Hi Donna,
Whatever you do, don't use me as a benchmark to compare weight loss. I am an oddity in that when I try to lose weight, it comes off very quickly. I certainly do not want to be the cause of any frustration on your part because of my weight loss during my first week.
Let me give you some background. I have always been very active in the past and am generally very solid with a lot of muscle. I am 57 years old, and untill last year (when I blew my knee out) I still played softball and other sports with much younger people (next oldest person on the team was 35). Because of the knee and later a back injury, I was not able to do the same type of activity which kept me trim in the past.
I always ate a lot at every meal and the lack of activity caused me to get a big belly. That is the only place that I ever gain weight. This growth caused me to rush out and get a new suit for a wedding two weeks ago because I could not button the pants on any of the dozen suits I already owned. This was the last straw for me and when Heidi (my wife) decided to start Medifast, I decided to do it along with her.
I am 6 feet tall and look my best when I am around 215 pounds. Muscle weighs more than fat, so at that weight people never guess me as weighing over 200 pounds. I once went down to 190 and people kept asking me if I was sick.
Anyhow, I had balooned up to almost 245 pounds, carrying the extra weight up front and getting into that "belt buckle pointing down at the ground" thing which is uncomfortable and does not look good. I hate it if my stomach sticks out further than my chest.
I did not do the 5 and 1 plan, choosing rather to go for the full program along with Heidi. Muscle tends to burn calories so that helped also.
I hope this background helps you to see that my weight loss for the first week is not the norm and that each person will lose at a different rate depending on many different factors (including our gene pool).
To me, any loss is a success so I consider you to be successful and you should consider the past week a personal success as well. I fully expect my weight loss in the coming week to be less than the first week even though I will faithfully stick to the plan. If I lose anything at all, I will be happy because a loss is a loss and it means I am heading in the right direction.............just as you are!