I am posting this so that I will shame myself publicly if I do not make some progress toward my weight loss goal. Somehow, the balance board knowing it and reminding me of it just doesn't motivate me too much. It is really hard for me to lose weight. I know how to diet so that I lose, but if I do so, I get severe cramps in my feet and nearly died snorkeling in Kauai because of it. Had to be thin for my one and only ever trip there, and it was nearly my last trip anywhere. I know it was a good healthy diet, but I didn't eat enough of it so I could lose. This time I am taking thyroid and B vitamins to help, but I also have to diet. I am not a lazy dieter, but somehow it always seems like I can cheat just once, and my thyroid doesn't do much of it's job and previously I was not getting much exercise. Two part time sit down jobs and some nonphysical volunteer work... So now I have the Wii

As of today, my weight is 147 lb. They say my ideal weight is 125. In the winter I can hide the fat pretty well under clothing, but by summer I want to be downright thin (thin lab rats live longer.)

I know that my love for the Wii will keep me motivated to exercise. So it's a balancing act between eating enough to be well and little enough to lose weight. And avoiding unsprouted wheat, in my case. I love crusty bread; the kind you rip off a chunk and butter it up. And the European bakery near my job sells it warm out of the oven oh yum. But any day that I eat unsprouted wheat I can be guaranteed to gain a pound.

Now you know, and I need you to check up on me! Pretty please. Help me take off about 5 pounds a month, starting today. Even through the winter. No excuses. By mid-April I should be where I want to be at that rate. TIA!

Today I got up and weighed in down one pound. Nothing to write home about, and it could be fluctuation, but I did deserve it having started the Fit for Life program yesterday. That is a great diet that I have done before. You can eat plenty of foods that you like, including carbs; ask if you want information about it. Thanks for your support!

Gratz on the first of many pounds to be lost

I also have a thing for bread. Love it, but I do not love rolls it leave on my body. So the bread in our house goes stale(I think it is the word for it - my mother language is Afrikaans, so my English sucks) lately.

Good luck on the next goal.

Well done, it's a pound in the right direction !

Good luck with your fit for life program, could you give me a link or PM me with some info please ? I know I am avoiding 'diets' but this sounds more like a lifestyle type thing. I've probably seen it or read about it somewhere but just out of curiousity.

Good luck ! will be back to pester you !

(Adlez, stale is quite correct ! ).

Thanks both of you for supporting my efforts. It really will help to know that someone is watching.

I did eat plenty yesterday and did not regain the pound.

Adlez, your English is perfect; you even have the slang. Good job. I'd have never known it was not your native tongue.

Alexa, I really think you will like the Fit for Life. And it really works; at least it did for us (along with getting some exercise, which I know you ae doing.) I will see what I can find on the net. You may want to have the book around if it is not on the net. It has charts of the carb and protein foods as I recall, and we used to look at it to see what we could eat together when it got confusing. I'll get back to you!

My netbook just deleted all my work in replying to your question! Grrr.

To reply in short, there are many articles on the net, but none that I found goes into detail. They critique the plan, some for and some against. The official site is said to require an expensive membership to help set up your program, so I doubt it makes the details available.

EBay has a 1985 edition (which is what we used back in the day) for only $0.92 starting price; that auction ends in 10 hours. There are newer editions available, but I am just going with what I learned from our book. The new ones do sound more complicated, which may be good or bad.

The sites say that dairy products are taboo. I don't remember that and last night had a slab of cheese with dinner, counting it as a protein (even though cheese is more fat than protein). I'll keep that in mind, but I choose good cheeses and may eat them if my weight goes off easily enough.

Also, you are not supposed to drink with meals to aid digestion.

Remember, a bonus on this diet is increased energy! We should have a Fit for Life thread on the Diet and Lifestyle section. Think I'll start one.

I am thrilled! I am down to 145.5 lbs., which is 1.5 pounds down from my start a few days ago. The great thing is that I have been filling my tummy and enjoying my food very much.

Yesterday we had a long day away from home, and I thought I would gain weight. I had two slices of toast with butter and peanut butter. I thought about having just one, but I knew I could not get near food again until after one, so I decided to eat hearty. Then at one, we looked for a place to get maybe a salad, and the only place we found was a Subway. Once inside, I could not resist the temptation to eat a sandwich. So I ordered their veggie delight (which is the equivalent to the Fit for Life Goodwich.) Even thought the bread was not sprouted wheat, which is my own personal choice at home. I skipped the cheese they offer since I was eating bread, took some jalapenos for spice, and did the chipotle sauce and some olive oil on the veggies. I ordered the foot long, thinking I'd save half for the ride home late in the day. But when I finished the first half, it was so delicious that I went ahead with the rest of it. I was sure by now that I was putting on weight, but my tummy felt good from the lack of mixing proteins and carbs. When we got home that night I ate a bowl of the Black Bean soup I'd made the night before. I even added some of the Nancy's Sour Cream (have you tried it, it is the best! And two tablespoons is only 80 calories.) We sat down to watch a movie, and feeling that I'd already blown it for the day, I brought the chocolate raisins and ate all I wanted with a cup of coffee.

This morning I weighed in, thinking I'd be up to 148 or so. I was 145.5 and so surprised! But it made me remember how easy it was to lose weight on the Fit for Life and wonder how I could have forgotten.

One reason I was sure I'd gain was that eating fruit is so very helpful in losing. I didn't eat fruit yesterday because I came to realize that fruit is the culprit behind my foot cramps. I ate fruit the first full day of getting back on this diet; I ate a pear and an apple in the morning, and then the cramps hit, just like when I was dieting for Hawaii. Back then I had eaten only fruit in the morning, a hold-over principle from Fit for Life. At that time I did not connect my diet to the cramps. A couple of years later I started to diet again, and got the cramps. Then I thought that probably I wasn't eating enough food and gave up dieting. I also added some minerals to my diet, thinking that I needed more electrolytes. One thing I noticed for sure was that when I took Potassium, the cramps got severely worse instead of better! That was a shock. I didn't really understand that until this week, when I ate fruit for breakfast and got the cramps again. My homeopathic constitution is Kali Carb. I have to take that for symptoms relating to the very early stages of Congestive Heart Failure. The Kali part of that mix is Potassium. A dose of homepathic potassium actually removes potassium from the body, just as homeopathich Sulphur removes excess sulphur from the body, etc. So I began to realize the other day that my body has some kind of bad relationship with potassium, possibly an excess of it. Don't process it right, can't expel it or something. Therefore, more potassium, from fruit, gives me the cramps. When I realized that, I thought that perhaps now, some years from our first success with Fit for Life, I wouldn't be able to lose on it, not being able to eat the fruit in that amount. But I decided to stick with the other principles anyway, since it makes me feel better and therefore realize that the Carb/Protein mix really is harder to digest. And I lost weight despite eating toast and peanut butter yesterday! (It was sprouted wheat, which is a vegetable and despite having some carbs, can be used as a veggie.) Some days I will eat just an omelet without bread. I will be happy enough with avocado, onions and salsa.....

Yay! Today I am down to 144.5! That is down 2.5 lb. since I started the Fit for Life, what, a week ago or less. I would say that could be a quirk, but it happened this way consistently in the past when I tried it. And this is despite my variation on the diet. It really is a great diet for people who like to eat, for people who like good nutrition, and for anyone with digestive problems.

Grats

All it takes is a real effort and it pays off.

Keep us up to date

Well, I'm down 4 pounds now, which I think is ok under the circumstances. Better than gaining!