Good job Sharon! Wow, 30 lbs that's lots, do you have a goal in mind? I have always been skeptical of Atkins - I have a philosophy of not eating more calories than you use in a day, and just not being stupid about food. I think that's the basis of WW. Nothing too gimmiky.

I've always been fairly slim naturally but it takes a little more maintenance now that I am getting close to 30. That and I'm going to a fancy new gym they just built by my house, and everyone there looks like they play high school volleyball... so I have to keep up with the Joneses as usual. LOL

BTW Sharon I think WW gives you a few extra points for digging the garden!

Sharon that is great! Have you celebrated by buying a new wardrobe? I'm trying to up my exercise program at the moment. I gained 30# since just before Christmas from a drug that I was on. So far I've lost 7# of what I had gained, I'm hoping it comes off as easy as it went on. If I keep snow-shoeing every day for two hours it should be gone in no time!

Syreeta

Great, Sharon! My daughter is on WW, and she did really well with it. I did too a long time ago, but what i lost and more crept back on over the years. No willpower anymore, for some reason. We got an exercise bike, and i try to get on that every day, but diet should go along with exercise, and that's tough for me - sheer laziness, i admit!

My doctor told me that gardening is an "activity" not exercise. Hah! Tell that to the wheelbarrows full of dirt i push around, and to all the digging and crawling around weeding! Maybe i should invite him over... :)

Hah - my doctor is about 75# or more overweight and he told me the same thing, Marcia. I asked him if he ever gardens. He just smiled and told me he goes curling once a week. This, while he is telling me that my cholesterol is too high and I still have to lose another 30 lbs. I already lost 38# two years ago. I started on Atkins but he switched me to the Heart Smart Diet. Anyone have a copy of it? I can't find mine and I need to get onto it again. I did find that I ate lots and still lost weight because I was eating the "right" things. And I didn't give up chocolate!

Shauna

My doctor is disgustingly fit. His wife is slim and beautiful and so are his kids. Terrible. :>

Maybe there's a copy of the diet on the web, Shauna? I don't know how my cholesterol is (no one mentions it and i don't ask), but i do have high blood pressure and losing weight would help that. I really wonder why i have no willpower anymore. I lost a bunch of weight in high school and had all the willpower in the world then. Maybe i used it all up?

Coincidental that you started this thread, Sharon. I just went looking on the web a couple of nights ago for a copy of it but I can't seem to find it. Of course, I find a large amount of sites that want some sort of $$/membership to access their diets. But, the HS diet should be free with either the Cdn. or the Am. Heart Society. They don't seem to have it anymore. I'll have to ask Doc about it next time I see him. Oh, drat, that means I have to get my cholesterol checked again. Bad news.

Shauna

Shauna, i googled "Heart Smart diet" and got a bunch of things, mostly general. Maybe if you dug around enough, you might find a copy of the diet. Then you could follow it for awhile before getting your cholesterol checked again! I've done that - one of the blood pressure pills i have to take is divided, half in the morning, half in the evening. So i try to get an appointment late in the day (after work - good excuse) and make sure i take the second half of the pill before i go. Works!

(((sigh)) Diet. That word has been in my vocabulary since I was about 13 - the classic lifelong struggle. I battle genetics more than anything, thanks to my short & stocky Polish/Ukrainian grandmother - tie a babushka on my head and I'm the spitting image.

I joined WW some 20 years ago and after a year and a bit lost 60 pounds and got lifetime membership. I've managed to keep about half of that off. When I think it's time to lose a few pounds, I still go back to the old WW diet which is low on fat and carbs, medium on protein and fruit and high in vegetables. I try to throw low sodium into the mix, too.

I kind of made it my new years resolution this year to cook healthier meals. DH, the guy who could eat anything and never gain a pound, put on a few pounds too, and has high BP. There's been a whole lot of fish, chicken, whole grains and vegetables getting cooked up, and as a result I've lost 10 pounds since Christmas. DH has dropped a few, too.

