larry's girl
Dead last finish is better than did not finish, wh
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2003
I guess I should introduce myself first. My name is Susan. I am 42 years old, married for 23 ½ years to the love of my life we have one daughter who is 19. They are the heartbeat of my world and I try very hard to be the best wife and mother I can possibly be for them, but I have come to a point in my life where I must focus on my needs and listen to myself a bit more to figure out what will help me to become a healthier person and what wont. This journal will be where I record my food choices, my exercise efforts, my attitudes (positive and negative), my triumphs, my failures, and anything else that I feel the need to type out so that I can understand my journey towards good health more fully. I am sure this initial post will be a VERY LONG one, so feel free to bow out now if you dont want to spend a ton of time reading it I completely understand.
I think I will start with a short chronicle of my lifes challenges up to this point, beginning with my mothers death when I was 3 years old and ending with how my medical diagnosis this year has provided me with a new beginning. After my mother died (she had pancreatic cancer and died one month shy of her 28th birthday), my grandparents cared for me while my father worked. I come from a long line of wonderful Southern cooks, and I learned very early that eating foods that I liked made me feel better when I was sad, frustrated or just generally out of sorts. I also learned that lots of the fun events in life (like family gatherings) involved mountains of food, and so food became a friend of mine from childhood on. When I was 7, my father remarried and I had to get used to a new mom and a new schedule. We all had some adjusting to do, and I would escape to my grandparents whenever I could and eat whatever I wanted for the time I was there. I truly viewed food not just as sustenance, but as love and comfort when things were tough. When I was in high school, my sister and brother were born and I learned all about how to care for babies! (In fact, my sister is the one who encouraged me to check out the WISH board and use the inspiration and encouragement here to muster up the courage to try this weight loss thing again. Her username on the boards is postesf hi, sweetie!)
Moving into adolescence, I began to see that I was heavier than the accepted norm and began to try every diet known to man chemical combination diets, Slim Fast, the Cambridge diet, eating nothing but Lean Cuisines and apples you name it, I did it (or so it seemed). I would always lose weight, but was never able to keep it off for any length of time. When I was 18, someone who had been a friend of mine for many years expressed an interest in being more than friends and, lo and behold, I was married a year later to a man who made it clear that he did not find skinny women attractive at all and preferred someone with meat on her bones. Boy, I knew he was a good guy to be around!! Anyway, we began our life together and, four years later, we had a new baby. This was a miracle in and of itself, because I had struggled with hormonal imbalance issues since puberty (I was diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome at age 18) and had to have medical help to get pregnant (I mention this because it will be significant in my story later). During our daughters early childhood, my husband began to have significant medical problems (which I will not go into here) and I noticed that I was having episodes of considerable muscle aching, terrible fatigue and just generally feeling unwell. This would go on for a few days and then disappear, only to reoccur a few weeks later. At first I thought it was just the stress of raising a child, caring for a very sick spouse and life in general, but after some detective work on my part, I decided that it was time to see a rheumatologist since I suspected I did indeed have a medical problem and I was right! I had fibromyalgia. I was 27 years old when I received this diagnosis, and in the beginning it wasnt really a huge deal because I only felt really bad sporadically. There wasnt anything specific that could be done at the time, just medication for the pain and extra rest for the fatigue. The problem was that as I got older, my fibromyalgia symptoms got worse and worse and worse. The flares became more and more frequent over time, and eventually I began to see that fibromyalgia was taking over my life.
