So I'll say from the get-go that I don't expect to update this every day... I can't dwell on every pound, every inch that I've gained and lost. I don't even like to weigh myself because when I look at the scale, the very fact that I'm in the 200's bothers me, even if I've been in the 200's most of my adult life (ok, so I'm too young for that to matter, but it's the only way I have to say it). I look in the mirror, and look at others... they're a size 12 and it looks to me like they are packing so much more fat and weight than I am, but I'm the one that's a 16/18/20 (depending on the store). I don't like numbers, I don't like dieting, and I don't think that anything's going to change that.

I live in the Sweetest Place on Earth (official tourist name of the nearest sizeable town), so chocolate is all around. You drive through the center of town and the center smells like chocolate, the outskirts smells like peanut butter (the Reese's factory)... and I'll be straight forward about this now... in less than a week, I will be going to Chocolate Fest... with 5 other women in my family. My cousin is on weight watchers and she says that she won't be eating the chocolate, but my philosophy is and always has been if I have a craving, I have to indulge it, because if I don't and I finally give in down the road, I'll gorge myself on it. I prefer a healthy, balanced, interesting, and flavorful diet to a calorie-restricted one in which I have to keep counting calories and fat grams and all that jazz. I eat fast food maybe twice a year, and those two times, I don't even want to think about what's going in my body because I know it will not let me enjoy what I'm eating.

And to be honest, (at least for me) what I eat is not nearly as important as what I do. I lived in Spain for 6 months during college, and we were eating fried foods with rice AND bread every day, plus once a week I had to go to the Chocolateria for chocolate and churros or hang out in the cafes for a Bon Bon (strong coffee with sweetened condensed milk instead of cream/sugar) and a pastry from the nearest bakery. But with all of those diet no-nos, I was walking 1/2 hour each day to class, sometimes twice a day (if there was a class after siesta, which was at home). I lost 50 pounds in those 6 months. I've tried not eating, I've tried restricting myself, but if I am not active, I don't lose a pound.

But that's the problem, right? It's not the dieting or the "balanced diet" that is the time-consuming part or the part that is the hardest to stick to. It's the exercise, that hour a day that I have to do to make any dieting that I do worth-while. But that exercise causes another problem. I have the beginings of arthritis in my hip (either from a horseback riding accident or from when I was born... no two doctors can agree), so the high-impact jogging is out. I am never available when the swimming pools are open, so swimming's out. I've tried belly dancing (ladies, great for menstrual cramps, by the way... it's what I use ) and other dances like latin dancing and ballroom dancing. I've tried eliptical machines and stationary bikes, but I don't get anything out of them... hardly even break a sweat. But the only work-out where I feel like I've worked out is a jog or something fast and high impact. (Actually, that latin/ballroom dancing is great too... swing, salsa, samba, cha-cha, the hustle... all get my legs feeling like jell-o by the end of the song - but that's not every day)

So in the end, I'm sticking to my plan (though taking the dog for a walk when it's this cold is REALLY hard to do, especially since I just got back from living 2 years in the caribbean), and we'll see... But one week into it and I've gained 3 pounds, though my clothes fit better and you can see that my "curves" are not quite so bumpy as they were before.

That's progress, right?

It sounds like you were gaining an advantage from the warm environments you were in! It also sounds like you are in your 20's (somewhere in there) so you might also be starting to experience a slow-down in your metabolism. If you already eat in a healthy manner, and are exercising enough to break a sweat, you may want to double-check your guesstimations and keep a food diary for a week or two, then look at your calorie/fat/carb/protein totals.
I know it's not something you want to do, but it might be better motivation to be SURE your intake is good, and it could open up some ideas for other solutions than high-impact exercises.
Do you ever add a few degrees of incline to your treadmill time? You may find it helps you break a good sweat (I agree about bikes, btw. I hate those things!), or it could just be something else to scratch off your list. My roomie can walk for hours on a level treadmill, but he kicks it up to 10% incline and he's only got about 15 or 20 minutes worth of energy (a bit over a mile).

I hope something helps! See you soon!