WEIGHT LOSS SUCCESS!!!

I know . . . I've been a bad, bad blogger.  Just haven't felt like I had anything exciting to share.  But I have to remind myself that my blog isn't necessarily about sharing and showing unique and/or one-of-a-kind experiences and creations, but just simply sharing bits of me and my hum-drum life.

So today I thought I'd share, what I consider for me to be a pretty exciting bit of news.  Since the beginning of February, I've been working to rid myself of some unwanted poundage.  Seems like for the past few years . . . or well, maybe forever . . . I've been struggling with, at times, 10 to 15 pounds of extra, unwanted weight.

I'm sure many of you can relate.  You know, not enough extra pounds to make you necessarily "overweight", just enough to make you uncomfortable in your clothes and how you look.  That's been me for a while now.  I've been very close to, or at the very high-end of my weight-range for a couple years.  And I've not been liking it at all!

Oh, I do feel fortunate that being 5'10" I can get away with carrying some extra weight.  But I was waayyy out of my comfort zone.  I'd been so frustrated because I exercise religiously - I have for years.  And I thought I was always good about what I ate, but I would overindulge a bit now and again. Thank goodness I do exercise regularly!  I may have had more than just a little weight problem all these years!

Super Bowl Sunday, I stepped on the scales and the numbers made me cringe.  175 pounds!!! OMG!  I hadn't weighed that much since after Son No. 3 was born.  I vowed it was time for drastic measures.  And I'm sure many of you are going to poo-poo, and maybe even severly criticize the drastic measures I took to aid in my weight loss.

You see, I'm a bad calorie counter, point watcher, carb eliminator, etc.  And I've tried all those programs - Weight Watchers, South Beach, Nutri-System, general counting of daily caloric intakes.  And while they're all fantastic programs, and really work for many, many people, I had very limited success with all of them.  When loosing weight, it's better for me to not have to think too much about food.  Those programs I mentioned, in some ways, almost keep me a little stressed.  All that tracking and adding things up (remember, I'm really bad at math!) would just be too much for me at times.

So I decided to go a more controversial route.  I enlisted the help of a physician at a weight loss center.  Using a prescribed appetitie suppressant, Phentermine (the good half of the ill-fated Fen-Phen cocktail), I've been able to loose

25 pounds and drop 2 sizes.  

Now, I'm not going to solely credit the drug for my weight loss, although it certainly did help with suppressing my appetite.  But I've been working very, very  hard.  I've stepped up my workouts, exercising every . single . day . . . yes every day.  Okay, there's been a few times here and there where I couldn't get a day in.  But quite honestly, I can count those days since the beginning of February on one hand.

I've also been very good about what I'm eating.  Although Phentermine will greatly reduce your appetitie to where you really don't feel the need to eat, I have been making sure I eat.  And as healthy as possible.   I know it does no good to starve and deprive yourself to have some or all the weight come back later when you're done with that program.  I even have sweets.  For instance, when I've made cupcakes, if I want a cupcake, I'll take a bite or two and then toss the rest in the trash.  I know, what a waste!  And that's been one of my problems over the years - cleaning my plate, or eating the kids leftovers.  Throwing away food was bad! Taking just a bite or two of a little treat allows me to enjoy it by not depriving myself, but not feeling guilty or having to pay later.  And something else I'm retraining myself on is to simply not eat if I wasn't hungry.  Too many times I eat because the food's just there or it looks good or smells good.  

I did an eight week stint on the medication, and lost an average of about 2 pounds a week.  There were even some weeks where I didn't loose a single pound.  The slow weight loss, I think, was ideal.  From everything we read, loosing weight slowly most times helps in keeping it off longer.

If you do some research on Phentermine, you will find that although it can be somewhat controversial by some professionals and it can produce cerain side effects in some people, it has been very effective in helping obese persons begin their weight loss journeys.  I realize I was not obese, and will admit that the weight I wanted to loose was mostly considered cosmetic.  And even with the 25 pounds I've lost, now weighing in at around 150, I'm still not at the bottom of my weight range, and I don't plan to loose any more.  This is my ideal weight.  I'm super comforatble at this weight.  My clothes fit better.  That muffin top is GONE! WooHoo!  And I just generally feel great!  I think it's got me back on track with the realization that if I want to look and feel a certain way, even though I do exercise every day, I can't eat the way I'd been.   

So, there you have it.  My very long and drawn out testamonial on weight loss with a little help.  I'd been wanting to blog about my weight loss success for a while now because I've been so excited and happy and proud that I've finally done it - reached my ultimate goal!  But if I did, I wanted to be truly honest about how I did it, but was afraid I'd get negative reactions to method I used.  Again, I'm not at all advocating this for everyone.  And it really should be done under a physician's watch.  I wish I could have done it solely on my own with my own self-control and will-power, but it just wasn't working for me.  And I really, really wanted to loose those pounds.

Now if someone would come up with a way to make stretchmarks magically dissappear . . . . !

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