Anyone have an exercise for flabby arms that is working??? I can camoflage the belly this summer, but the arms are literally hanging out there, and looking like sheets of crepe paper!!!!! I don't intend to wear sleeveless, but even short sleeves show too much! It'll be too hot for long sleeves, and I still need to lose about 40 lbs to my goal, so it'll get worse!

I hear you, Tracy, and I am right there with you. I will admit, though, I haven't been as "good" about exercise as most people are. I have a relatively sedentary lifestyle, I am a stay at home mom, Navy wife, and I play onlne games. Other than keeping my house clean (which DOES count as exercise, trust me, with a 2 year old!) and taking her to the playground, I have stopped exercising regularly. I got a Gazelle a few months back, and I loved it...until my daughter refused to let me do it alone! Since she doesn't nap, that made it virtually impossible to workout on it during the day (and with my husband in Iraq, it's a struggle to simply maintain a positive attitude once the sun goes down), and it got folded down a couple of months ago...and hasn't been back up since. The result of this lack of exercise, I believe, is why I am losing slowly already. I am hitting about 5-7 pounds a month (which I guess is still average, for this far out?), usually right after my cycle. At 8 months out, I have lost 103 lbs and am wearing a size 12 (started at 311, in a size 26). It doesn't help that no one can give me a "goal" weight to shoot for, tell me what kind of body frame I have, or give me anything to really "compare" myself to, that is reasonable. I see others around me who have busier lifestyles who are losing faster, who enjoy exercise (I never have, other than the kinds I am about to mention)...and I beat myself up mentally about it, knowing it's my own fault that I am not losing any faster. I try and say to myself, "Well, you certainly wouldn't have lost 103 lbs. in 8 months any OTHER way!", but some days that's not even enough to not make me feel like a big slacker. I do great on food...high protein, low carb (and then usually only "good" carbs), plenty of liquids...I still have a very tempermental, small pouch (which in my mind is VERY GOOD, considering how I hate "organized exercise"). And...I have been losing a Pant Size a month, minimum, since surgery, so something is going right, somewhere. I have always been pear shaped, and now my jiggly stomach and thighs are starting to bother me immensely (not to mention my bat wings, which are my only upper body problem...never had a huge chest to begin with), I'd be wearing a size 10 jean if I didn't have this hanging skin on my stomach (granted, it still has some fat in it, and I think if I asked a PS about it, he'd say not yet...part of me wants to ask just to see what he would say, it bothers me that much). On the plus side, the spring here is absolutely gorgeous in Virginia Beach, and I am about to buy myself a bike to do one of the things I truly enjoy and haven't had the energy to do in a long, long time...go bike riding in the early evening/late afternoon. My energy level is enormous, and I feel like an entirely different person in that regard. Plus, since I am a water baby, my pool opens on May 31st and I will be hitting that daily! I truly can't wait. I have to buy a new swimsuit, but every time I go to the store I can't decide if I should buy one yet or not. Maybe I am just stalling, lol. Excuse me for going on, but these things have been on my mind the past couple of weeks and your post just really hits home for me. No matter how much I try NOT to compare, I have a whole Favorites folder dedicated simply to people's profiles that I found who I think have a body shape like mine, who started around the weight I started at, who are near my height, etc. I have the semi-constant (and I hear common) fear that I will suddenly stop losing and never see the 1's...which I haven't seen in my entire adult life, in fact, haven't seen since high school. I don't need people to "kick me in the butt and make me exercise", etc., because I am admittedly stubborn (redhead LOL) and that tends to just make me want to stick out my tongue at the well-meaning individual. No one said this was easy. Anyone who tries to claim that it is, I will debate to my dying day that it's not. Just because it's effective, doesn't make it simple...no matter what anyone says. In short, I hear ya girlfriend, hang in there...we feel it too. ~Stacy

I know how you feel. I feel the same all the time like i am eating too muck and the I have not lost what I shoud have and then I get on the scale and it does not move. I get so pissed off thinking I am going back to my old ways I could cry. Then I will put on a pair of jeans that just fit or were too small and they are big I may not be loosing as much in numbers on the scale but the inches are just falling off. look at your inches and see. drink more water and work out 5 more mins. each time you do work out. this should help you it did for me. you are doing so GREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! keep up the great job you are doing. Just look at it this way you have just lost 112 in 8 months that is great. Lynn 381/255/???

I live in Merced, Ca but I don't think I will be able to go to the craig park because I will be moving to Edmond, Oklahoma at the end of this month and we have so much to do. Wish I could meet you, sorry. Raoulene

Hi Norma, I haven't posted in a while so I thought I should check in. I'm glad I did. I am having some problems with eating (as in all the time). I promised myself and my docs that when I started this if I got to a point I needed help I would ask for it. So this week I asked. Afterall, the surgery was on my stomach not my head. I have been overweight most of my life and I need to make some mental changes. I see the physc. the first of the month. ...Weight loss has slowed to 1-3 lbs/week. No loss in the past two weeks. Weight: 260 Loss thus far: 96 Goal: 180 On a positive note: All my labs are normal. Something I thought I would never hear again. I exercise 4-5 times a week and have for the last 3 years (habit). Until the next time, Pat B. 356/260/180