New kid on the block!

Hello fellow dieters!

To keep my very long story short, I'm 21 years old, 5ft4, a little more than just 'chubby' and doing something about it, for once

I weighed in at 202lbs on August 13th 2012 with a goal of being in the "160's" by Christmas and I am happy to say, I just about made it: weighed in at 169.4lbs today Christmas day 2012. PHEWW! I was hoping to be a bit closer to the 160 mark to be honest, but it's better than nothing!

My goal over Christmas is not necessarily to lose any weight, because my house is full of chocolate and I plan on eating at least some (most) of it...but I definitely don't want to gain, so I will be weighing every day just to keep things in check.

I will not be going out to get drunk on new year's eve because I want to be fresh for New Year's day! On the 1st January 2013 I will be re-kick starting my diet by jumping into the Dukan diet and seeing how it goes. Wish me luck!

Onwards and downwards! xox

Congratulations on the progress, that's very good!

Thank you just seems like such a long way to go, still! Can't wait until the day I step on the scale and see 125lbs! Good luck to you, what is your plan? Will you be starting in the new year too?

congratulations Sergeant on your loss - how'd you do it? How'd you stick to it? Combo of diet (which plan) and exercise? How'd you stay on plan?
I want to look up the Dukan as I'm not familiar with it.
Kudos to you for not overdoing it over the holidays!

Thank you Santiago I didn't follow a specific diet plan, I just kept my calorie intake to around 1200 per day (upped to 1500 with protein shake on weight training days) and worked out *most* of the week. I didn't really do any cardio, I probably did one session on the bike/elliptical a week or not at all - not really a big fan of cardio as although I lose the lbs, the inches don't come off quickly enough! I focused on resistance training with medicine balls, kettle bells and weights and went from a 36.5 inch waist to a 30 inch waist in around 3 months. The healthy eating itself was fairly easy to stick to, I'm a real carnivore so ended up eating chicken most days anyway. The exercise was so much harder to stick to because I hate working out, really hate it, but once I saw the inches coming off I was motivated enough to keep going. If I really didn't feel like working out I would just cut my calorie intake back to around 1000-1200 and eat super clean and made sure I worked out the following day.

I have to say, I'm on day 2 of the Dukan diet and finding it quite difficult. I ate so much chocolate and sweets in general over Christmas that I can really feel the lack of sugar in my diet Very tired! I chose the Dukan because it's full of meat so suits me perfectly just need to power through the first 5 days then I can introduce veggies back into my life!

So, do you have a plan for the New Year? And do you have a plan that you will be following?

Thats so awesome sergeants! Good for you, hopefully the new year will keep that fire going and you'll hit 125 before you know It! I know how it is not liking a particular exercise, I don't like lifting because I feel silly doing it. I feel like its reserved for people who look like arnold schwarzenegger(sp?) cardio is my thing but the two combined is what makes it work so ill have to hit the gym with the terminator on my mind!

Thank you Selenap20, I can see from your ticker you are half way to your goal! I just re-started my diet so my ticker has reset itself but at least the number on the left isn't 202lbs any more!

I used to feel exactly the same! Luckily a friend of mine worked in a gym at the time so he helped me to learn the correct ways of lifting etc but I know what you mean, especially as all of the super hulk-muscle men are all sitting in a line in front of the mirror lifting, and there's me, a weakling trying not to collapse under the smallest weight in the gym behind them! I don't know what it is about cardio that I hate so much! I think it's probably a combination of remembering what PE was like at school and hating it then plus just being on an elliptical or bike and watching the timer go down soooo slowly, just feels like forever. Whereas with weights, you can split them into sets of different exercises and it seems time goes by a bit quicker. I really don't know! But I do know that, as you said, I will have to do a combination of both cardio and resistance and to be honest, I'll take cardio over being 200lbs+ any day of the week!

What is your current exercise routine, if you don't mind me asking? I always like to try to take different ideas and see if there is something out there that perhaps I may even enjoy a little!

Currently just winging it. I got "busy" with school and work so im just getting back into it. Prior to falling off the bandwagon I would do an hour 1/2 lifting class 3x a week. Cardio of jogging, elliptical, or hour of zumba class 2x a week. Then mix it up with whatever I like on the remaining 2 days (sometimes nothing at all). My gym membership expired and I hate the commitment of a contract but the gym really helped because I bought a ton of cute workout gear and I was excited to go to show it off and to meet up with friends in the classes. Now I work out at home using my kinect playing your shape evolved 2012 (its amazing) and other dance games on it and the wii. Im doing alright now, but I think im going to have to bite the bullet, stop being cheap, and get back in the gym.