Hi, everybody. I'm looking for some weight loss buddies and stumbled on this forum. I've mostly been lurking for the past couple of weeks, throwing in an odd comment here and there. I'd like to start a Diary but... I've been dithering around trying to think of a good title. 
So I decided it would be easier to just say hello in the Newcomers forum. OMG, these smilies are just toooo cute. 
I'm normally a pretty text-based person, but I thought I'd try to fit in with the crowd and ... 
no, really, I was just looking for a simple smilie. That wasn't it. Oh well, just call me 
*heh*
Sorry about that. It's the end of the workday and I'm easily distracted. So, anyway, I'm 58 and very overweight. I'm not sedentary, however. I enjoy physical activity, but unfortunately I also love to eat. About the time I hit 50, my metabolism dropped noticeably and my weight started going out of control. I would diet for months and lose 10-20 pounds, but the moment I stopped counting calories the weight would come back faster than I would have believed possible. I topped out at 262 in 2001.
Then I discovered bike commuting! I started riding to work a couple of times a week (12 miles each way) and finally was able to lose weight with a "sensible" 1500-1800 calorie diet - something that had just quit working for me without that extra exercise. I lost a few pounds in 2003 and got in better shape than I had been in for years. In 2004 I lost 20-25 pounds. Then, unfortunately, I lost my job. Without the bike commuting I gained it all back in less than 2 years. Such a disappointment.
I was able to start biking to work again in 2006, this time along a really beautiful off-road bike trail. It was a different direction from the other job, but still about the same distance. Too far to ride every day, but I never missed a week all summer, and usually biked two or even three times a week. I loved it. Again, I lost weight in the summer, but no matter how hard I worked at it, I always gained back at least 10 pounds in the winter. Still, as long as I got back to biking in the spring, the trend was continuing down. At the end of the 2007 biking season I was down to "only" 224, and my legs were like iron (under the layer of surface fat). This winter I FINALLY found a winter activity that was as much fun as biking - ice skating!! I skated all winter and managed to keep my winter weight gain to just 3 pounds, and launched a spring diet blitz that took off 10 more pounds as my skating classes came to an end.
Now it's biking season again and I'm down to 216. But, tragically, I can no longer bike commute. My company has moved to a distant suburb, separated from my home by FOUR major highways, a creek, a river, a sewage treatment plant, and a railroad yard.
So I'm feeling a little desperate. I'm at the lowest weight I've been at in the last 15 or 20 years, and I want to keep going. But without the bike commute I don't know how I'm going to do it. So far, things have been going well this spring, but I have to keep my motivation high. It's so much easier when exercise is just built into the schedule.
Are there any other middle-aged women in this forum? Not that I'm not interested in everybody's stories, but middle-aged bodies are not quite the same as 20-somethings. There seem to be a few other bikers, judging by the forum names. Anybody else into skating?
So I decided it would be easier to just say hello in the Newcomers forum. OMG, these smilies are just toooo cute. I'm normally a pretty text-based person, but I thought I'd try to fit in with the crowd and ... no, really, I was just looking for a simple smilie. That wasn't it. Oh well, just call me *heh*Sorry about that. It's the end of the workday and I'm easily distracted. So, anyway, I'm 58 and very overweight. I'm not sedentary, however. I enjoy physical activity, but unfortunately I also love to eat. About the time I hit 50, my metabolism dropped noticeably and my weight started going out of control. I would diet for months and lose 10-20 pounds, but the moment I stopped counting calories the weight would come back faster than I would have believed possible. I topped out at 262 in 2001.
Then I discovered bike commuting! I started riding to work a couple of times a week (12 miles each way) and finally was able to lose weight with a "sensible" 1500-1800 calorie diet - something that had just quit working for me without that extra exercise. I lost a few pounds in 2003 and got in better shape than I had been in for years. In 2004 I lost 20-25 pounds. Then, unfortunately, I lost my job. Without the bike commuting I gained it all back in less than 2 years. Such a disappointment.
I was able to start biking to work again in 2006, this time along a really beautiful off-road bike trail. It was a different direction from the other job, but still about the same distance. Too far to ride every day, but I never missed a week all summer, and usually biked two or even three times a week. I loved it. Again, I lost weight in the summer, but no matter how hard I worked at it, I always gained back at least 10 pounds in the winter. Still, as long as I got back to biking in the spring, the trend was continuing down. At the end of the 2007 biking season I was down to "only" 224, and my legs were like iron (under the layer of surface fat). This winter I FINALLY found a winter activity that was as much fun as biking - ice skating!! I skated all winter and managed to keep my winter weight gain to just 3 pounds, and launched a spring diet blitz that took off 10 more pounds as my skating classes came to an end.
Now it's biking season again and I'm down to 216. But, tragically, I can no longer bike commute. My company has moved to a distant suburb, separated from my home by FOUR major highways, a creek, a river, a sewage treatment plant, and a railroad yard.
So I'm feeling a little desperate. I'm at the lowest weight I've been at in the last 15 or 20 years, and I want to keep going. But without the bike commute I don't know how I'm going to do it. So far, things have been going well this spring, but I have to keep my motivation high. It's so much easier when exercise is just built into the schedule.
Are there any other middle-aged women in this forum? Not that I'm not interested in everybody's stories, but middle-aged bodies are not quite the same as 20-somethings. There seem to be a few other bikers, judging by the forum names. Anybody else into skating?
with you so much. I have this wonderful membership to the local Y and just love a bunch of the classes, but I work nights about an hour away. So all of the good classes are just when I need to head off to bed. I can't ride a bike to work because it is an hour away at 70 MPH on a major highway. I am trying very hard to find something that fits into my life that I can adopt as a routine. What is worse is that my schedule is not fixed and I tend to do the swing-shift thing on my days off. That is the only way to get the housework done. The rest of my family all live on early day shifts. Right now I am about 80 lbs heavier than I should be and I just want to be healthy. 
