Looking for a new fitness program? How about trying the Presidential Fitness Challenge. This challenge comes in three varieties:

1. The Active Lifestyle Program - For those of you who aren't active on a daily basis yet, this is a great way to begin. The rules are basically to get a minimum of 30 minutes of exercise at least 5 days a week, for a total of 6 weeks.

2. The Presidential Champions Program - If you're already active and want a new challenge, this program is for you. Your goal is to see how many points you can earn by staying active. Points are based on the amount of energy each activity burns. So the more active you are, the more points you'll get. When you reach 20,000 points, you'll earn a Bronze award. Then you can continue on in the Presidential Champions program for a Silver or Gold award.

3. The Advanced Performance Presidential Champions Program - This is basically the same system as the Presidential Champions Program, except that the award goals are higher. For instance, you need to get 40,000 points to earn a Bronze award.


The Presidential Champions Fitness Program Website (where you can log your progress and also order your awards when you've reached your goal)

Also, if you want, come join the LJ pres_challenge community to chat with others who are challenging themselves with this program.

(Comment on this)

hey I just joined!I'm 5'4 and at the mo wigh 196 ponds :s I wear a UK size 16, which if I'm being honest is starting to look a bit to small! I think I'v put on about 14 pounds in the past four months, due to stopping going to gym because of winter and an up in school work.so I'm hoping to loose a stone, by healthy eating and exercise, but as I entering exam season, my A levels which are preety importanat, I'm gonn ahve to be careful with planning hmm..spose I havnt figured it out very well so far! I'm gonna see how I get on this week and see what happens!
anyways hi everyone!
xxx

(Comment on this)

hey - im a first time poster in this comnunity and stuff...yeah..

i go and work about about 3 or 4 times a week and try to control my portion size and watch WHAT i eat...and i do good for about 4 days...then i get back into a sloppy pattern again. and it sux. ... i love carbs =( and it makes me sad lol.

but anyways, now i am 5'7 and 194 pounds, but to myself and most other people, i dont look like i weigh that much...which kind of confuses me. i dunno how i can weigh that much but not look it. and i wanna loose some weight. but im not really looking at how much weight i loose, its more of a size thing. i wear a 11 or 13 (depending on brands) and 34 and 36 (for like silver jeans and stuff)

and im just lookin for some tips on things that would help me loose the inches and kinda quick ya know? and so reassurance too.

so thats y i decided to join =) thank guys ttyl

Current Mood: crappy

(2 Comments |Comment on this)

Newbie
Hi, I'm Tammy and I am a chubby girl. But I am exceedingly glad that there is a comm out there that supports something other than eating disorders. Anyway, I way about 175 and I would like to lose about fifty pounds. I wear about a size 14 in U.S. clothing. I've been chubby most of my life but never overweight until about freshman year in highschool. But I am confident and I want to lose that weight. As an aspiring actress I know that weight is very important in the "biz" so losing weight is important to me so I can do what I have always wanted to do. Anyway. I am confident and ready!

Add me if you like!

(Comment on this)

Hello
My name is Mara and I just joined!
Ive been overweight pretty much all my life apart from one summer when I was 15 when I became bullemic and anorexic and lost lots of weight very fast. Got a boyfriend, gained a ton of weight after we broke up and now Im at Uni and my minds a bit more stable am trying to to lose weight safely and not through Mia again.
Im "5"3 1/2 (that 1/2 matters dammit) and currently weigh 80Kg and am a size 14/16. Ideally I want to get down to a size 10/12 and weigh about 65Kg so 15 kg to go!!!!
Am also finding www.fitday.com invaluble in tracking my calorie intake :)

(Comment on this)

Newbie *waves*
Hey yall...I just joined so I figured I should post something. ;]

This is one of the few communities that I've found that offers support with diets rather then eating disorders..I'm sad to say that I have considered anorexia but when I started crying when my mom ordered pizza for dinner one night I decided that that was *not* the way to go..lol.

Anyways, rite now I'm 5'3 at 166lbs -down from 173 since the 2nd- and I'm not trying to become a stick figure. I love having curves..I just want a few less lol. But if you want to know my whole dieting story just read my journal, and you can add me if you want. ;]

*waves* --kita

Current Mood: optimistic

(Comment on this)

hungry for support..*laughs*
Hi everyone.
My name is Nikki, I am 23 and Oh yes I am a chubby chick. *smiles* I jsut want to start out by saying I looked at a lot of groups for weight support on livejournal and this one seems to be the most positive and it does not promote eating disorders!!!! YEAY.

