Setting a Goal

I had my first follow up visit on Monday. I was a little disappointed because i have only lost 21 pounds since November 1st.  I want to set a  realistic goal for my next appointment which is  February 14, 2017. How do i go about that? 

Why do you need to set a goal for February 14th?  I think your best goal is "stick to your plan and lose as much as you can."  Do you find time-based goals like that to be motivating?  Is your surgeon insisting that you make them?  

Yes I do find them motivating. No my surgeon in not asking me to make them.

Set yourself a goal of a pound a week, whatever that math works out to be.  Then you'll feel like a rockstar when you exceed it.  

I agree.  My goal is to follow the doctor's orders.  The weight loss will come -- sometimes fast, sometimes slow -- but that way I don't get caught up in "I have to be XXX pounds by XXX date."

Trust me, this is hard as my birthday is in 4 months, almost exactly 5 months out from my surgery day and it is very tempting to set a weight goal for that day.  However, that could be disappointing if I don't make it -- conversely, if I make it very easily, I could convince myself that it wasn't a big deal and I didn't challenge myself.

I avoid the self sabotage and just let the scale do what it does.

Oh, and I didn't follow my own advice and missed a goal I set for a specific period and started to beat myself up over it.  So, now I am trying to follow that advice.

oh ok

this makes sense to me too.

This is good advice. Goal should be to consistently stick to the surgeons plan.

21 lbs is great. I agree with others that your goal should to be to stay on plan. A fixed number of pounds is tough because you can't control that scale. But you can control following your plan. Stick to it and you will succeed. I was a slow loser but got to goal (my surgeon didn't think I would make it but I did). We are all different.  GL  Diane S.