I'M BACK.
I turned sixteen on January 5th.

I'm between 5'2 and 5'3, and I weigh roughly 240 lbs.

According to Fitness.com,
"You have a very high Body Mass Index of 42.60

According to an average BMI of 22.5 your weight should be 126 lbs."

This means that I need to lose 114 lbs in order to be at a healthy weight.
Right now, I'm aiming for 180 lbs, which is a loss of 60 lbs. It will take a lot of time and effort, but I believe that I can make it happen.

My plan? Cut back on my portions; try to make healthier choices. I'm going to cut out soda and start drinking plenty of water. No more brownies, candies, or other sugary treats.

For breakfast, I'm going to eat something small.

During lunch, I'm going to get whatever the main part of the meal is at school, and eat half of that, along with a vegetable side and a small carton of skim milk. I'm going to throw away the bread or fries that they usually give us. Who needs those extra carbs and grease? I'll also pick up a banana, apple, or pear, and save it for a snack later in the day.

And for dinner, I'm going to eat whatever my parents make me, but I'm going to eat a smaller portion than I normally would. I'm going to get a SMALL, SMALL portion, and if I feel like I really need it, I'll go back for more. Going back for seconds will also make me feel like I've eaten more than I actually have.

I'm also going to start walking laps around my neighborhood. I'll start with 2 laps in the morning; 2 in the evening. It takes me about 10-15 minutes for one lap at present.

I'm going to keep track of how many times I can get up and down my stairs without stopping each day.

I'd like to get to the point where I can do crunches with ease, also.

I'm not focusing on my weight so much as I am getting into better habits at the moment.

I wish that I could fit back into my old clothes. I'm down to like one pair of pants that fits me now.

The girl in my avatar is me, by the way. I have leopard print tape on my cheeks.

I've been in a tight spot and have decided to come back. I really, really need to make this happen.

Well it sounds like you have the right attitude and so much determination!
It's gonna be hard, but just know that we're all here for support when you need it!

You're gonna do awesome!

So I just did one of the Walk Away the Pounds video. I figured out that the missing one is the One Mile Walk. We have Walk and Kick and Walk and Jog. Today I did Walk and Kick.

I love the videos because they increase your heart rate and make you sweat, and they're also the perfect length of time: 30 minutes. Even if you have a busy schedule, you can take the time to do them, and if you don't feel like exercising, you just tell yourself, "It's only half an hour. It's only half an hour! It won't kill me. I should just get it over with." And afterwords, I always feel better and a little more energetic. Along with that, it makes you feel like you're working out with someone, but you don't have to feel embarrassed, and you don't get angry looking at the people in the video because Leslie Sansone doesn't put incredibly athletic, perfectly fit, model-type people in her videos. They look like regular, every day people.

I'm also eating a burrito (350 calories) at the moment and drinking a rather large glass of water.

Hi Paroxysm
Welcome to your diary

Congratulations on taking the first steps towards reaching your goal.

When I first woke up to actually deciding to lose the weight, I had 102 pounds to lose. It seemed so overwhelming. However, we CAN do it...one pound at a time. You'll get there, there will be slip ups along the way, the most we can do is to keep moving forwards towards our goals.

You wrote:
With all the great things you said, this to me, is the ultimate choice you've made and will help you not only to reach your goal but to be able to maintain it once you get there.

Good luck on your journey!

Thank you Amunet and M2M for the encouraging words!

I'm very glad to be here.

Hey Paroxysm! Glad to see you join in and make a decision to chose healthy! When I started I was 234 lbs and I've lost 27 lbs. If I can do it anybody can do it and I mean that girl. You may not lose it fast, but slow and steady is the way to go. Changing your lifestyle to a healthy active lifestyle is the way to go. When you eat right and excersize the extra lbs have no choice but to disappear.
If you're looking for a good site for calorie counting try sparkpeople.com or fitday.com they are both excellent tools and have alot of valuable information. Remember, we are here to support you so if you need anything just ask.

Thanks! I'll check out both of those websites.

Paroxysm,
Welcome to your diary!! I wish you the best with everything. You look like you have the right attitude. You're definitely at a good age to start changing your habits now, so they will be with you for the rest of you life.

