Thread: Lost 4lbs in a year!!!!!!!!

Hi, I'm new to MiniMins but alas not to dieting.

Yesterday I did my new year weigh in and I weigh 4lbs less than last year. It sounds bad but it could be so much worse as I toppled off the wagon last march and put on 1st 7lbs between march and october. So I've managed to relose 1st 7lbs plus 4lbs.

I've been losing weigh for 2 years now.

This year I'm going to do slimming worlds food optomising but unfortunately there isn't a class nearby.

Anyone done it/doing it online?

I feel your pain ... I managed to lose a grand total of ...2lb! Saying that it was a roller-coaster year so have joined SW online a couple of days ago and really feeling motivated. I lost 35lb with SW about 10 years ago so know it works, am finding EE makes it so much easier, but am more focused on portion sizes this time around.

Best of luck to you - I'm sure this is our year

Thank you for your support.

I started the diet today and so far 4 syns. I'm really hopeful as it seems like a 'life plan' which is what I need. I've yoyoed so many times, once even getting down to 8st13lb counting calories but once I got there I didn't have a clue how to maintain it without being 'on a diet' forever.

Let's make this the year we both do it.

I would love to be back in the 8 stone somethings too. Just like you I didn't have a maintenance plan and couldn't sustain it so have just wasted years yo-yoing.

I eat much better now, I love to cook so will probably use sins on things like olive oil and base ingredients to make the dishes I enjoy. Back in the day, I used to do Green days and live off Pasta 'N Sauce until the time I spotted a caterpillar in my saucepan which I'd rehydrated whilst cooking it - bleeeeeugh!

Did you count the syns?

It was a Red day so it's free protein squidginess!

Well that's day 2 nearly done. So far, so good despite my dad, who has dementia, trying to get me to eat an apple pie about 100 times.

It really does seem like an excellent diet, if it works that is, and I don't give in to apple pies for the sake of peace.

I'm doing EE at the moment, once I'm confident that I'm doing it right I'll try red and green.

Got myself a ticker, you likey?

Saying no to your parents when it comes to food is really difficult - I commend you on your willpower! Mine used to tell me that I needed to be chunky as being so short I would look like a little girl. I think nowadays with my shelf-like bum and poke-yer-eyes out boobs there's no mistake!

The diet does work and if I know what I'm eating of an evening I could probably map it out to red or green - I do like having 2 HEXBs - but might wait until it's warmer [fat chance any time soon!] so can do more mediterranean salads and grilled meats etc.

What's on your menu for today?

I've had: satsumas, home-made spiced carrot & red lentil soup with HEXB slice bread & synned ryvita. Will be having rest of my homemade cottage pie this eve with probably broccoli & sweetcorn. Maybe hula-hoops and some natural yogurt with lemon curd for a snack for syns if I need to.

Your ticker - I likey! Transcendental rabbit flying mesmerised into a jumbo-jet with 70s day-glo colours agogo - Trippytastic!

Porridge and milk

Homemade chick rice and veg soup, mullerlight

Gammon steak, broccoli and crispy potato, (5syns), raspberries

More soup

Belgian choc option (3 syns)

The 70's ticker? Not sure if my style is retro or if I'm just getting old!!! I do drive a 1972 vw campervan.

Oooh campervans! What colour? I'm thinking orange or aqua or maybe even poo-brown - 70s favourite after-all!

Foods looking good. I'm thinking I made too much soup and need to freeze up portions as can see it being lunch for the next full week at this rate.

Tomorrow I'm going to try making fresh pasta - although for some reason this has syns though dried is free - not sure why this would be - additional moisture can't add cals can it? I'm unlikely to eat more of it either as reckon it'll cook up like a big glob of wallpaper paste!

Also, you've done fabulously well to have lost 3 stone already Did you SW previously before joining here?

She's fire engine red and her name's Katy. She's wintering at my daughters house and getting a bit of TLC.

Know what you mean about the soup. Chick, rice and veg is on todays menu again! I know soup is really good for filling you up, and I do really like it but having the same one all the time isn't so good so I've bought the New Covent Garden's A Soup for Every Day. It arrived this morning, I just need to go through it and find the ones I can make syn free, and buy a new blender.

Home made pasta!!!! Sounds yum. I've only made it once. Don't under estimate how much it swells as I ended up with plate sized raviolis.

I've never done SW before, always counted calories but what always happens is that I get bored of all the measuring and counting, and when I stop writing things down cheese and crackers appear magically and force themselves down my throat and someone puts lashings of butter on my veg and my semi skimmed milk turns itself into jersey gold top.

I need a plan I can keep up forever without getting bored, not so much with the food as the keeping track. I've been overweight for about 15 years now so I really need to sort this out.

What do you find the hardest part of SW food optomising ?

Well had my first weight in & 2.5lb off - might even have to start a ticker!! I'm doing SW online which told me weigh-in is this morning even though I only joined last Sunday night so strictly speaking it should be Monday morning, but happy with that for 5 days and hopefully something similar next week. To be honest I'm so fed up of the losing, gaining, losing, gaining cycle of last year I'd much rather be a tortoise if it keeps it off.

