1. Answer these questions before starting your diary.

-- How much weight do you want to lose?
My current goal is to get under 200 lbs.

-- What is the timeframe for reaching your target weight?
My timeframe for reaching that goal is 7 months from now.

-- How do you want to accomplish your goal (what methods do you want to use)? I will continue with the water aerobics classes, walking (when my leg gets better), and avoid eating junk at night. I will also eat healthier with more fruits and vegetables and less bread, sugary snacks, and meat.

-- Who or what can support you in reaching your goal?
The only person that can really help me is me. Diet clubs and lectures about my weight don't work.

-- How realistic is your goal? It is very realistic.

-- When will you start? I start now.

What is your current height and weight?
My current weight is 278 and my height is 5' 4"

What obstacles could get between you and your weight loss goals?
The main obstacle for me is me. I want to eat and love to eat. I need self-control. Plus, I tend to get hungry more often than I should. I think I have low blood sugar. Perhaps a diet that doesn't lower it quickly would help.

I'm on my way. I've not kept a journal such as this, this is a new thing for me. Let's see how it works!

Hello downtown!! Welcome to the forums! I just joined a little while ago, but am still learning how it all works. Make sure you read the stickied threads, and good luck to you on your journey. There are many wonderful, supportive people here. A few things that have worked for me in the past: drink lots of water (and tea!), and eat every few hours. Keeping a food journal has helped me a lot too. Good luck!

Thanks so much for the encouragement Lizzie! You're right about the water. I do have less aches and pains when I'm hydrated. I also tend to be a little hypoglycemic, and I get thirsty a lot. I've been checked for diabetes but don't have it--yet. That's why I'm on this path. It runs in my family.

Eating small, frequent meals is a good idea too. Thanks for the suggestion.

I just wanted to welcome you to the forum. I think it's a great place to get motivation and advice. Also, it's a great way to keep yourself accountable too. One site that may be of help is fitday.com. I use that site to keep track of calories. It's a great way to see how many calories you really are taking in (sometimes it's quite shocking). Right now I use it not after I eat but before. I'll plan what I'm going to eat the next day and make sure that I don't go over my calorie goal. Just tonight I was shocked, I could only fit one burrito into my dinner... I always eat two! For years! But with the rest of the calories I had for the day and with my calorie goal being only 1500, only one burrito it will be!

So hopefully if you get a chance, check out the site, it can be a real eye opener

Again, welcome and good luck!

Thanks for the website suggestion Risty! I will check it out.

Today went well. My leg is still sore and weak, and I guess that's a good motivator to watch what I eat. The less weight, the less burdensome it becomes.

I had my usual cereal, wheat free Puffins. *I think I do need to keep an eye on the portion size however. I probably ate one and a half portions at least. On my way to work I had my usual as well, iced coffee.

I had a snack bar at 9 a.m. with a bottle of water.

At noon, I had homemade soup my sister made--she makes great soups! And to drink I had skim milk.

I went out for supper and had the jumbo fish sandwich. I removed the top slice of bread, which is subway sandwich sized. I ate half the fries. No dessert.

Now I'm drinking a small 8 oz. can of Coke, which I'm calling dessert. It's 100 calories.

I'm guessing I had about 1,400 calories today.

*Another note to self--check out site mentioned by Risty to get more accurate caloric readings.

I snacked when I got home today, but I was hungry. I had chips and pretzels. I had an 8 oz. can of Coke and for supper I had two slices of pizza, 4 cheese, no meat. For dessert I had a cup of mint chocolate chip ice-cream.

One good thing, it's the weekend and I stay up much later. More time to burn it off. Now I'm drinking juice and water--1 part juice, 3 parts water.

Hey, it sounds like you're trying hard to start off changing your eating habits. It's hard to do it all at once, so taking baby steps is a good idea. For one, if you usually get dessert and chose not to that night then that's an awesome start! Then you can move on to other things, like instead of eating ice cream you can have that sugar free jello stuff (like they show on the biggest loser). Or just cutting out the iced coffee, or maybe just having it as a once a week treat instead of an everyday thing. Little changes like that add up! And those changes will then lead to bigger changes!

I hope your leg starts feeling better.

Whenever you check out the website, let me know what ya think

Thanks for the encouragement Risty. I'm thinking about signing up at FitDay. Does the site calculate the calories for you? If so, I like that idea!

I went out last night to Red Robin and had the cod and bottomless fries. I only had the one serving of fries and didn't eat them all. No dessert, although I did get an iced coffee on the way home.

My leg hurts today and I have to go out later and fight the snow. I'm feeling down today but fortunately, my appetite isn't crazy. I've decided to eat only when I get hungry and not because I'm down.

Yeah the site calculates the calories for you. What I like about it is you can add your own food items, for example if there is a bread or yogurt or something that you eat all the time, you can add it will be fast and easy to pick that food and have the calories added. Whereas if you don't have it added you have to try and find it in the list and sometimes they don't have everything of every brand. So if there's something I eat a lot, I add it. If not, I just pick something similar to it and make sure that I have the right amount of calories.

I'm sorry you're feeling down, but I'm glad you decided to eat when your hungry and not when you're down

Feeling a little better today. Had x-rays on my hip and knee. My weight is the same today as it was a month ago when I last saw my doctor. At least I didn't gain.

Did well with the eating. No bread with my tomato macaroni soup tonight. For dessert I had two small Famous Amos cookies and an 8 0z. can of Coke.

I got an account with Fit Day. I can't figure it out though. I couldn't find any place to post what I ate and get the calories.

I'll be going to my water aerobics class tomorrow after work!

In fitday, you have to be clicked on the foods tab (which when you log on that's the one it goes to automatically.) Right under the date in the middle of the page there's a food search. That's where you'd type in what you ate like for example "apple" then all the apple items will come up and you'd pick the one closest to what you ate. Once you put your first food choice in, you'll see where it goes and how it's set up. You can always delete something too if you choose something by mistake, so just play around

If you want to add your own food, like a particular yogurt or something you eat often, that's found on the left side. You would choose 'create a custom food' and just fill in the blanks!

I hope that helps

Thanks. I think I got a little frustrated when I tried to find some foods I had eaten that were not on the list and I couldn't figure out how to type in anything.

My laptop died and I'm in the process of looking for a new one. I have to use other computers in the meantime so it will cut down the amount of postings here for awhile.

I'm avoiding nighttime snacking and I decided to eat more salads. A friend of mine told me that greens, such as lettuce, are good for achy joints. My hip and knee are still bothering me but I noticed the other day after eating a Ceaser salad that my leg didn't bother me as much. Could it be also the oil in the dressing? Who knows, as long as it's healthy and helps.

I decided to give the diet teams at work another try. I didn't do that well last time, but I know now with my health the way it is that I must get serious. I'll be on team with 3 other co-workers. I see them everyday and can get encouragement and feed-back.

I think that team thing is a really great idea. It's just one more thing to help keep you motivated and accountable. Sure it's not a guarantee, but every little ounce of support helps!

I got weighed in last Thursday for the start of the Best Losers Club at work. I showed a loss of 2 lbs. from my visit to the doctor's that Tuesday before. I also found out I have osteoarthristis. And my knee problem stems from the way I've been walking.

I'm still taking in veggies everyday! My hip isn't bothering me like it was. Water aerobics again tomorrow.

Good job on the weight loss and keeping the veggies up! I definitely need more veggies in my diet!