't like. I would like nothing more than to be able to make a career change which without a doubt would be a substantial drop in pay. And here I was being told that I would be able to do that. Maybe not tomorrow, but say, in 10 years...or 5...or who know...but it WAS within the realm of things that were possible.

BUT driving home somehow my frame of mind changed. I panicked. I thought "No way am I going to have enough if I stop working or slow down or anything." I don't want this to come across as greed, because that is not it. I do not want to live some ultra-cushy lifestlye. I just need to be financially secure because I have no one else to take care of me. I come from a poor family that has nothing. In fact, I help them alot and fully expect to have to support some of them to some extent in the future. So anyway, even though I was given all evidence to the contrary I started feeling like it didn't matter how long or hard I worked, how much I scrimped and saved, it was never going to be enough. That it would not be enough. Very important thing right there. It would not be enough. By the time I got close to home I was so compulsive and had to stop at the grocery store to buy binge food. I couldn't just buy one pint of ice cream. I had to buy ice cream AND cookies AND donuts. Then I'd head for the checkout and think of something else I wanted. As though I thought it wasn't going to be enough.

I know I am an emotional eater. My main emotional triggers are stress, anxiety, loneliness, and being overly tired. But I had never made this connection before. I have an irrational fear of not having enough. I am not sure why. I didn't even realize I had this fear til yesterday.


Sorry to be so long-winded and a downer. I just wanted to get this out. Now....if I only knew how to fix this crazy fear.

Xena - That is fantastic that you have made the connection between your fears, your emotional triggers and your eating. This problably won't help, but it is interesting. I like to think that money could help be a motivator, but most of the time it isn't.

Take $10 (which is what I am assuming the cost was for the ice cream, cookies and donuts) and say you cut that same $ amouhnt out every month and added that $10 to a savings account for the next 25 years, at the end, compounding monthly at 6.5% interest you would have over $7500. That little bit adds up to a lot, just as small changes in what we eat add up to a lot. Also, think of the expenses you will save when you are older from not having as many weight related medical problems. Yeah - I know. It should help but it doesn't. When we are afraid and stressed out food can be such a comfort and it is so hard to break that response.

I should get back to work, but I am too distracted and depressed, so I will probably be back shortly with some other personals.

hello everybody. hope your day is going good. another day of exercise done but it was a hard go this morning!

Xena, wow I know how you feel about the food/worry/stress thing, because I've been there too, too bl**dy often!!!!
Nancy, good call on what she could have saved instead of eaten!!!! Sorry about your assistant leaving.
Kayley the gig sounded great, I wish we could go to see some bands, you have no life of your owmn when you're a mum!!!
No time to answer/discuss anything, I've been on a one day writing seminar/course thing and now I have to bath my boys & put them to bed. Food-wise not too bad a day, here's to warmer weather & more willpower!!!!
xxxsharon. Ammi where are you? Jilly so glad to see you back, sorry for your probs.