By this time, we had moved from Raleigh, North Carolina to Atlanta, Georgia so that I could work nights while my husband worked days. (He had recovered enough of his health to be able to work again by this point.) We did this so that I could be home with our daughter during school breaks and over the summer, and eventually we decided to home school her. I worked nights for nine years (up until this past March) and as the years went by, it got more and more difficult to sleep and when I did sleep, I wasnt getting any benefit from it so I woke up just as tired as I was when I went to sleep. My weight continued to climb, despite multiple attempts at Weight Watchers and dieting on my own. The only thing that stopped me from trying programs such as Jenny Craig or Nutrisystem was that they were too expensive to fit into the budget. In the past two years, I have been diagnosed with sleep apnea (I use a CPAP machine), type II diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Last year I had trouble fitting into the seat on Expedition Everest I managed it, but it was a near thing and I was horrified that I might not be able to ride anything I wished at my beloved WDW. So I joined an organization called TOPS (which stands for Take Off Pounds Sensibly). They are similar to Weight Watchers, except that they are nonprofit and therefore the meetings are much cheaper. I loved TOPS and did very well there, losing 40 pounds in about six months. I felt like I had finally found the answer and then I had a MAJOR fibromyalgia flare, the worst one of my life. I was so sick there was no way I could make the TOPS meetings on a regular basis, much less shop and cook healthy foods (so of course I gained back all that 40 pounds I lost). I was barely able to put one foot in front of another and feared being unable to continue doing my job (and since I carry all our health benefits, that would have been catastrophic). I knew I needed help, but didnt know where to turn to get it because I had already exhausted everything traditional M.D.s had to offer. I was at the point of giving up, but my DH wouldnt let me. He was determined that he would find someone who could help me feel better and he did.
In January of this year, I became a patient at a medical practice that integrates traditional medicine with naturopathic medicine, nutritional therapy, Chinese medicine, behavioral modification, etc. and they specialize in chronic illness. My DH saw an advertisement for them and insisted that I schedule an appointment he even went with me to the first visit. I had extensive blood work done there and they discovered that I had a list of severe nutritional deficiencies a mile long. I began a regimen of I.V. infusions with vitamins, minerals, enzymes and amino acids, as well as lots of supplements in capsule and powder form. I was found to have several food allergies, and modified my diet to avoid those foods. I was also instructed to stop working nights and go to a normal daytime schedule because third shift work is so terribly hard on a healthy persons body, much less someone like me who has such severe health issues. I was fortunate enough to be able to switch to a daytime position at my place of employment and reestablished a normal sleep pattern within a few weeks.
After making all of these changes, I went back to see the M.D. at the integrated practice and she asked me if my fibromyalgia symptoms had improved at all. I told her that my pain level was much better, but that I was still extremely exhausted all the time. She asked me a few questions, including whether I had difficulty getting pregnant with my daughter (which I thought was odd at the time). She said that she thought she knew what the basic cause of all my health problems was. Turns out, I have something called celiac disease. I had never heard of celiac disease and was immediately alarmed at what it entailed and how serious it was. She reassured me, explaining that celiac disease is a genetic illness that you have from birth. Your body does not have the ability to digest the gluten (or protein) in wheat, barley or rye (or oats unless you get special gluten-free oats, because practically all oats in this country are contaminated with wheat during processing). When you eat it (and we eat a lot of wheat in the U.S.), you are trying to digest something that your body does not have the ability to handle, and therefore (over time) your digestive system becomes less and less able to function, until it pretty much stops. PLUS everything that you have eaten has turned into toxins in your body you are literally being poisoned from the inside out and that is where the health problems begin. As she went on to explain, polycystic ovarian syndrome, fibromyalgia and type II diabetes are all autoimmune disorders my body was turning on itself because it was being bombarded with toxic substances all day long, every day, for years and these are common health problems in patients with celiac disease. On top of that, the food that you eat cant be utilized because your digestive system has pretty much stopped functioning, so you dont absorb any of the nutrients you eat and you dont get any energy from the food thus the pain and exhaustion. She told me that for many years, it was thought that the only presentation of celiac disease was in people who are emaciated with large stomachs (sort of like the pictures of malnourished children we have all seen). But it has been discovered in recent years that there are variants of celiac disease, one of which is that you have the same nutritional deficiencies and digestive tract damage, but most of what you eat turns to fat. And all of a sudden, a lightbulb went on in my head. THATS why it is so hard for me to lose weight. Of course, I learned that this doesnt mean I cant lose weight, just that it is much harder for me than it is for the average person. And since it is hard enough for the average person (if there is such a thing), it is difficult indeed for me. At the end of that visit, the M.D. gave me information on how to get gene testing done (for a definitive diagnosis) and said that we would move forward once the results from that were back.