I tried Atkins once and had a scary night one night with extreme weakness in my muscles and my heart pounding really hard. I wasn't taking a multi vitamin (as recommended) nor extra potassium so I was kind of running on a potassium deficiency. Not fun. Anyone who's doing Atkins, make sure you take that extra potassium to help out your heart - a pretty important muscle!

The only exercise I do besides garden is walk. When the weather is decent there's nothing better than a good long walk. My canine girlies appreciate it, too, although the older one is having a tough time with the longer walks now.

I think the doctors who think gardening is an 'activity' are looking at too many of those gardening ladies in magazines, with the pretty flowered sundress and sparkling white gloves and sunhat, gracefully leaning over to snip a rose. Yeah right.

Oh Pudge, Baba!

Thanks for the compliments gals, I need to lose an additional 15 pounds to reach my goal, 20 would be even greater ;)

Atkins educated me a lot of how many empty carbs I was eating and not to be afraid of the good fats. My weakness is the breads and sugar, IÂm one of those persons who canÂt be fulfilled eating just one donut, I get that rollercoast rush followed by the big crash, therefore I go back and eat another one and another one and another one.

My physical exercise is my job; I must walk 5-8 miles in an 8 hour shift, lots of bending and lifting as well. I know the exercise gurus donÂt consider this exercise as well but at least IÂm burning up the calories ;)

I too like my walking; I take Maisy our dog out every other day for 30-45mins out on the country roads, not only is it good exercise but it relieves so much stress from my hectic job. If itÂs too cold I will use the boring treadmill. A couple of years ago I used to work out with weights every other day too, have a whole gym downstairs but always find some excuse not to get down there. I really need to dust off those weights and get back into that groove ;)

Shauna, Heart Smart, is that the guys that put those red check marks on healthy food labels? I'll see if they have any brochures at work for you.

Best wishes and good health to all!
Sharon

I really think any exercise is good exercise. A good example is a close friend of mine, who is quite overweight. She used to work at Burger King, where she was allowed to eat all the food and drink all the pop she wanted, but since she was on her feet all the time didn't really gain weight. Although she was already overweight at this point. But then she got an office job and just ballooned, at least 50 lbs in a year and probably more but I didn't ask. Gosh I hope she never reads this forum :-0 Not that I am trying to be mean. I think what the gurus have against constant light exercise is that it makes a difference in burned calories but not so much in cardiovascular health.

Sharon, that would be great. That's the one. Very strange that all I seem to find with reference to the "Heart Smart" diet when I google are all $$diet services. I even checked the Can. and Am. societies websites. And I googled about 10 pages. No luck.

But, Pudge, isn't that all of us you are describing? At least in the bubble I live in, that's what we're like. LOL

I really need to start trying to get more exercise. I've started doing leg lifts (on my waterbed) because they help to keep the muscle cramps at bay in my bad leg and keeps the muscles stretched. And, does this count? I stare at my exercise bike in my family room everyday as I hang my husband's shirts on it. Seriously though, I have noticed a lot more booming thumps going on in my chest this winter and I don't like it at all. And I eat quite a few bananas, which are really high in potassium. You are right, Pudge, the potassium is a must.

Shauna

Shauna, have you gone to this site yet?
I noticed that they have a contact link, maybe write to them and ask if they can send you a brochure?

Went to work today and couldn't find any brochures in the dietary dept. Sorry.

Sharon

Here is a link that might be useful: Health Check

Ugh...did you have to bring up this? ; > (Way to go though Sharon)

Best weight loss program I've ever been on was pregnancy...I had morning sickness (morning...yeah right) for all 9 months...between not being able to keep anything down and constantly running to the BR...I lost 30 Lbs...(and I was eating iceceam for breakfast every day). Unfortunantly, after I had the little guy everything tasted so good I put it all back on, and they brought a few friends... : p

I'm bad when it comes to diet...trying to work on that for the sake of ds. DH is a meat and potatoes kind of guy, but his taste for veggies is kinda limited...and I'm just as happy to eat a big juicy steak and a loaded stuffed potato, and forget the Canada food guide...LOL.

