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Congratulations Sisky! It's awesome, isn't it? I'm not quite there yet - but I've made a lot of progress over the summer riding my bike (I've been tracking my mileage in my journal). I also do strength training at the gym and the results I've been getting are insane! My weight hasn't dropped too much but I have gone down several pant sizes! My biggest victory though was kicking my soda habit. I stopped drinking soda in January of this year and now I drink water instead. I feel better and my skin is looking better too! I wish I had done this years ago!
Keep up the good work - I'm rooting for you!

*hugs*
Snufflypoo

You've realized what many others would benefit from adopting. Functional strength is extremely important yet so many women believe lifting weights for strengthening purposes rather than endurance will cause them to buff up like Arnold. In reality, most women don't have the testosterone levels to do so. Muscle weighs more than fat, but muscle will prevent numerous age-related injuries seen in the clinics I volunteer with. Muscle also burns A LOT of calories for the long run and the act of lifting weights is often more beneficial than a couple minutes on an elliptical.

Growing up, I was always pressured to be skinny and low in weight. How skinny and how heavy seemed like meaningless goals as I befriended girls who could eat a horse and never gain a pound as well as women with a prominent back-end that attracted the attention of all men within a 50 ft radius. I had success with dieting once, but it was achieved after a summer of lying prone on my deck sunbathing and surviving on watermelon and green tea. It was a sedentary lifestyle that I obviously couldn't maintain as school restarted and I was forced to consume hard food for mobility energy.

Losing weight consumed my thoughts and eventually turned into an obsession that only worsened my problem.

When I tore my ACL and went to physical therapy, I finally realized the importance of strength over weight. Muscle helps you heal and saves you from further injury. The more muscle you have, the better an injury will heal. Muscle helps you burn more calories so excess weight won't lead to injury. I realized that working out for the sake of losing weight is an endless battle, but building muscle for the purpose of becoming strong and living life to the fullest potential 20 years down the road is worth working toward.

I am 5'6, weigh 160 lbs, and I am a bad a** ********.

Good luck!

I'm a kind of person who wants to get in shape and my 2 other sisters that is why we made a after school club in are school called FUN FITNESS , which I would say is a success because more than 40 people signed up and they like!
I also work out with my big sis every day, we play dance central on Xbox360 and we do bicycles and sit-ups, push-ups, steam engines and more! I definitely agree with you!
I'm 137 pounds and I'm 5'something!

Sounds like a plan! Breaking away from the scale (or pant size) was hard for me to do in high school..I kept trying to squeeze into clothes that were too small for me and trying to shrink into them - it was really comical.

I think the best motivation I got was later on, when I had people to I loved and cherished telling me that I looked beautiful as my own uniquely proportioned self Good stuff.

Cheers to all of you. This is a journal entry every young girl and young woman on Gaia should read.

For myself, I dearly wish I didn't have asthma. All my life it has held me back from being as physically active as I'd like and as would be good to keep me healthy. I'm only about 20lb beyond "healthy" but I know I could be so much more if only my lungs allowed me. I could get there...sort of. I'd have to work just as hard as an athlete in training to get to where a normal person can be without such work, and that is so depressing I've never had the will to do so. Pathetic, but my own little story.

WOW