So I had the tests done and researched celiac disease on the internet while I waited for the results. And when they came back, sure enough, I had a severe case of celiac disease and since its genetic, my daughter had to be tested, too. When her test came back, she also had a severe case of celiac. Since there is no cure for this, the only way to treat it is to adhere to a gluten-free diet, and we knew that we would both have no choice but to learn to eat a brand new way. It became evident quickly that it was important to do so, not only for our health now, but also because if celiac remains undetected or is ignored, it causes severe damage in the digestive tract sometimes resulting in cancer or other potentially terminal illnesses. This was scary stuff, but I was just grateful that I finally had an answer and it was something I could DO something about. We also learned that it takes about 1 ½ to 2 years for the damage from celiac disease to heal once a person begins a gluten-free diet, so we knew it would take some time for our systems to recover from the years of damage we had unknowingly been inflicting on ourselves.
So, for the past six months, my daughter and I have been concentrating on learning to eat gluten-free. That means we have had to replace or eliminate things like pasta, bread, crackers, pizza, cake, pie (because of the crust), cookies, anything with malt (which is made from barley), anything with MSG (which has gluten in it), and so on. It makes grocery shopping an adventure, because you have to read the ingredients list for everything that you buy to make sure you dont end up eating something you shouldnt. If we do accidentally eat a gluten-containing food (or even food that has been prepared on the same surface as food containing gluten without proper cleaning in between), we will become very ill within about six hours, with severe nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and feeling like weve been hit by a truck not fun and one big reason why we try hard to make sure we dont eat gluten or gluten-contaminated food EVER!! There are some gluten-free products available at health food stores and some grocery stores, whether packaged or in mixes, and we have learned to use those when we need to substitute. They cost a little more than the regular stuff, but we are just glad to be able to find gluten-free products if we need them.
So thats where I am today. Only heres the problem I am 54 tall and weigh 326 pounds (as a comparison, I weighed 145 pounds when I got married and the insurance charts say I should weigh 130 pounds). I am so big now that I cant bend down to put on socks or tie my shoes. I cant fit in a normal chair with arms even if I can get myself into it, it is so uncomfortable that I cant sit there for long. Seats in the movie theater are almost impossible for me to sit in now. I started riding the bus to work about two months ago, and that has been a rude awakening as to how big I have become (as if I needed one). I have to sit in the seats at the front of the bus that are three across because they are the only ones big enough for me (they are supposed to be reserved for disabled riders, but we dont have any of those on the bus when I am riding in to work, so I can sit there). If the only empty seat is between two people, I cant sit in it because I will crowd them so much that we are all uncomfortable (and when I did this anyway because I needed to get home, I was told in a loud and rude manner how much room I was taking up I wont be repeating that experience because it was terribly humiliating). I have trouble moving around I waddle when I walk because I am so fat. In short, I am miserable and very frightened that if I dont find a way to stop this weight gain, I wont be able to function in society at all before much more time goes by and I will be housebound. I have considered surgical options, but find I dont have what it takes to submit to a surgical procedure in truth, the idea of surgery scares me more than the weight does. So I have to find another path that will work for me. Since I started riding the bus back and forth to work, I cant get to the TOPS meetings any more they start too early and there arent any other meetings that start later in my area, so I have to do something else.
I admit I was reluctant to even start down this road one more time, even though I know it is imperative that I do. I wasnt sure I had it in me to try again. After losing and gaining weight so many times, I just wasnt sure I could deal with the whole process again but my sister convinced me I could do it. She was so enthusiastic about the great people here on this board and how much they had helped her (she is training for the 5K marathon at Disney in January) and she was sure that I could make this work with your help. So, heres what I have decided to do:
1. I joined ediets.com on Friday because they have a wheat-free eating plan that I think will work well for me. They provide menus and shopping lists, as well as exercise plans, and other e-tools to track your progress. I am looking forward to exploring how their system works. I have also bought extra measuring cups and spoons this weekend so that I can measure out food portions correctly.