Also bad when it comes to working out...really bad, since I have almost a complete gym in my basement (DH used to be a 'meathead' (in the nicest way possible LOL) ten or so years ago, and used to workout 3+ hours/day on top of a very physically demanding job...FREAK...LOL ; >

Guess I better get on that...maybe I'll just get pregnant again...LOL "Oh Hubby..." ; >

Verena

I blame most of my weight gain on pregnancy. Works out great. I pat my stomach and say, this is the 20 lbs i was overweight to begin with. Each hip and the rear end is another pregnancy - there ya go, explains everything! Actually, since i was already overweight, i made sure i didn't gain a lot during pregnancy. Trouble is, i never lost any of it. And it's harder to do as you get older. So all you spring chickens out there - make sure you lose the weight now!

Here's a quick quiz from WW...

Nutrition Folklore

1. Eating carrots will make your eyesight better.
True
False

2. Fresh fruits and vegetable are always smarter choices than frozen or canned.
True
False

3. Honey is healthier than sugar.
True
False

4. Spinach is an excellent source of iron for folks who donÂt eat meat.
True
False

No cheating by googling either ;)
Sharon

Thanks, Sharon, for checking for me. I had contacted the Cdn. Heart/Stroke Found. on Fri. and they got back to me today. They do not endorse any diet and recommend following the Canada Food Guide. When I asked specifically about the Heart Smart Diet, I was told that there is a company that makes it look like they recommend it but they do not. Hmmmmm......that's probably gone to the lawyers already.

I like to say that my excess weight came from having my last two boys 13 months apart and I hadn't lost my "baby" fat from the first one before I started the pregnancy weight again. Not quite true, though. 15 years later, it is really just alot of unhealthy eating and extra snacking on ice cream and soft drinks.

BTW, my answers to the above are that they are all true.

Shauna

Well without googling I'm going to say the answers are all at least partially false.

1) A deficiency of Vitamin A damages eyesight but carrots don't actually improve it.

2) Frozen vegetables are as good as fresh.

3) Not for me! I'm allergic to some pollens and honey makes my mouth swell.

4) Spinach is a reasonable source of iron but apparently there was a laboratory error that caused the entire world to believe that spinach is full of iron and it's not.

So what are the answers Sharon?

1. Eating carrots will make your eyesight better.
False. Like other deep orange veggies, carrots are chock-full of beta-carotene, a nutrient that transforms into vitamin A, which is necessary for healthy eyes. But neither beta-carotene nor vitamin A clear up existing vision problems. Besides, most people -including those who wear glasses - have no trouble getting the amount of A their eyes need, says Althea Zanecosky, R.D.

2. Fresh fruits and vegetable are always smarter choices than frozen or canned.
False. Produce that's put on ice after being picked hangs on to most of its nutrients, and keeps them when the food is thawed. Meanwhile, fresh varieties that travel to a grocer and then to your fridge may lose vitamins to heat, light and water along the way. Canned items are also nutritionally sound, and they won't rot or get freezer burn. Processing does remove certain vitamins, such as vitamin C, and adds sodium (in veggies) and sugar (in fruit syrup) - but sometimes, even that's nearly a nonissue. "If you're making a stew or soup that requires lengthy cooking, which would destroy some nutrients in fresh or frozen veggies anyway, go for canned - it's cheaper," says Zanecosky.

3. Honey is healthier than sugar.
False. The smooth brown liquid is made by bees, the shiny white grains come from a refinery -- but they're chemical look-alikes that are, simply, sugar. The small amounts of minerals in honey aren't enough to offer a nutritional advantage. In fact, when served by the spoonful, honey actually has more calories than table sugar does - but because honey's sweeter, you might use less. "Researchers are looking into honey's antibacterial qualities for topical use, but it's still no health food," says Zanecosky.

