All of you are an inspiration to me too! By the way, someone said to me recently, "How old are you, early 40's?" The guy asking me is 56. I'm 55. He was shocked. I think if I dyed my grey hair (ain't gonna happen) I would get carded!
Since reading through all the inspirational stories here, new-comers and old-timers alike, I've gotten more committed and cleaned up our diet a little more. Instead of Newman-O's for dessert, we have fruit. Instead of munching on whatever is around for lunch (baked Tostitos, which have some oil, peanut butter on sort-of whole grain bread, etc.), we now save enough dinner leftovers to have for the next day's lunch. And we are almost never resorting to Amy's frozen dinners anymore - they are tasty and vegan, but not low fat unless you're comparing them to McDonalds.
My husband, at 5'10.5", has had his weight fluctuate between 155 and 180 over the 20 years he's been (sort-of) following this WOE. When I first posted here, we had started cutting back on cookies and his other weaknesses (potato chips, french fries) and he was down to 160. He is now down to 148 for the first time in his adult life, at age 68, and he's held it there for a few weeks now. He has been posting about it on Facebook, and SO many people are telling him to be careful, he is being too restrictive, he looks too skinny, he will have health problems, it's unhealthy to focus on your weight so much, he should just accept his weight as it is (or was), etc. Funny thing is, NO ONE (except me of course) would ever dare tell him he looked too fat, was eating too much junk, or was risking his health and his life back when he was 180 (or, before he started this WOE at all, at 220 or more) with a protruding belly and high cholesterol.
And at 5'3.5", I'm now down to 110, and just bought a size 6 pair of jeans to replace my old size 8's. I wan't really trying to lose, just cleaning up the diet for his benefit. I call it the codependent diet
And, especially for newcomers, I should point out that
we are not blindly trying to push down the number on the scale by starving or depriving ourselves. We have just gotten rid of the last of the junk in our diet, and
eat all that we want of oatmeal, berries, bananas, melons, brown rice, quinoa, whole wheat pasta, yams, potatoes, kale, broccoli, squash, spinach, tomatoes, all kinds of veggies. We still sometimes have a little avocado, or some tofu or nuts in a stir-"fry", but only maybe once a week.