2. Starting tomorrow morning, I am going to prepare my meals and clothes the night before so that I can get up at 4:45 a.m. to get on the first bus out (at 5:30 a.m.). This will put me at work by 6:45 and I can work out in the gym we have here for about 45 minutes, shower and dress and eat a quick breakfast before work. I am planning to alternate between walking on the treadmill and lifting small hand weights (ediets has a virtual trainer to show you how to lift correctly, which I will watch first). I will start out slowly and then gradually increase the intensity of my lifting and my walks (hopefully).
3. The naturopathic doctor at the practice where I am now a patient told me that we should each drink half of our body weight in ounces of water each day. So that means the bigger you are, the more water you need. In my case, that is 163 ounces of water a day. I am going to make it my goal to drink that much every day (and hopefully adjust accordingly as my weight goes down).
4. I did not have a scale, so I bought a digital one online that arrived last week. I will weigh in once a week (which is required on ediets anyway). I will also measure myself in a few key places so that I can track inches lost as well as pounds.
5. I am going to remember that weight loss will more than likely be AGONIZINGLY slow for me, and that its okay to go slow just as long as the numbers go DOWN slowly instead of UP.
6. I am going to join every thread I have seen here on WISH that speaks to me, hoping to receive encouragement, support and inspiration from others and give some back as well.
7. I am going to use this journal as a tool to help me figure out myself and how I can successfully fight back against this monstrous amount of weight that I carry around every day. I am tired of it. I am ready to get rid of it. I am not looking for perfection, I just want to feel better and be able to move around and sit in a chair like a normal person without it being such an effort. PLEASE HELP ME HELP MYSELF!!!
To those of you who have read all of this (I truly didnt mean to write a book, it just came out that way), thank you SO MUCH for your time. Your comments and suggestions are more than welcome I will treasure each and every post that anyone chooses to make to my journal because I know that it means you care enough to take the time to offer your compassion and kindness to someone else who desperately needs it. Thank you again I hope each of you has a lovely day!
I think I will start with a short chronicle of my lifes challenges up to this point, beginning with my mothers death when I was 3 years old and ending with how my medical diagnosis this year has provided me with a new beginning. After my mother died (she had pancreatic cancer and died one month shy of her 28th birthday), my grandparents cared for me while my father worked. I come from a long line of wonderful Southern cooks, and I learned very early that eating foods that I liked made me feel better when I was sad, frustrated or just generally out of sorts. I also learned that lots of the fun events in life (like family gatherings) involved mountains of food, and so food became a friend of mine from childhood on. When I was 7, my father remarried and I had to get used to a new mom and a new schedule. We all had some adjusting to do, and I would escape to my grandparents whenever I could and eat whatever I wanted for the time I was there. I truly viewed food not just as sustenance, but as love and comfort when things were tough. When I was in high school, my sister and brother were born and I learned all about how to care for babies! (In fact, my sister is the one who encouraged me to check out the WISH board and use the inspiration and encouragement here to muster up the courage to try this weight loss thing again. Her username on the boards is postesf hi, sweetie!)
