I did Weight Watchers. It worked well, and helped me lose a good amount of weight. I was stalled out for a while, and with my marathon training I found it too hard to count the points and still get the right kind of foods I needed for training.

I'm off it for now while I'm in France, but they have it over here too. There are the frozen meals in the grocery cases. I did the online without any meetings and it worked, but it's definitely a help to have other people to connect with. They have message boards there, but I didn't really like them.

I really like the Turbo Jam series. Does anyone else do those?

Count me in as one who is working on improving my health in 2008, for the long run. As for diet, I've removed red meat totally, still eating bacon, however. Added much more fish and am trying to really green up the diet with way more veggies and using meat protein almost as a condiment rather than the larger portion of a meal.

My big bugaboo is getting out and exercising. Happily, where I am currently working, we have a great space to walk. Now that the weather is not raining, I'm going out for 30 minutes to walk to get myself going. I will extend it longer and longer. But one must start somewhere. It's the hill climbing at home I really need to do.

Everyone here is so inspiring and my hat is off to you all! :snap:

Ditto, ditto, ditto, on all counts.

I'm doing the online program too...I like being able to just enter a food and have the points pop up! I keep the books in my car, which proved helpful the one time I was out doing errands and got hungry. I don't like the meetings because they seem to foster competition, are shame-based, and, although they encourage attendance after the weight is lost, people give you the fish-eye if you do. And I agree the online WW boards are terrible. I hang out at "3fatchicks.com" where there is a wonderfully diverse group of men and women, and support for most healthy eating plans.

And the scale? I avoided it while putting the weight ON, so now I force myself to check fairly frequently. Not really daily, but certainly more than weekly, just to pace myself. And I take an evening "off" the program once a week, to combat that drudgery of being good all the time! :evil: Hey, that's what those flex points are for, eh!?

www.extrapounds.com is another really good site. They have tools to help you track weight and inches, with handy graphs to see your progress and problem areas. They also have blogs.

A little extra nudge for me to be healthier
 

I gave blood this morning and my BP was higher than it ever has been. The nurse said it was elevated, but for me, this was radically higher than what I normally see. 150/90 :eek: and my normal is around 124/70.

Ergo, now looking seriously at my salt intake and increasing my walking regimen (read this to me stop being such a lazy a$$). I've got no excuse not to get my tennis shoes or walking shoes on at work, we have lagoons and ponds and ducks and loads of pretty areas to walk amogst the buildings. Plus, I live in a walking city, I have a gorgeous park 1 block from my place (up a semi steep hill) and do I walk up that hill to tour the park, nope.

Waving bye bye to sea salt at the table, and bacon as well kalamata olives (in extreme moderation).

Just the kick start I need to get me moving.

As far as goals, I have a few myself. I'm not trying to be a model, or even look good in a swimsuit, but I'd like to be healthier.

Mostly, I want to get sick less often with my stomach issues. So that means less grease, less soda.

As an aside, I'm also trying to reduce heavily processed foods and eat more "real" food, stuff that's closer to its source. So real butter, more "fresh" bread and less preservative-filled bread, more items that still retain their original shape (chicken comes to mind).

One major exception to that is Splenda, which I'm actually trying to sub in once in a while as a way to reduce my sugar intake. I'm not comfortable with subbing it in 100% (see above paragraph), but I find that if I put 3 sugars in a coffee, I can easily put in 2 sugars and one Splenda, reducing my sugar by 1/3, and still not feel like I'm bombarding myself with over-processed food.

I am SO thankful that I like my coffee and tea black, no sugar. Makes dieting far more bearable to be able to reach for those whenever I want (we'll ignore the problem of caffeine addiction).

I won't lie. While wanting to avoid the health issues my dad has was the final motivating factor, vanity definitely plays a part. I don't expect to end up with washboard abs, but it'd be nice to see these love handles go away.

I totally know what you mean. As a secondary "side effect", it will be nice to have a lot more clothing options available for me.

My big thing is removing more cholesterol and fats from my daily intake, so that when I do want to gob out on "bacon fest", it won't have a lasting impact on my body. So, I want to balance it so I can still enjoy it, without having to cut it completely out later on due to irreversible or long-term risk.