The MakeMeThinner Support Forum

[Chubissima]

You can just call me Lisa.

This is a super long first journal post! Make yourself a cup of tea and settle into a comfy chair, haha!

Right now I'm at 208 pounds (I'm 5'8"), which is 66 pounds over my ideal weight of 142. But when I look at myself, yeah, I can see I'm overweight but not THAT much! I don't know where it's all hiding... I'm not exactly endowed in the chest area.

For too long I've fooled myself into thinking I don't have a weight problem because I don't look terribly overweight (and my near-and-dear-ones insist that I look great). Chubby, yes. Obese, no. However, I definitely do have a problem:

- Lately I've noticed that I FEEL heavy.
- Shifting in my chair is more difficult than it should be.
- My feet hurt if I spend too much time standing up.
- My love life is totally stalled because of logistical challenges associated with it, ya know. That, and I just don't feel like it. Snuggling is great, but anything beyond that just seems like too much effort. How sad is that?
- Things are just in the way. And by things, I mean my blob belly. I don't even know where it came from - it's massive! It reminds me of a baby's diaper that is way overdue for a changing. Does that make sense? Big and bulky and awkwardly hangy. I can't do yoga because my belly is in the way!
- My knees hurt! My right knee is starting to give out.
- Laziness!!!! I was a VERY active & athletic kid. That part of me is still there, but for the most part I'm just lazy. I have no get-up-and-go. When I DO get up and go, I always overdo it and hurt myself because my stamina is actually pretty good but I'm just TOO HEAVY to safely do all the stuff I want to do.
- I frequently run into things with my hips or my bum. It's embarrassing, really.
- My sweet daughters often make comments like "you're fat, Mommy", or, "wow, your butt is BIG!!!!". They don't say it with so much as a hint of meanness - they just make observations.

I've tried diets, exercise, calorie counting, and sheer willpower. None of that worked. I've developed a hate-love relationship with food. I say "hate-love" because I HATE the fact that I love food so much. Hate it SO much that grocery shopping and cooking have become huge chores for me. I don't know what to buy at the store anymore, because no matter what I get (super healthy or super UNhealthy) I'm going to mess up and gain weight. I'll get motivated and go on a healthy diet binge - lots of egg whites & veggies & lean meats & whole grains - followed by a junk binge - ice cream and cookies and fried things. So, I have come to look upon food as my enemy, and yet I get ridiculous compulsions to eat eat EAT! Portion control is a joke. I knew I'd lost my mind the other day when I was shoveling sweetened condensed milk into my coffee!

THAT'S IT! No more food for me! But I can't very well go on a starvation diet, so I'm very happy I found Medifast! I didn't even know about it until one day when I was online reading reviews of another diet food system (which shall remain nameless, though it's a fairly popular one). Medifast seems PERFECT for me! I won't have to think about food at all!

There are going to be challenges. My fiance works out of the country a month at a time, then is home a month at a time. Food has always been one of our favorite activities - cooking, eating, and ending the meal with a nice glass (or 3) of scotch. He always gets a little bummed out when I'm dieting, then I feel bad that he's feeling bad, so I cave in and allow myself to eat "just a little" of his amazing cooking. Then it becomes far too easy to justify eating "just a little" of it everyday. BUT! If all the amazing stories I've read here and on other sites are true, I'll lost weight so quickly that I won't have to deal with that problem much. If it takes me 4 or 5 months to lose the 66 pounds, he'll be gone half the time. When he IS home, he'll be so blown away by how much weight I'd lost in his absence that he shouldn't pout too much

I don't actually have my stuff yet.



So I'm not officially ON the program. I'm just hanging out, waiting, trying not to be a poser.

OH! I should mention that I accidentally dyed my hair bright pink a couple years back (hence my avatar). I was going for a sexy and mysterious deep red, but that doesn't really work on very bleached blonde hair. I've learned to be much nicer to my hair

[sidrah]

Hi Lisa, Nice to meet you. You are right about how good he will feel about the changes he sees, but you will fell good, too. How old are your daughters? home from school for the summer, yet?

Long posts are fun to read, so have no worries about that.

Check back often and have a great day.

[Chubissima]

Thanks, Sidrah It's great to meet you! Where in AZ are you? I lived in AZ many years in my youth - Lake Havasu, Bullhead, Camp Verde, Phoenix (briefly) and Chinle (on the Navajo Reservation).

Long posts are fun to write, too!

My girls are 6 (Gabi) and 9 (Monique). This is their last week of school! Seems like they're getting out awfully late. I go to the University of Utah, and we were done the first week of May! Gabi is just finishing up kindergarten, and Monique 3rd grade. They're so funny when they make their little comments about my size; it's as though they never noticed it before, haha!

I did Atkins before, after Monique was born. I lost weight SO fast! And I kept it off fine 'til I became pregnant with Gabi. I gained a LOT of weight with that girl... but I digress. Losing weight quickly (and SAFELY) is such a huge motivator. I can't WAIT to start! I check on my order every day to see if it's shipped. Waiting is torture...

My fiance (R) & I are heading up to Toronto in a couple weeks to visit family. Assuming my food has arrived by then, it will be a huge test for me. I don't know if you're familiar with a place called Tim Horton's, but they're only in Canada (that I know of). Every time we go we always stop for Timbits (donut holes) and coffee. That'll be a tough one to resist for sure!

[Tawanda]

Welcome!

