Ding dong, anyone home???

Where the heck is everyone lately????? Come on people ... lurkers and regulars ... let's post updates on where we are at in our journeys! It's so slow here lately ... let's get some good discussion going! My current status: Maintaining my weight, up and down the same 2 pounds over and over again. I'm eating less than I'm supposed to be, per my dietician. Yet I can't seem to shed anymore weight. I'd like to lose an additional 10 pounds even though my doctor said not to lose anymore. I'm going to the gym 5 days a week, twice on two of those days. And I've signed up to run another 5K run on the 4th of July. After that I signed up to run a 5 mile trail run which scares the living daylights out of me! I'm loving my kick-boxing class and I'm starting to do more weight lifting to tone up my muscles ... which are somewhere beneath all this saggy skin. All in all, I'm really happy with where I'm at, even though I'd like to lose a tad more. But I'm loving that I have the energy to do more things now. I'm not hiding in my house anymore and I love it! So, where are YOU at??? Deanna

I braved the worse of all experiences yesterday. SWIMSUIT SHOPPING. I hit several places in the mall. dread and despair. everything is on clearance, but first, last and foremost is that the girls can not just RUN FREE, they must be held, supported, and contained. no free spirits here. Land's End has the best support, but for $91, I so do not think so. finally ended up at Kohl's and got something nice at 50% off, and it looks pretty nice. will post pictures when I REALLY GET BRAVE later tonight with the camera out for my son's 6th birthday. I have not really wanted to be in a suit for YEARS. I have done it, just didnt WANT to! Always started my suit selection with a cover-up first and then found a suit to go under the cover up. as for the weight. I do not care anymore, as long as I stay in the zone, I am quite content. finding clothes that are in my zone, are a little more difficult. first off, I grab a small and then I second guess and grab a medium. I go to the changing room and try on the small totally expecting it to not fit, but it does and I CONTINUE to be surprised. my daughter saw the 'girls' running free as I tried on a shirt today and she was just SHOCKED at how droopy and deflated they are and was terrified that she would look like that at 40 as well. poor mutt. I can just about guarantee at the rate that she is going, yes, this could happen to her, or worse. just the way it is. I swear, looking at my body in the mirror in the changing room with three of my kids and one of my grand kids is not for the faint of heart. heehee but hey, body's are body's and this one is mine. it nourished all of them and gave them life. and it is what it is. the boys are used to it, but sister has not seen it bra'less for AGES. heehee all I could say was GRAVITY WORKS (from Ferngully) I am preparing for my sabbatical next week, getting all my clothes in order for 6 weeks of spa days. indoor pool and outdoor beach. even got my Rx sunglasses out so that I am not all squinty by the end of the summer. HEY, wonder if I can change my NetFlix Address?

Oh Kat, you had me laughing so hard! I remember when I was a little girl and I happened to see a woman in a changing room and her "girls" were sooooo long and droopy and I kept thinking "Dear God, please don't let me look like that!" Well, here I am and I look just like that! I've been trying to be discreet in the shower at the gym when I take my daughter swimming so she won't see my skin. I don't want to scar her for life or anything! OK, so fill us in on the details on your 6 weeks spa getaway! Can I come??? No, seriously, can I come? Hee, hee! Deanna

on a negative note, the courts divied up the children during the last fiasco so that I got the two older girls and he got the younger one. I was not amused, but that was how the judge did it. so since she is severely autistic and has issues and can not transition out of her routine without serious delays, repercussions and major issues, all visitation occurs in her home state, washington and I bear the entire expense out of my pocket. I usually go up 3 times a year, this is the first year that I am reducing down to two times and seeing how it goes. or we can look at it as a positive. I am flying up to washington state, leaving 110+ temps and ungodly humidity to bask in some dry and reasonable temperatures of around 80 and 0 humidity and have a maid clean my room every morning for 6 weeks. no cooking, no cleaning, just take the kids to the pool or beach every day, I have wifi and cable + HBO for 6 glorious weeks. no photo shoots, nothing to do but relax, and puter around with my fall advertising and marketing campaign and implement my new website for work. it is all a matter of perspective. I choose to look at it as a 6 week sabatical with a hot tub and indoor pool, and a beach with beautiful sand 1 mile walking distance along the river front. just all around pleasant way to spend the summer. oh and check this out, I am kitty korner from Costco, so each day is FREE LUNCH, just wander around the tasting tables three times and I am stuffed and I do not have to clean the dishes. heehee

