I was at a plaeau for months so I decided I would just maintain - did not work so well.....I've been eating any and everything! OMG weight comes back on SO FAST!!! Tomorrow starts my healthy eating plan in earnest again! This is what I am thinking for meals and snacks, I am the kind of person who can eat the same thing over and over.

Morning: coffee w/coffeemate
Breakfast at work: low carb toast with peanut butter
Snack: baby carrots
Snack: apple slices with a wedge of laughing cow
Lunch: a Lean Cuisine under 250 cals
Dessert: Dannon light & fit yogurt
Snack: a bar (Zone, Atkins - something of the like)
Dinner: protein and a vegetable with something added for the hubby (rice or something for him)
Dessert: sans sucre mousse or SF pudding & cool whip or greek yogurt with some lemon pudding powder and sugar free cherry pie filling (cheesecake!!)
Drinks: Water, sparkling water, minute maid sugar free lemonade

I'm gusstimating thats under 1,600 calories......I weigh about 270 right now, and am 38 years old. Any comments, suggestions and advice are greatly welcomed!! I am a big snacker and in my brain a meal is not over unless there has been a dessert.

Congrats on making the choice to start over and get back in control. You go girl!

Good luck!!

Be careful with lean cuisines, there can be a lot of sodium in those packaged foods. I wanted to try the Healthy Choice all natural frozen meals, but I'm low carb right now, so thats off limits. Keep us updated!!

Sounds good to start with, but as you progress and are comfortable I highly recommend ditching as much of the processed stuff as possible and adding more whole foods (veggies, fruit, nuts, lean protein and complex carbs) you get way more bang for your buck with these are your body functions better which = more weight loss. Good luck!

Congratulations on grabbing a hold before it all came back! I admire that so much.

As you ask, my advice would be Do Not Guesstimate. If you don't have any kitchen scales, get a really cheap set from the supermarket. Weigh everything and having weighed it, record it. sparkpeople or fitday or any of the free sites. For 2 reasons: 1) guesstimating is really hard; either you go way over or way under, either way, it's not good for weight loss. 2) on a reduced calorie diet, it's Very Hard, no matter how healthily you eat, to get all the nutrients you need. These logging programmes will list for you how much calcium/iron/potassium/fibre/carbs all the good stuff you're getting; or not.

You've got great determination, and enthusiasm for this new attempt ~ it would be such a shame if you didn't get the results from all your efforts, just because of the odd extra calorie you guessed wrongly on.

Good luck!

I agree with the last poster. You need to know exactly how much you're eating for total success - especially in the beginning. After time, you can guesstimate, but only after your learned how much you should be taking in.

What workouts are you doing?

Good luck

try to eat the 'super foods' whenever you can.

hey gonna be a 5! i'm on cathe and here too also. i'm mom418 on there.

Yeah, lean cuisines, and healthy choice and such often do have a lot of sodium, but I prefer them to cooking since I really hate cooking. I think it is possible to be on a good, and healthy weight loss plan without laboriously cooking meals. Honestly, I have bigger fish to fry than sodium but too much still isn't good for you. Just keep the prepared meals to a minimum, maybe once a day or something. My plan is something like oatmeal for breakfast, a lean cuisine for lunch, and salad for dinner.

Oh I was guesstimating in the post - I'll actually be writing everything down in my little notebook. Thats what I did when I lost the initial weight. I was mentally adding calories in my post thats why I said guesstimate.

I've been off and on here two years, had kept off 9 pounds when I started back here in July. Now I'm down 11.4 more pounds, partly because of acid reflux problems. Anyway, that's motivated me to try to keep going down the hard way. Tracking on FitDay, using a combination of Dr. Oz You on a Diet and Mark Bittman's ideas in Food Matters.

Good for you!!! Like others said, watch the processed foods and get a food scale . It really makes a difference. I lost this weight the first time eating a lot of lean cuisine and calorie counting with a lot of junk food. It was a painful PAINFUL journey and I put it right back on when I was pregnant with my 2nd. This time is totally different in a lot of ways... but it's easier without the processed stuff.

I'll keep everyone updated - I really appreaciate the support.
So far so good today - have had coffee and a protein shake,
had to take my dog to the vet so breakfast will be a bit late.
I've said it before but I am REALLY loving this forum! I look
forward to getting to know everyone. It took me so long to change
forums even though the Surgery one was not working for me because
you get to know people and care what goes on in their life. I want
to do that here, and hopefully contribute something positive to all of you!

1,665 calories yesterday - down 3lbs today.
Now I don't expect that to be an every day thing, but its some
good positive reinforcement for just starting over.
I've decided to add in a "when I get to work" protein shake so today
I had a strawberry Oh Yeah, 130 calories & 18 grams protein. Filling
also.

1800 calories yesterday.
Had a 40 minute walk.
Down another 1/2 today.