Okay, so I just discovered that I can do about 15 crunches without taking a break and jog down, then back up my stairs five times consecutively without dying of exhaustion.

By the fouth time, I start feeling weak, and then when I'm done, I'm way out of breath and have to sit down.

15 crunches isn't a lot, but when I was younger, I would do 10 crunches in the morning and 10 crunches at night. Eventually, I was up to 50 crunches in the morning and 50 at night. Somehow, I stopped doing them, though. This was when I was maybe eleven or twelve.

I'm going to start that up again, except starting at 15, and trying to add on five crunches every week.

I'm off school today, so it's been a lazy day... other than sleeping, being on this forum, and exercising, I've gotten nothing done!

But I have school tomorrow, so I'll have to remember to do all of these things again.

Thanks, Changeforlife!

Unfortunately, Iwan, sparkpeople is only for adults, and I'm fifteen... BUT I signed up to fitday.com and am about to go look at it.

Hehe you sound like me. When I was twelve I did 50 pushups and 100 situps every night before bed. Even after 4yrs in the army, I can't do 50 pushups like I used to! (maybe just because i hate them).
Anyway, you're gonna do super awesome. I can feel it!

Heyas Parox,
Welcome and good luck to ya! You can do this and
you have lots of support! Hope you have a gr8 Day, Tammy

Eh. I can't do push ups to save my life.

I plan to take a walk tomorrow afterschool. I'm going to aim for 3 laps around my neighborhood.

Thanks Squid and Tammy.

MmK, so this is day two, and I feel great.

I just got back from a nice little walk. I did two laps around my neighborhood, and I jogged every now and then.

I think I'm going to start posting this little... chart thing to keep track.

Number of laps (around neighborhood): 2
Time left the house: 4:07 P.M.
Time arrived at the house: 4:30 P.M.
Time elapsed: 23 minutes
Approx. time per lap: 11.5 minutes

I stopped to stretch twice. My side kinda started aching, and I got out of breath after jogging, but I was able to regain my breath in a decent amount of time. I started up a sweat, so I ended up taking my jacket off even though it's cold and windy out. I drank some water before I left and then some more after I returned.

Oh, yeah! I dragged my cousin along with me, who's thinner than I but kinda lazy, and she had my camera and was stopping to take pictures and stuff, and I lost her nearing the end of the first lap, so she stopped and I did an entire lap more than her. When I started jogging and she was way behind me, it felt so good. While we were walking, at the beginning, I was explaining to her how respiration occurs, why we have to be able to inhale a certain amount of oxygen in order to exercise (because of the need for ATP), and the importance of stretching because of anaerobic respiration and the production of lactic acid through fermentation. I hate it when I actually learn stuff in school and start discussing it in daily conversation, but I have a test on that stuff tomorrow, so it's good review. Heh...

This morning, I had: one frosted blueberry poptart (200 calories)
For lunch, I had: skim milk (90 calories); 4 pieces of teriyaki chicken nuggets; corn; sliced pineapple (obviously from a can); a roll

I think I'm doing pretty well so far. This morning, my friend, Jennifer, offered me a cookie, and I was like, "Err... nnno, thanks." Woot.

But now I have to do a Biology study guide for that test tomorrow, a timeline for AP World History, and some French stuff. I'll be back on later!

Good for you!!

My standard line (in an up beat tone) is: "No thanks, I'm good." I love it because it can be taken so many ways - other people generally take it as I'm fine, satisfied - but I know it's my mental mantra that "I am BEING good by saying No"

Yeah. Jenny was like, "Why not?" and my response was, "I'm fat." But I suppose that's not the best answer. She was like, "One cookie isn't going to make a difference?" But I told her that to me it would, so she was like, "Whatever. More cookies for me."

Also, I just did twenty crunches and jogged down and back up my stairs three times. I think I'll try the stairs thing again later, when I'm not so worn out.

Hopefully, in a couple of weeks, I'll be able to walk around my neighborhood three, maybe four times.

I'm also hoping that maybe I'll be able to jog for longer periods of time.

I wish that the lunch ladies would hand out slips of paper that tell you how many calories you've just been given to eat. I wish places and McDonald's and stuff would, too. Maybe then people would realize, "Hey! This is way too much," and maybe save half their sandwich for later.

It's kinda hard for me to even attempt to count calories.