First off let me say that I do not mind being a little buxom and vuluptuous. One of my role models is Mae West who was a curvy loudmouthed actress who thought for herself and never made excuses or apologies. She was a succesfull actress and never ever tiny. She was an hourglass. I am normally an hourglass but married life has made me comfy and I packed on 30 pounds of wieght on my already curvy frame.

I joined this community because I want to post without riducule and I hope to get support and give support. I do not beleive in diet pills or quick schemes for weight loss. I want to EARN it. I like feeling accomplished and hard work does that. I do have a tendancy to binge eat so if anyone has tips for avoiding those late night snack cravings that get me in trouble I would love to hear them!!!

Vital stats...
I am 5'4 and 180 pounds.size 14 This has become unhealthy for me. Heart problems run in the family and I want to nip this before I get any larger.

I am out to lose about 30lbs of fat. And after that I just want to tone what I have. I do not want to be a size 2 or even a 5. I want to prove that I can be a size 8 or 10 and look fabulous. I jsut want to tone and have some muscle definition. That is more powerful and sexy to me then being able to see my hip bones!!!

I just got a boflex for my birthday and today is my first workout. I will post my waist,hip, thigh and whatever measurments tomorrow, and every two weeks update them. I am NOT NOT NOT going to look at a scale. If my clothes feel and look better that is what I am going by. People are too hung up on scales and they tend to depress me.

If anyone has any excercise routines that have worked for them pleas share them with me. Okay I am off to my boflex.
GOOD LUCK with your goals everyone. my IM screen name is iridianblaze if anyone wants to to chat.

Current Mood: optimistic

(1 Comment |Comment on this)

Hi, I just joined.

I'm 17, 76kg (167 lbs aprox.). I've just started to eat healthier and exercise more very recently. I created this journal to document my progress (add me if you like!) and to join like-minded comunities with. I'm glad to have found this community compared to all the other ana/mia communities out there.

Excited note: With my new exercise/healthy diet I've lost 2 kg (4.5 lbs aprox) in the last two or three days! I'm very happy :D

Plug: If you havent been to FitDay.com, I sugest you look it out It's very useful!

(2 Comments |Comment on this)

yay! it's nice to see a chub-positive weight loss community. all of those ana-mia communities piss me off to no end...

anyways, i started eating more healthy last month. i've become a strict vegetarian- no meat or dairy. my diet has been equal parts fruit/veg, grains, and soy products, eventually my diet will be mostly produce. it's really a struggle to consume 1500 calories of that stuff a day, i'm eating more now than before! i'm 5'4" and on april 15th i weighed 197 and this morning i weighed 185! my highest weight was 220 and i never want to be there again...i hold most of my weight in my legs (i'm a super pear) and it is soooo hard to do something as simple as walking when all of your weight is in your legs.

right now my goal is 160, which is what i weighed ten years ago in high school. after that i might push to 150 or 140, but i think i would look weird at anything under 140. i would have like a twenty inch waist and HUGE hips! it would look really bad, i am built to be a curvy, chubby gal :)

so good luck to you all, i look forward to posting more and seeing everyone reach their goals.

Current Mood: awake

(4 Comments |Comment on this)

New member - request for advice
I've been overweight for as long as I can remember. My parents were never big on eating healthy, so I never really learned how to do so. Now I'm 21 years old, and I'm realizing that living like this isn't a good idea. I had a baby three months ago, and I don't want to make the same mistakes my parents made. I want to teach her to eat right and exercise so that she stays healthy and happy.
When I became pregnant, I wore a size 20. That was down from a 24 the year before (after being down to an 18 a year before that). Now I have no idea what size I wear - I'm still wearing my maternity clothes. When I first went to the doctor, I weighed about 295 lbs, which went up to 305 in the last month of my pregnancy (and has since gone back down to what it was). Thankfully, I'm healthy otherwise, but I'm realizing that I can't keep this up. Sure, I'm healthy now, but if I don't lose some of this weight I don't know that I'm going to be this healthy 10 years from now. My goal weight is 180. I know it's a lot, but I don't want to lose it all at once. My goal is to be down to that weight by my daughter's second birthday (2/5/06).
I'm looking for advice on how to switch my cooking and eating styles from Hamburger Helper & frozen pizza to more healthy foods. I love to cook, and I don't mind preparing and eating vegetables, but my fiancee doesn't like them all that much, and I don't want to make two different meals every night. On top of that, with the baby around I don't always have time to cook, or dont feel like it, so a lot of time I'll end up asking my fiancee to cook (which is where the Hamburger Helper & pizzas come in). And then I have the problem of money. I can't always afford to get the healthier foods sold in the stores, as I just lost my job and my fiancee can barely cover the bills with his income.
I really want to change this part of my life. I want to be healthy, and I want my daughter to learn to eat right from the start instead of having to change her eating habits later on like I'm going to have to. Any suggestions on how to start?
Thanks.
-Rachel
Note: Cross-posted in curvyandfit)

