I just wanted to thank everyone for their encouragement. After tracking my calorie intake for a normal day I saw just how few I was getting in. And now I do see why I had no energy and still had weight. For right now I am working on solely getting my calorie counts up. Right now I don't have alot of fruits and such in the house. And I know I need them but I can't run out and get them yet till pay day. So I am doing what I can with what we have here. I did go today and pick up a cheap thing of quick oats and bananas but thats all I can get right now. Right now I just need to get my count up and to stay up. Next week I will get better things to eat and better snacks. From what I figured online I need 1988 calories to maintain my weight and 1488 to lose weight so I am shooting for close to 1488 a day or 297 per meal for 6 meals a day.

Once I hit that I will start doing more cardio (that might happen once the kids go back to school in 5 wks so I can hit the track). I am thinking 6 days a week to start with. Than after about a month I guess I will figure out how to add some weight training to that. I don't know maybe carrying hand weights when running and/or using ankle weights. We have 2 gyms in town I will see which one I can do some weight training at for a reasonable price.

Anyways thanks for the encouragement and thats my go plan for the next few weeks.

*hugs* Yu can do it!

I try to keep myself between 1400 and 1600 calories a day. It doesnt sound like a lot, especially when you are used to eating a lot more, but when you eat a lot of healthy, low calorie food, you'll be surprised - Ive had days when Ive eaten some nuts just because it was the end of the day and I wasn't hungry, and I was under calories!

Just remember to keep track of how you feel once your adding in exercise... it may be that you will have to tweak your plan and add a bit more calories.

And, of course, we are all always here for you!

~Fae

Sounds like you have it all planned out good luck!!

For me though its been hard getting myself to eat this many calories. But I have noticed since I have added more calories in I have been feeling more hungry. So now my appetite is coming back which I am taking as a good sign.