[sidrah]

Wow. 2 at home and going to school, too. Very cool. Yeah, depending on when you get your package and how into it you are, it might be easier or harder to resist. Once you get going, it really is simple, but the getting going is the toughest part along with the first few days or so.

All it takes is saying, "No thanks," which is easier said than done. But, you know all that. Never heard of Tim Horton, but I know his evil cousins Dunkin and Donut.

I am in Chandler and I teach in Coolidge, so I have teacher friends that have worked in Chinle. I'm from NY, just finishing up a doctorate program here and probably moving out next year. Not a fan of AZ. You sound like you got around a lot to different areas. It's not so much the weather as it is the slow pace that I just can't deal with. My parents moved out here about 8 years ago and I came out with them. My mom got sick and laid the guilt trip on about "coming back for my funeral" but I wouldn't have left anyway even without it. She died 3 years ago on Easter so I am not really held here by anything other than the fact that I put waaaay too much money into the degree to not finish it. I kind of pooped out and had no desire to finish it after someone commented, quite sarcastically, that it was too bad my mom died and didn't get to go to my graduation. That kind of made me mad and I stupidly just stopped caring about it at all. So, I have 2 brothers that are in AZ still and 1 living in CA, so I am most likely heading out to CA after this next school year is over. Which brings us back to where we are going with all this. I want to go there and start fresh and not worry about weight on top of everything else.

There are some recipes that might help you for a trip, but so many people pack and eat well out on the road that it is more than easy to do it and do it well. Wishing you luck and any advice or help I can offer!!

[Karli]

Welcome, Lisa ! Good to see you and I will be looking forward to you getting your stuff and being able to start ! Cheers !

[Chubissima]

Thanks, Karli!

[Chubissima]

OMG.

I was just in the process of typing up a ranty post about how my stuff isn't here yet, when there was a knock on my door.

MY STUFF IS HERE!!!!!



I'm going to open the box & check out what I got. Oh happy day!!!!!

[Karli]

WOOT !

[Chubissima]

Man. That's a LOT of food. I did the free extra week (signed up for auto-renewal), so I have many many boxes. I did the variety pack, so I've got a little bit of everything. Where to start?! I just had a salad a few minutes ago, so I guess I'll have to wait a couple hours to actually try anything.



This is so, so, so cool. I can't wait to get started. I suppose tomorrow will officially be my first day.

[Karli]

Yeah, tomorrow will be your official first day, but if you eat MF for the rest of the day today, as it would normally be, I bet you will still lose some weight by tomorrow, as well as start your mind to be getting into the groove -- but if you DO do that, and you haven't had much protein to go with your green, I would add some protein. Congrats !

[Chubissima]

Thanks for the advice, Karli! I do plan on doing MF for the rest of the day. I have enough time for 2 or 3, I think. For dinner, I'm going to have a chicken drumstick or two (skinless, of course) and some zucchini. I've been doing, umm, "other" meal replacement shakes for a couple of days, to get myself into the habit of not eating much.

I just cleared out an entire cupboard & put away all my MF stuff. I dumped ALL the shakes (I forget how many boxes) into one big box, all the bars into a smaller box, then left the soups / puddins / oatmeals & scrambled eggs in their boxes. The hardest part is going to be choosing what to have every day! So many options, it boggles the mind.

This is going to be so perfect for me. The last time I'd lost a ton of weight, I ate pretty much the same thing every day - chicken & veggies. I think I was also having egg white veggie omelets for breakfast. I seem to do better when I don't have to think about food or plan menus. I'm already in the habit of drinking lots of water & green tea every day.

I love tea - I have probably 10 different varieties of tea in my cupboard! White earl gray, coconut green, pineapple green (not my fave), cherry rose green, green gunpowder, cloud mountain white, regular old black tea bags, pu erh, gen mai cha (toasted rice & green tea), english breakfast, peach flavored black tea, lavender rooibos (also not my fave). Tea is fabulous. I'm going to go make some right now!



**NOTE: caramel crunch bar I always worry about funky aftertaste with meal replacement bars, but this didn't have it. And it wasn't too sweet.

[Chubissima]

I'm going to (try to) post my food every day. I've found that this helps keep me from cheating

I got my MF shipment this afternoon, so I didn't have a full day on it. Here's what I did have today:

- 2 "other" meal replacement shakes
- Salad w/ homemade vinaigrette (olive oil, lemon juice & Braggs aminos), a few slices of beets and a dash of sunflower seed kernels
- 1 caramel crunch bar
- Dinner @ Outback (seared ahi appetizer & a side of veggies)
- 1 choc mint crunch bar
- Lots of water & tea, of course!

I think I'm done eating for the day. I'm not hungry at all, and I'm REALLY tired.

****WEIGHT****

Since I already sorta started MF today, I'll use this morning's weight as my starting weight: 201.5

It was 208 the other day. I don't know where the other 6.5 pounds went. Maybe it got scared of Medifast & ran away on its own?

[sidrah]

Yay. Glad the things got to you. I agree. Good plan on posting what you had. When I am out I keep it on my phone and just transcribe later on. Sometimes, days start to run into each other and this way you can always backtrack and see what happened when and look for patterns.

I'm glad you're on your way

[Chubissima]

Thanks, Teresa!

I stayed up later than I meant to last night, and got a case of the tummy grumbles, so I made myself an orange creme shake. Surprisingly good, for being mixed with water! This morning I had a banana creme shake for breakfast. Think I'll whip up a pouch of scrambled eggs for breakfast #2

One pound down already! I know, I know, I shouldn't get addicted to the scale but I was curious to see what half a day on medifast would do