(3 Comments |Comment on this)

Why is this so *hard?* I feel like I'm doing the right things, that I'm cutting back on what I eat, then I crunch numbers and find out I'm eating more calories than I thought and according to new research, I should be eating even fewer then I thought. I know I know... ounting calories and obsessing isn't helping. I just did it to have a look at where I was. I don't know how on earth I'm supposed to get all the fiber and vegitables and stuff I need and still stay under 1800 calories a day. Argh! I'm just frustrated.

It makes me all the more jealous of my WLS friends. They looks litterally 10 lbs a *week* sometimes, while I doing it the "old fahsion" way hover around 5 a month when I'm lucky. At that rate it'll take me almost a year to get to my goal. Oh to be big enough for them to rip me apart and put me back together again. (No, I don't really wish that.)


I have yoga tonight. If I can stop falling asleep on my desk, I should feel better after that. I need to have a really light dinner tonight. That shouldn't be hard, I'll just have soup or soemthing.

The thing about weight loss, people who are snarky about it, act like if you just "put down the double cheeseburger!!!" it falls right off. Er.... they should all be reverse lyposuctioned. Any one can walk away from a cheeseburger, or hell, eat nothing at all for whole day-- but it's not just one day. It's day after day after day...
It's like that old quoute, "Any idiot can get by in a crisis. It's the day to day living that wears you down."

Current Mood: frustrated

(4 Comments |Comment on this)

Help!
I'm so frustrated I just can't stand it. I've lost 15 lbs since Halloween and now it's just.... stopped. I've been following the advice in the fabulous book, "Fit From Within" by Victoria Moran--- skipping only adding a spiritual element and getting a network of support--- so in desperation, I started praying before meals (something Wiccans don't as a rule, do) and joined this group. I too, don't want to be "skinny" (I'm 5'9" about 210 lbs according to my overly friendly scale, and about a size 16) and I'm aiming for about 165-175 size 12-14. I gained a lot of weight after my knee surgary this fall and lost it all- so why won't my body keep going? I do excersize when I can (Yoga, swimming, walking and of course, physical therapy) but I know you aren't supposed to excersize when you are sick and I've had no fewer than 3 flus and 5 colds this winter!!! ARGH!!!

I'm just at my wits end and thinking about giving up. I have two good friends whoh've had WLS (gastric bypass) and drop pounds like there's no tomorrow. I know they don't mean to, but they do nothing but talk about how skinny they are and it was so easy for them- I just want to beat them about the head and face with a pillow. It's as though they've totally forgotten what it's like to be on this side of the fat hill. I know having the surgery isn't easy- but for those of us who never let ourselves get big enough to qualify (my Dr. laughed at me when I asked) it's really hard to look at their new size 8 bodies and not be angry when they rub it in our faces, even without meaning to.

I hope someone can help me, I feel really wimpy and vunerable airing all this out, but well hell... I guess it's worth a try. Sorry.

Current Mood: nervous

(3 Comments |Comment on this)

Introduction
Hi! I've just joined the community after finding it through velcroswench's userinfo. I'm currently trying to put together my own eating and exercise plan based on World Health Organisation recommendations, rather than diet industry ones, which I've found are often misleading. If people are interested, I'll post the details once I'm confident I've got something workable. I'm actually pretty excited at the moment because I think that after working on this approach for about five months and having several false starts, it's finally starting to come together. I think all I need to work on now is keeping to the official guidelines on alcohol and making sure I'm getting enough fibre, and I'll be following all the official recommendations. I'm mainly doing this for health reasons, but if I get down a dress size or two, it'll be a nice side-effect.