Well were I am depends on who is looking at it.. I raised my calories up to btween 1300 and 1400 a day and I started loosing weight again.. go figure.. because of my legs I have not been exercising either.. Right now I am at 127 which is 137 pounds down from my surgery weight and 157 from my highest. Life is good.. I am doing more now than I ever have. we have a trip planned to go to the kern for some river rafting, biking, fishing.. and anything else we can find to do out there. It's funny today.. i went to get my car washed and as i was sitting there some woman (heavy but not hugh) was talking with her kids about some dog that was over weight. I looked around and not one person sitting there waiting for their car was within their ideal weight range.. most reminded me of a year ago. it just struck me right there on the spot.. Hey.. you can do this.. u can loose all that weight and you will keep it off.. I thought about how busy I had been with getting ready for my trip.. I havent stopped all day.. shopping for food, etc...and my final place the car wash at 130 and i still hadnt had lunch or anything... the old me would have stopped and grabbed bad food and sucked it down.. I would have grabbed the junk food at the car wash and eaten.. instead I was looking accross the street at this place that serves really good healthy food that i eat at occasionally and was longing for it. I know I can do this now.. the mind is changing with the body.. things are getting easier and I am not obssessing about the things I shouldnt have.. I can do this. I was pretty happy with myself at what I now know in my heart was gonna be my future.. not just my hope. I am getting to the point now where I do see the skinny person in the mirror and I like what I see. without the mirror I forget I am skinny but at least I am starting to see it. I wear a size 3 pants and medium shirt and I have to fight myself to get that size.. i just want to get the bigger sizes so I have to try them on and make sure so I dont get the wrong size anymore.. shopping is fun.. I love buying new clothes and actually care if my shoes, pants shirt etc all come together.. before I could of cared less. Life is so much more different now and I wouldnt change it for the world.. I love my new life.

Hi Carla! You know, I just realized lately how many other people are overweight too. Before I always was bigger than everyone else so I didn't really pay attention to what size people really are. There are way more people with weight issues than I realized. And I've finally started to see that I'm more "normal" now and actually smaller than a lot of people. It's kind of reassuring to me to know I'm not the biggest one in a crowd anymore! I've been finding myself craving healthier food options too. I drive by McDonalds and Burger King and can't fathom eating there anymore like I used to. I would cram that food in and want more and more and now it just sounds gross to me. I'm so thankful for that! Good job Carla! You are so inspiring to me! Deanna

Good post Deanna It's intesting reading where you are all at. Great to see that the image in the mind is catching up with the actual body size for you guys. For me, when I think about the numbers I have lost and the size I am now, it blows my mind. Some days I take for granted how far I've come, but this to me is like an impossible dream. Yes, i struggle some days, which you all share with me (hee hee), but it is only when I really think about how my life was before and how every night I would go to bed in tears feeling such a failure in life, regardless of all my acomplishments and how losing weight seemed like an impossible insurmountable mountain that could never be achieved. Yet here I am, I believe due to God's grace and blessing. I give all credit of my weight loss to Him. He is the one who gave the surgeon the skills to perform the surgery, He is the one who sustains me on the bad tough days, and he is the one who steers and keeps me in the right direction when I feel like chucking in the towel and going back to my old destructive eating habits and behaviours. As you all know, for me this has been a journey of not only losing weight, but of emotional healing too. I see such a difference in me, the way I value myself so much more now. I have always had confident times and not confident times, but at the back of it all was the fear of rejection by others - if I stayed fat I could always blame that for being rejected and failign at relationships. Even though my logical mind knew how crazy this was, I am certain that this is what was going on in my subconciousness. Anyway, I'm well on the way to a normal bmi, and now have a healthy body (the mind part is still getting there, but I can live with that - I'm a work in progress ) Wow, what an amazing, great journey we have been on. And I keep thinking that it is just going to get better the closer I get to goal.

OK as usual, I'm a bit late... But I'm in NC looking at property...we are moving next year... I am now 148... it has me at a normal BMI ... I want to be about 125 to 135 ... every one is already telling me I'm getting too thin... I am getting plastic surgery both a complete lower body lift and breast implants and arms done... (they tell me 15 lbs of skin will be gone after its done so be careful not to lose too much more weight)right now I am looking for the right time to be out of commission. we have things planned all summer and then my son starts school... so finding the time is going to be interesting.... He cant drive himself to school.. and I will have to be able to spend several weeks out of commission. My husband travels allot and cant drive him... so perhaps the thanksgiving break or Christmas break... I am in 9/10 pants (mostly because of the skin) and a small shirt... I still see myself as bigger and it took my sister dragging me to the mall to get clothes that actually fit me. I get hit on all the time, but don't see the person they must ... and honestly don't recognize myself in the mirror most of the time....