Moving into adolescence, I began to see that I was heavier than the accepted norm and began to try every diet known to man chemical combination diets, Slim Fast, the Cambridge diet, eating nothing but Lean Cuisines and apples you name it, I did it (or so it seemed). I would always lose weight, but was never able to keep it off for any length of time. When I was 18, someone who had been a friend of mine for many years expressed an interest in being more than friends and, lo and behold, I was married a year later to a man who made it clear that he did not find skinny women attractive at all and preferred someone with meat on her bones. Boy, I knew he was a good guy to be around!! Anyway, we began our life together and, four years later, we had a new baby. This was a miracle in and of itself, because I had struggled with hormonal imbalance issues since puberty (I was diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome at age 18) and had to have medical help to get pregnant (I mention this because it will be significant in my story later). During our daughters early childhood, my husband began to have significant medical problems (which I will not go into here) and I noticed that I was having episodes of considerable muscle aching, terrible fatigue and just generally feeling unwell. This would go on for a few days and then disappear, only to reoccur a few weeks later. At first I thought it was just the stress of raising a child, caring for a very sick spouse and life in general, but after some detective work on my part, I decided that it was time to see a rheumatologist since I suspected I did indeed have a medical problem and I was right! I had fibromyalgia. I was 27 years old when I received this diagnosis, and in the beginning it wasnt really a huge deal because I only felt really bad sporadically. There wasnt anything specific that could be done at the time, just medication for the pain and extra rest for the fatigue. The problem was that as I got older, my fibromyalgia symptoms got worse and worse and worse. The flares became more and more frequent over time, and eventually I began to see that fibromyalgia was taking over my life.
By this time, we had moved from Raleigh, North Carolina to Atlanta, Georgia so that I could work nights while my husband worked days. (He had recovered enough of his health to be able to work again by this point.) We did this so that I could be home with our daughter during school breaks and over the summer, and eventually we decided to home school her. I worked nights for nine years (up until this past March) and as the years went by, it got more and more difficult to sleep and when I did sleep, I wasnt getting any benefit from it so I woke up just as tired as I was when I went to sleep. My weight continued to climb, despite multiple attempts at Weight Watchers and dieting on my own. The only thing that stopped me from trying programs such as Jenny Craig or Nutrisystem was that they were too expensive to fit into the budget. In the past two years, I have been diagnosed with sleep apnea (I use a CPAP machine), type II diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Last year I had trouble fitting into the seat on Expedition Everest I managed it, but it was a near thing and I was horrified that I might not be able to ride anything I wished at my beloved WDW. So I joined an organization called TOPS (which stands for Take Off Pounds Sensibly). They are similar to Weight Watchers, except that they are nonprofit and therefore the meetings are much cheaper. I loved TOPS and did very well there, losing 40 pounds in about six months. I felt like I had finally found the answer and then I had a MAJOR fibromyalgia flare, the worst one of my life. I was so sick there was no way I could make the TOPS meetings on a regular basis, much less shop and cook healthy foods (so of course I gained back all that 40 pounds I lost). I was barely able to put one foot in front of another and feared being unable to continue doing my job (and since I carry all our health benefits, that would have been catastrophic). I knew I needed help, but didnt know where to turn to get it because I had already exhausted everything traditional M.D.s had to offer. I was at the point of giving up, but my DH wouldnt let me. He was determined that he would find someone who could help me feel better and he did.
In January of this year, I became a patient at a medical practice that integrates traditional medicine with naturopathic medicine, nutritional therapy, Chinese medicine, behavioral modification, etc. and they specialize in chronic illness. My DH saw an advertisement for them and insisted that I schedule an appointment he even went with me to the first visit. I had extensive blood work done there and they discovered that I had a list of severe nutritional deficiencies a mile long. I began a regimen of I.V. infusions with vitamins, minerals, enzymes and amino acids, as well as lots of supplements in capsule and powder form. I was found to have several food allergies, and modified my diet to avoid those foods. I was also instructed to stop working nights and go to a normal daytime schedule because third shift work is so terribly hard on a healthy persons body, much less someone like me who has such severe health issues. I was fortunate enough to be able to switch to a daytime position at my place of employment and reestablished a normal sleep pattern within a few weeks.