Current Mood: hopeful

(2 Comments |Comment on this)

new member
Hi everyone, I just joined. I'm a chubby chick, size 18 - 20 depending on the cut of the clothing. I've been chubby for as long as I can remember. Always dieting and hating my body, but I'm trying to change my stinkin thinkin. I want to be content with my size and for the most part I am at times, but at others, I wish I were thinner. I try making healthy choices when it comes to food but I'm always struggling with a work out routine. I start off strong for a couple of months then lose all motivation. Right now I'm stuck with having to motivate myself again. Working out just seems like such a chore to me. Goodness, I mean I even start to yawn during a workout. That's how bad it gets. I was wondering what others do to motivate themselves when it comes to excercise and just dieting in general.
Thanks for your input in advance.

(5 Comments |Comment on this)

Newbie
Hello all. I just joined and decided I would post.
I'm Jackie. I'm 22. I live in Oklahoma with my husband and our 2 kitty cats.
I've lost 35 lbs since early this year and am now roughly 212 lbs. I am completely content where I am but still wouldn't mind getting under the 200 mark. ;) (only 12 lbs to go, why not)
I have been chubby all my life. I have been on and off diets since I was 13 and never stuck to any until this year when I lost 35 lbs. I tried the ever popular Atkins diet which failed miserably and almost caused me to have kidney failure (Gee no one told me it was hard on your kidneys. Go figure) so now I'm back to just eating under a certain number of calories a day (thanks to fitday.com) and exercising whenever I darn well please. >:)

I never ever want to be a skinny girl. I've lived almost my whole life looking at this chubby girl and I don't want to lose that because I think I am beautiful. I just don't think I would look right were I to be skinny.

Anyways, that’s me. Hi everyone. :)

Current Mood: content

(5 Comments |Comment on this)

Holy Freaking Gods!
I have not been to the gym last week. Various states of being busy and being lazy have interfered. I have been doing my bouncies, but not as regularly as I want.

After one week on the Atkins diet.

I have lost 12 Pounds.

Holy freaking smokes.

wow.
wow.
wow.

I am a happy bunny. I am, I am, I am. :D

Current Mood: ecstatic

(2 Comments |Comment on this)

New to the Community
I am Achbar..I just wanted to drop in and say Hello.

Achbar

(2 Comments |Comment on this)

More on that diet thang...
I think I'm doing pretty good with this so far. I've had some craving (waaah, no oj) but I'm living. ;)

Day one's dinner was pork chops & salad with some kinda mushroom sauce. Snack was a few olives.

Day two's Breakfast was 2 eggs, 2 slices of bacon and a babybel cheese. Lunch was a salad similar to Day 1's, but with tuna & mayo isntead of roast beef. Dinner was steak (and a few bites of salad). Had some olives. Think I had another babybell between breakfast and lunch.

Day three's Breakfast was 2 eggs, 2 mushrooms sauteed in real butter (oh so good), 2 pieces of bacon, and one sausage. Lunch was same as day two...tuna salad. Dinner was roast chicken and some mange tout peas made with a lil water and a touch of butter. Again with the babybel's and the olives. Matter of fact, had to run some errands on the way home and was starving so had a babybel light and about 6 or 7 olives. Hunger vanquished. :)

Day four's Breakfast was 2 eggs, 1 mushroom sauteed in real butter, 2 pieces of bacon, one sausage, some mozarella and a mixed watercress, spinach, and rocket salad. Lunch was the ubiquitous tuna salad (man I'm glad I'm home tomorrow, must see about taking lunch to work next week lol). No snacks so far.

I'll be weighing myself on Monday and will duly post my progress. ;)

Current Mood: calm

(4 Comments |Comment on this)

The Evil Atkins Diet
Well it's not evil. From what I've personally heard and read on my friends' lj's, it's actually quite good. So, taking inspiration from evergrey I've decided to take the plunge. Not like I was getting anywhere with the low fat diet. ;)

( Wench muses on the meals of the dayCollapse )

Sooo...anyone else tried Atkins? What did / do you think?

Current Mood: contemplative

(5 Comments |Comment on this)

If this isnt suitable for this community, please let me know and I wont post this type of thing again :)

( But, has anyone else seen the UK mag, Spirit & Destiny? Collapse )

Current Mood: calm

(1 Comment |Comment on this)