4. Spinach is an excellent source of iron for folks who don't eat meat.
False. Sure, nutrition charts give half a cup of spinach an impressive 3.2 milligrams (mg) of iron - even more than 3 ounces of sirloin steak (2.9 mg). But spinach's plant form of iron, called non-heme, isn't absorbed well by the human body - only a scant 2 to 20 percent of the mineral makes it into the bloodstream ("heme" iron is carried in animal tissue and better absorbed by the human body). Even more discouraging: Spinach also contains a substance called oxalic acid, which further inhibits absorption. "It's a double whammy," says Zanecosky. Ready for some good news? Vitamin C enhances non-heme iron absorption, so you'll get more of the mineral by tossing orange segments into your spinach salad or by eating the greens cooked in a dish with tomato sauce.

whoo-hoo 4 for 4 on that quiz!

Diet and exercise? I can tell you for certain that exercise is the biggest factor. When I lived in downtown Ottawa for a few years I walked everywhere because I didn't have a car and taking the bus to go a few blocks wasn't worth it for me. By the time the bus would arrive at that bus stop I could have walked that distance at least 2x, you know what I mean? Anyways, I lost alot of weight and the lady that I was boarding with was freaking out at me that I wasn't eatting, etc. Truth was that my bf & I were having beer and pizza just about every night and would never think twice about going for icecream. So, yes, I was eatting! LOL

Now that I've been a SAHM for the past 10 years I can sure see the weight gain [basically 10# for each baby I've had - LOL] and I try really hard to eat well, etc. I go for walks with my oldest DD as often as possible and have an excerise bike and a tread mill at home. OOOPPS, they are NOT for hanging laundry on???!! LOL! When I do use them regularly I can see and feel a difference but then 'life' gets in the way and I get out of the routine of going on them..... grrrrr.

Ang
***who is looking at the tread mill thinking, yeah I should get on there***

*Shocked* You mean my weight bench isn't meant to be a clothes rod for winter jackets?? LOL

I hear you though, I worked at a meat packing plant for a year and was in the best shape of my life...nothing like slinging 20-80Lb boxes of meat 9 hours a day, 5 days a week to keep a girl fit. Then I did 3 years behind a desk and now SAHM for a year... Poor DH, we met at the mp plant, he thought he was getting "some-young-thing"...but I've been going down hill fast ever since... : P

Verena
***whose thinking it's time to go downstairs and use that leg press...and do some crunches...and some lunges and squats...(thunder-thighs, anyone? I have a pair that could use a new home... ;-p) ***

I hope this isn't Disney-worthy and that nobody's offended but...

The difference between a girlfriend and a wife?
45 pounds.

The difference between a boyfriend and a husband?
45 minutes.

45 minutes of what? I'm afraid I have no idea. Hope someone else knows. ;-)

LOL

45 minutes...

Depends on who wrote the joke...

My guess - the ammount of time for the average wedding ceremony - men don't change... ;-)

Hah. I couldn't stay awake that long now! Come to think of it, neither could dh! :>

"The difference between a boyfriend and a husband?
45 minutes."

I remember them good ol' days ;)

Here's an eye opener!

{{gwi:691455}}

I've lost 6 of those ;) Gross!

Sharon

Is that you, you skinny witch? :>

Yeah you skinny witch you're skinnier than me! LOL What kind of fat is that? It looks delicious! The brick looks like the fat free onion crackers DH bought me from Superstore.

Heck no, thats not me, I have a voluptuous bod than that! LOL!

Gil, you crazy nut! Are you one of those person who love to eat meat fat, my mother is like that!

Sharon

That fat looks fake and is way too yellow.

Skinny witch, ha ha ha, Marcia you are hilarious.

I thought the fat looked like the fat on top of a can of chicken noodle soup. But no, I don't eat fat that's gross. I was just being silly.

Well, I like a good marbled steak so I am not in the fat is evil camp. I haven't had a can of chicken noodle soup in ages, but come to think of it, it looks a lot more like chicken fat in colour but you would never get that chunk off a chicken LOL!