After making all of these changes, I went back to see the M.D. at the integrated practice and she asked me if my fibromyalgia symptoms had improved at all. I told her that my pain level was much better, but that I was still extremely exhausted all the time. She asked me a few questions, including whether I had difficulty getting pregnant with my daughter (which I thought was odd at the time). She said that she thought she knew what the basic cause of all my health problems was. Turns out, I have something called celiac disease. I had never heard of celiac disease and was immediately alarmed at what it entailed and how serious it was. She reassured me, explaining that celiac disease is a genetic illness that you have from birth. Your body does not have the ability to digest the gluten (or protein) in wheat, barley or rye (or oats unless you get special gluten-free oats, because practically all oats in this country are contaminated with wheat during processing). When you eat it (and we eat a lot of wheat in the U.S.), you are trying to digest something that your body does not have the ability to handle, and therefore (over time) your digestive system becomes less and less able to function, until it pretty much stops. PLUS everything that you have eaten has turned into toxins in your body you are literally being poisoned from the inside out and that is where the health problems begin. As she went on to explain, polycystic ovarian syndrome, fibromyalgia and type II diabetes are all autoimmune disorders my body was turning on itself because it was being bombarded with toxic substances all day long, every day, for years and these are common health problems in patients with celiac disease. On top of that, the food that you eat cant be utilized because your digestive system has pretty much stopped functioning, so you dont absorb any of the nutrients you eat and you dont get any energy from the food thus the pain and exhaustion. She told me that for many years, it was thought that the only presentation of celiac disease was in people who are emaciated with large stomachs (sort of like the pictures of malnourished children we have all seen). But it has been discovered in recent years that there are variants of celiac disease, one of which is that you have the same nutritional deficiencies and digestive tract damage, but most of what you eat turns to fat. And all of a sudden, a lightbulb went on in my head. THATS why it is so hard for me to lose weight. Of course, I learned that this doesnt mean I cant lose weight, just that it is much harder for me than it is for the average person. And since it is hard enough for the average person (if there is such a thing), it is difficult indeed for me. At the end of that visit, the M.D. gave me information on how to get gene testing done (for a definitive diagnosis) and said that we would move forward once the results from that were back.
So I had the tests done and researched celiac disease on the internet while I waited for the results. And when they came back, sure enough, I had a severe case of celiac disease and since its genetic, my daughter had to be tested, too. When her test came back, she also had a severe case of celiac. Since there is no cure for this, the only way to treat it is to adhere to a gluten-free diet, and we knew that we would both have no choice but to learn to eat a brand new way. It became evident quickly that it was important to do so, not only for our health now, but also because if celiac remains undetected or is ignored, it causes severe damage in the digestive tract sometimes resulting in cancer or other potentially terminal illnesses. This was scary stuff, but I was just grateful that I finally had an answer and it was something I could DO something about. We also learned that it takes about 1 ½ to 2 years for the damage from celiac disease to heal once a person begins a gluten-free diet, so we knew it would take some time for our systems to recover from the years of damage we had unknowingly been inflicting on ourselves.
So, for the past six months, my daughter and I have been concentrating on learning to eat gluten-free. That means we have had to replace or eliminate things like pasta, bread, crackers, pizza, cake, pie (because of the crust), cookies, anything with malt (which is made from barley), anything with MSG (which has gluten in it), and so on. It makes grocery shopping an adventure, because you have to read the ingredients list for everything that you buy to make sure you dont end up eating something you shouldnt. If we do accidentally eat a gluten-containing food (or even food that has been prepared on the same surface as food containing gluten without proper cleaning in between), we will become very ill within about six hours, with severe nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and feeling like weve been hit by a truck not fun and one big reason why we try hard to make sure we dont eat gluten or gluten-contaminated food EVER!! There are some gluten-free products available at health food stores and some grocery stores, whether packaged or in mixes, and we have learned to use those when we need to substitute. They cost a little more than the regular stuff, but we are just glad to be able to find gluten-free products if we need them.
