ok, so i'm not a regular but I thought I'd share this.

I was never overweight, just not happy with myself. I grew up a skinny kid, and when I went to college and got on the pill, I shot up to 130. Which as you know is actually an acceptable weight (i'm 5'5"), but for me it was the heaviest I'd ever been.

Anyway, I wanted to share how I got back to my original target of 119, in case it helps anyone:

I used CalorieKing Nutrition and Exercise Manager. Without a doubt I couldn't have done it without this. And I was one of those people who thought that counting calories was a silly and stupid way to loose weight. boy, was I wrong.
All this software really does is calculate your calorie, fat, carb, protein, fiber etc requirements (there are many online calculators who'll do this for free) and then you log your meals (it has a big database) and it shows you how you're doing. It is entirely possible to do this without buying software, but I'm lazy.

Here's my weight loss chart. this screenshot is a bit outdated, I just reached 119 today.
(ignore the last dot, it is my revised goal for the end of august.)


notice the gap in the middle where I gained back a little weight? that's when I had no scales!

Yes.. I am a scale junkie. If I don't have scales, I loose my motivation, simple as that. I weigh myself at least twice a day. People are always saying 'nooo, only weigh yourself once a week!', but that would cramp my style. I know that weight fluctuates over a day and doesn't have much relevance to the overall weight loss trend, but I love to observe it anyway...
in fact, for a while I alternated between logging my morning weight and my evening weight just for the heck of it, hence the spiky chart.

(edit) oh, and as for exercise, I tried to do 30 minutes of walking or cycling a day, though to be honest I didn't do this every day. I didn't feel like I was making a special effort to work out, even- I just changed my habits a bit; instead of walking to the nearest shop, I cycled to a bigger (and cheaper!) supermarket further away.

i find that counting calories is the only way to go.

if i dont count cals i always think im eating less than i really am.

surprisingly, when i DO count calories i tend to UNDER eat. mostly because i tend to try to save some cals for the end of the day just in case i get hungrier than i though i would in the evening.

nothing sucks mroe than going to bed hungry!!!

Great job!

Got any pics? I'm a sucker for a 5'5" 119lb girl! (same height and weight my wife was when we dated)

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thanks

I regret this now, but I didn't take any before photos, not proper whole body before and afters.. I did take a jokey 'before' one, though it REALLY does not show the worst of it.. i'm just too good at photography and too vain to ever take a bad photo of myself, heh

http://img2.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/9ada9ed985.jpg

and a recent headshot from when I was modelling a few weeks ago! (yay!) just a crappy cell phone photo, as the proper photos have to be developed/scanned first.
http://img2.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/3e09995b20.jpg

to be honest, i'm not *quite* where I was before I started gaining weight, but I'm in a good place right now and i'll definitely get there soon.

I really want to do weight training, but I'm afraid i'll hurt myself doing it improperly.

hah yeah, that happens to me too! and then of course you get to feel EXTRA guilty because you're not supposed to eat right before going to sleep.

It's a bit tricky to keep on top of this as i'm in new york at the moment, and there are SO MANY wonderful restaurants I want to eat at, plus whenever I stay over at my boyfriends place I don't have any of my regular foods there, though he eats super healthy so that's good But I think I'm developing an intuition for it. or at least, if I am eating too much one some days, I seem to be making it up on other days, if that's possible..

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Wow! Great job! You look super.

I think weighing yourself once a day or more is fine, so long as you understand how weight fluctuated during the day, day to day and for women, throughout the month.

The people who don't understand or accept this expect to always see lower numbers every time they step on. When they see it going up and they've been "good" they get frustrated. Sometimes that frustration ends up with them falling off the wagon.

For me, once a day is plenty and often I don't weigh myself but once a week.

But we are all different and what you're doing is clearly working!

Enjoy the Journey!

David C

thanks

oh yeah, it's not particularly clear on that chart image because it's a bit distorted, but I totally noticed the water retention weight from my time of month. Funnily enough, I also noticed that one morning I got up and (excuse the over-share) peed like twice the amount I usually do in the morning- and that was also the day I dropped like 1 pound instantly.

Another thing I noticed was that skipping my birth control pill-free week (you can skip every other pill-free week, according to the manual) seems to have a bad effect, but I only did it once so it may just have been coincidence.

i'll take that as a compliment ..

You look fantastic.. I'm so happy for you!