So psyched that I found you!

[StarShine1975]

Hello, my name is Star-Shine, I'm a 36 yo mom of a 19 yo. I work full time at a desk all day.

I grew up pretty fit, I was a tom boy and did a lot of sports with the guys. I had my daughter young, and got back in shape without even trying. I have struggled with fitness for only the past 8 years. In the past, I have been on extremely strict diets and did machine weight training with lots of cardio. I lost the weight quickly, and would do well until I felt deprived and would blow it all (I'm a all or nothing kind of girl) and gain the weight back.

This time around, I vowed to lose the weight slowly and not deprive myself. I logged my food and exercise into a website and did the basic calories in vs calories out. I have lost 15 pounds of the total 30 which was my goal. Because of the calorie numbers, I wanted to burn the most calories and that was by jumping onto the elliptical. I had just mentioned last night to my BF that I didn't feel as tone or strong as usual. That's when I decided that I need to get back to weight lifting.

I started back up with weight lifting this week and this morning, someone made a post on my tracking site about "the difference between skinny fat and fit and thin." In the post was 2 links with one of them being a link to Spezzy's page showing her achievements. I was memorized by her transformation and story. I basically spent the rest of my work day reading various articles on this site.

I am signing up for the up coming challenge, I just need to figure out my starting point so that I can set realistic goals. tomorrow I am going to see where I am in the push up/ pull up/ squat/ etc. levels. Although I know I can't do a pull up.

Based on the awesome information on this site, I am no longer shooting for a goal weight. I want to focus on being stronger and having more energy. I would love to be able to do the circuit training and HIIT, but wasn't sure if alternating them M-F would be too hard on my body. I have plenty of research to do, but I'm motivated to be strong again!

Height 5 foot 7.5 inches

Current weight 158

Some goals:

1. Be more forgiving if I fail and stop being all or nothing regarding fitness.

2. Stop focusing on the scale and measure my fitness level instead.

3. Strive to be a bit better every day.

Any tips are appreciated. Thanks for bringing me on. =)

[SuperXM1ke]

We're glad you found us too!

[Senator Ozmo]

We are glad to have you. I can relate as having been fit earlier in life, but now work behind a desk. Welcome and be good to yourself

[ebm1224]

welcome to the forum. i relate to the all or nothing issue as well. i definitely believe that small changes over time are the key to lasting fitness for the rest of our lives. yes, you'll lose slower but you'll develop habits that will be harder to break when things get hectic (at least this is what i'm telling myself). glad you're starting your journey here!

[BAMF]

Those are some of the three best goals!

If you are "on" a nutrition and exercise "wagon," you can theoretically "fall off" of it. If you change your life, that is something one cupcake can't take away from you.

Welcome!

[cremshoff]

Howdy and welcome to the Rebellion! where is your fitness and eating at currently? where do you want them to be at later on?

[StarShine1975]

I'm still figuring out my goals at the moment.

Today I did:

Body weight squats: I did 4 sets of 20 fairly easily. I used to use weights in the past and have been intermittently doing BW squats recently.

Dumbbell Presses: 4 sets of 10-16. (15 pound weights) I can probably move up to the 17.5 pound weights

Deadlifts: 4 sets of 8 (80 pounds) I wasn't absolutely sure if I was doing these right, so I didn't want to push it on weight or reps. Will re-watch videos.

Inverted Rows: 4 sets of 9-14. I was pretty high on these, but I can't even come close to a half of a pull-up.

Planks: I did the first one for 60 seconds and almost died. Second one I could only do 30 seconds. I used to be able to do it for 2 minutes. Working back up to it.

I've been logging my food for a while. I was consuming anywhere between 1200-1600 calories depending on my cardio that day. I'm going to shoot for closer 1600-1800 now that I'm using the weights. I don't have any restrictions on my diet, because I usually eat pretty sensibly. But I do make my decisions based on what I have left in my calorie pool. As of this morning I have lost 17 pounds doing weight loss the old way. I hope to lose more fat while gaining muscle. I'm not so concerned about how much I weigh.

I'm not sure where my goals are yet. I'm thinking about decreasing my body fat % and increasing my level of fitness over all. I just don't know what a realistic increase would be. Squatting with a certain weight? Actually being able to do 1 pull up? I just don't want to set it too high and fail.