So thats where I am today. Only heres the problem I am 54 tall and weigh 326 pounds (as a comparison, I weighed 145 pounds when I got married and the insurance charts say I should weigh 130 pounds). I am so big now that I cant bend down to put on socks or tie my shoes. I cant fit in a normal chair with arms even if I can get myself into it, it is so uncomfortable that I cant sit there for long. Seats in the movie theater are almost impossible for me to sit in now. I started riding the bus to work about two months ago, and that has been a rude awakening as to how big I have become (as if I needed one). I have to sit in the seats at the front of the bus that are three across because they are the only ones big enough for me (they are supposed to be reserved for disabled riders, but we dont have any of those on the bus when I am riding in to work, so I can sit there). If the only empty seat is between two people, I cant sit in it because I will crowd them so much that we are all uncomfortable (and when I did this anyway because I needed to get home, I was told in a loud and rude manner how much room I was taking up I wont be repeating that experience because it was terribly humiliating). I have trouble moving around I waddle when I walk because I am so fat. In short, I am miserable and very frightened that if I dont find a way to stop this weight gain, I wont be able to function in society at all before much more time goes by and I will be housebound. I have considered surgical options, but find I dont have what it takes to submit to a surgical procedure in truth, the idea of surgery scares me more than the weight does. So I have to find another path that will work for me. Since I started riding the bus back and forth to work, I cant get to the TOPS meetings any more they start too early and there arent any other meetings that start later in my area, so I have to do something else.
I admit I was reluctant to even start down this road one more time, even though I know it is imperative that I do. I wasnt sure I had it in me to try again. After losing and gaining weight so many times, I just wasnt sure I could deal with the whole process again but my sister convinced me I could do it. She was so enthusiastic about the great people here on this board and how much they had helped her (she is training for the 5K marathon at Disney in January) and she was sure that I could make this work with your help. So, heres what I have decided to do:
1. I joined ediets.com on Friday because they have a wheat-free eating plan that I think will work well for me. They provide menus and shopping lists, as well as exercise plans, and other e-tools to track your progress. I am looking forward to exploring how their system works. I have also bought extra measuring cups and spoons this weekend so that I can measure out food portions correctly.
2. Starting tomorrow morning, I am going to prepare my meals and clothes the night before so that I can get up at 4:45 a.m. to get on the first bus out (at 5:30 a.m.). This will put me at work by 6:45 and I can work out in the gym we have here for about 45 minutes, shower and dress and eat a quick breakfast before work. I am planning to alternate between walking on the treadmill and lifting small hand weights (ediets has a virtual trainer to show you how to lift correctly, which I will watch first). I will start out slowly and then gradually increase the intensity of my lifting and my walks (hopefully).
3. The naturopathic doctor at the practice where I am now a patient told me that we should each drink half of our body weight in ounces of water each day. So that means the bigger you are, the more water you need. In my case, that is 163 ounces of water a day. I am going to make it my goal to drink that much every day (and hopefully adjust accordingly as my weight goes down).
4. I did not have a scale, so I bought a digital one online that arrived last week. I will weigh in once a week (which is required on ediets anyway). I will also measure myself in a few key places so that I can track inches lost as well as pounds.
5. I am going to remember that weight loss will more than likely be AGONIZINGLY slow for me, and that its okay to go slow just as long as the numbers go DOWN slowly instead of UP.
6. I am going to join every thread I have seen here on WISH that speaks to me, hoping to receive encouragement, support and inspiration from others and give some back as well.
7. I am going to use this journal as a tool to help me figure out myself and how I can successfully fight back against this monstrous amount of weight that I carry around every day. I am tired of it. I am ready to get rid of it. I am not looking for perfection, I just want to feel better and be able to move around and sit in a chair like a normal person without it being such an effort. PLEASE HELP ME HELP MYSELF!!!
To those of you who have read all of this (I truly didnt mean to write a book, it just came out that way), thank you SO MUCH for your time. Your comments and suggestions are more than welcome I will treasure each and every post that anyone chooses to make to my journal because I know that it means you care enough to take the time to offer your compassion and kindness to someone else who desperately needs it. Thank you again I hope each of you has a lovely day!
.
You *ARE* inspiring girl 
i just weighed in and i lost 4 pounds this week!! i am so excited! i worked hard! and made good choices all week(well, except for 2 beers!!hehe!)buts thats ok. have a good day remember stay focused![/quote]
i am not awake yet!
I'm going to try to do 35 minutes of walk/running tonight again too.
, you poor thing! Are you ok? Just make sure that you aren't seriously injured and DEFINITELY just do a light workout today.