Fat isn't evil - you need fat for fuel for your body. The way i look at it, i should be able to fly! LOL

LOL...Me TOO!! I tell DH that the extra padding around my middle is just a full tank o' gas on a sex machine. (Maybe that's why I'm friskie all the time...) 45 minutes...no wonder I didn't get that joke...Sorry ladies...ONLY 45??? (Guess we're still in the honeymoon phase...) ; >

Hi,

I hope you can help and that you can allay my fears that weird things are going on. I am a major fan of the Atkins diet and managed to shed 28lbs, 2 years ago, on it and have kept it off. I am now 159lbs and went on the Atkins again about 8-10 weeks ago as I was starting to feel suffocated by my extra weight. slowly, I managed to lose 6.25lbs, but more importantly 10 inches. I had a bit of a bad spell when my Boyfriend had his Birthday, but I got straight back to it and have been feeling slimmer than ever. However, I weighed myself this morning and I have put on 3.25 of the 6.25lbs I lost (not all in one go, the last time I weighed I had put some on), but I have lost another 1.5 inches, making my total inch loss 11.5. How can I be losing inches, but not weight and actually putting it on? I am desperate to be around 140lbs as I am only 5'2".

If any of you have any help, advice or reassurance, please may I have it?

Thanks

You know Nina, I always say get rid of the monster scale, if you're losing inches and feeling great that is more important than a stupid metal thing with numbers on it.

Here are some reasons....

Congratulations on your weight loss!

Here is a link that might be useful: Why the scale lies...

Sharon, i've been doing the weighing at TOPS all summer so now i can tell everyone the scale is lying! LOL I've printed that article to bring to the next meeting.

Actually, since this thread was started, i've lost between 20 and 25 lbs, depending on the week. I've had a bad August! :( But then, so have many of us - twice this month we've had a net gain, and that only happened once all winter. I've been trying to eat better - cut down on junk (chips, peanut butter SOB), and i've actually been using the exercise bike almost daily since November. My initial goal i thought would be easy, a pound a week. Turns out it isn't easy at all, for me, anyway. Some people have lost almost 40 lbs since we started in November! It's a start, though, and this time i'm determined to lose and keep it off, even if it takes a couple of years!

Oh wow Marcia, that is great to hear, weigh to go!

Myself, I've been very bad all summer long, I can tell my jeans are tight. Oh well, fall and winter is around the corner to get back on track.

Sharon

We were talking about that at the meeting last night, Sharon, how we thought it would be easier to lose weight in the summer but most of us are finding that it isn't. So many gatherings, family and friends, bbqs, that sort of thing - not condusive to weight loss! Someone else pointed out that in September things become more structured with kids heading back to school and clubs and activities starting up again. We've got a challenge from the head offices at TOPS - for everyone in each club to lose at least 5 lbs by Christmas. That shouldn't be too hard, eh? (if that statement comes back to bite me in the butt, i hope it takes a BIG chunk! LOL)

I just read that last post i made about losing 5 lbs before Christmas and how i hoped it would take a big chunk out of my butt! LOL It didn't happen - the 5 lbs or it taking a big bite out of my butt! I have been slogging away, and finally things are getting back on track. I've been losing fairly consistently for the past couple of months. Funny thing is that when i posted last summer, i was down about 25 lbs - now i'm down 27 lbs. So you can see what happened over the winter. Guess it was a bad one, not only weather-wise!

I was getting sloppy there for awhile but I'm back on track following Atkins thou. It helps me control my carb cravings.

Exercise is gardening, I must walk 3 miles a day around the acreage here.

Sharon

Hey evreyone,
Is anyone trying to lose weight like me this year? Well I have lost a total of 50 LBs with the help of dramatic weight loss in dunwoody. Now I have a wedding coming up and need to lose more so I was just trying to reach out for some motivation to start back up :) I have keep my weight loss off really well with working out and I use the beaded fastin sometimes to help stop my hunger. Whats everyone else's story? I'd love to hear! Thanks and i'll keep everyone posted.

I don't think this side gets used much You may want to try a different forum that has more traffic.