Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Day 1

Hi everyone. I am a woman in her mid-30s who is desperate to get back into shape. I have tried doing this many times on my own, but I have been unsuccessful at keeping the momentum going for very long. For most of my life, I have never been someone who has had major weight issues, but I have struggled with food addictions practically all of my life. I know that food is my drug of choice - it has always "temporarily" helped me to feel better when times are tough, but as is the case with most drugs, after the "high" wears off, I am riddled with the guilt of losing my self-control.

Now that I am getting older, I have come to the realization that it is going to be much harder to maintain my figure/health without taking some more drastic, permanent changes. FYI, I am no fan of "crash diets," and I never have been - I realize that I need to plan on making LIFESTYLE CHANGES, rather than this being a project that I dabble with for a few weeks.

For starters, I have tried minimizing sweet drinks from my diet (my favorite being sweet tea) and drinking water most of the time. I also realize that eating out really packs on the pounds as well, so I need to try to do more cooking at home. I have also gotten really lazy and inconsistent with working out lately. One of my more current excuses has been the extreme heat that we are dealing with here in the South, but since I have several different workout videos, I know that I can do those until the Fall returns.

I hope that many of you out there will share your success stories, and even your failures, so that we can lean on each other for support and accountability. If any of you have suggestions regarding things that have worked for you, I'd love to hear them.

I plan to post my weight once-a-week, and I am going to try to post my eating and exercise daily to keep me motivated and accountable. My weight as of this morning was 134. (I have already dropped from 136 by drinking more water and doing less eating out.) I think that a reasonable goal would be to lose 2 pounds per month. I would really like to get back down in the lower to mid-120s so that I can fit back into my "skinny clothes" again. For a more definite goal, I'll set 124 up to be my target weight, and then I'll go from there.

Current weight as of 7/22/08: 134
1st goal: TO LOSE 2 POUNDS BY 8/22/08