I quite like the CG soups but find they need more seasoning so often tart them up with a bit more seasoning and dependant on the soup extra veg eg peas or sweetcorn, some parsley, frozen broad beans etc - that way I get a good 2 portions out of them rather than 2 stingy ones. Today is my last day of soup for lunch - I really don't want to see it again for a long while!
Ah do you know what I've just realised I misread your post and you've bought the book not the cartons - doh! Oh well now I'm sure they're going to be delicious - do give a rating as you make them - I might give them a go myself. I used to subscribe to BBC GoodFood and have just done a cull with my magazines, I'm going to check for soup recips there and let you know if there's any goodies - I recommend the spiced carrot and lentil one .. which is the one I'm currently OD'ing on!

I didn't do make the pasta in the end - not enough eggs ... or motivation! Had a lovely dinner of chicken and chorizo pasta which my fiance made which is delicious but hard for me to figure out syn content. I guess that is what I find hardest about SW is that I like to eat real food also cook more exotic cuisines, not sweetener and cakes made from weetabix and couscous. So although components of my food are free eg chicken, I need to syn all the other ingredients and divide by portion size.

I think I need to do that with my recipes in advance and then I can tot up syns and know what I'm eating- it's just dinners really, everything else I can do as free food. I love to bake, so that might take a back seat for a bit. Hand blenders - I have a Bamix stick blender which is brilliant for grinding, beating, pureeing, liquidising etc. It can even foam up semi-skimmed milk to thicken up like cream which I'll do it the summer I think for smoothies. I really recommend one - but it's pricey though luckily mine was a gift. I've also got a 20 yrd old Braun 300w hand blender which is still going and great for soups. I'll shut up now about kitchenware cos else I'll be banging on about stuff for ages!

You've done so well with your losses prior to SW that I'm sure this'll work really well for you. I did it first in my early 20s when it was just Red and Green and managed to lose 2.5 stone from the heaviest I'd ever been and I never thought I'd get back and actually a little beyond that again. You don't do you? But too much good living and finally being content and happy meant I haven't been keeping an eye on it but it's really affecting me now. I've always been podgy from age 2 and only had a very brief period where I was quite slim and I'd be happy enough to be back there again also from a health perspective too now I'm a bit older.

SW really will work if you stick with it but this time around I am trying not to eat to excess - last time - if it was unlimited I really did stuff myself but this time having to have third of SF food on your plate has mad my dinner portions a lot less massive which can only be a good thing really.

You sound like a gal with a plan so I reckon you'll do just fine Have you got your first weigh in soon?

CONGRATULATIONS 2.5lbs is great.

I put a 15oz can in a bag everytime I lose a lb so it's more than just a number to me. It's amazing how much a few lbs actually feels like, and amazing how it adds up. Scary actually.

My first SW weigh in is Monday. The plan is to weigh myself on the wii fit then have a wee play on it for half an hour. Even if I haven't lost I'm going to carry on the same as I have been for a week or 2 because I know it's not really about rapid drops brought about by eating food you don't enjoy. I'm happy to be a tortoise.

Diet food you don't enjoy is not just pointless, it is, in my opinion, counter productive. Much better just to have a little bit of what it is you really want. My problem is that now my kids have grown up if I make something with 4 portions then I'm eating it 4 x . I can freeze it, but I'm still going to eat 4 portions of food with lots of syns over a couple of weeks whether I want to or not.

I was a skinny child. When I left school I went to give blood and they wouldn't take it cause I was only 7st 11lb and I needed to be over 8st! When I went to Uni I moved into catered halls and that's where it started. To be fair I was not the only one who put on weight, we all did. Every night they gave us puddings with big jugs of cream or custard and every Sunday we had a roast dinner with pudding for lunch then another full meal in the evening with even more pudding. It wasn't just the quantity, the quality of the cooking was amazing too!!! Add to that the option of a full fried breakfast every morning and less sport than at school, well, you can see how it happened.

By the end of 2nd year I was 10st 7lb . I joined a slimming magazine club and started my first diet and have been up and down ever since but 18st 1lb is my very top weight.

I'm new on here, but I have been calorie counting for about 8 weeks and lost 11lb so now I am going to do slimming world :-) I done it about 2 years ago an lost 1 and a half stone but lost track and put it all plus more back on!!! But I go to the gym now and do Zumba and a spin class so I know I can do it this time :-)I have had bactelors Chinese rice for lunch plus an apple and I had tesco light choices sausages for dinner with roast pots peas and sweetcorn with gravy it was lovely!!! Oh and to finish of with a weight watchers toffee yogurt!!! How do you get the ticker?? Good luck with your diets :-)

Is it wrong that I'm salivating at your descriptions!? I agree with the much rather eating food you enjoy. It doesn't help that my fiance and I both enjoy good food but he's being really supportive, we both need to be slimmer, although
I've just convinced him to get on the scales which he hasn't done since last March - he too is at his fattest but he's lucky to carry it well - he's built like a labrador so rotund belly but solid with it, it's me that's walrus-squishy!

It's strange isn't it that you only you start to go on a diet you get fatter? I'm definitely going to try your "fat-in-a-bag" thing to show me how much weight I've lost! Good thinking and best of luck for your Monday weigh-in - Im sure you'll do brilliantly!

Originally Posted by bellybling

CONGRATULATIONS 2.5lbs is great.