Winning Weight Loss Newsletter to Debut

First, thank you to all who have subscribed to the new Winning Weight Loss newsletter! I really appreciate the interest!

I am at work on our first edition right now, so you will get it soon!

Just a reminder --- if you did not find an email asking you to confirm your subscription, please check your 'spam' or 'bulk' folder in your email program.

Even if you clicked the button on here to subscribe, I cannot send you a newsletter unless you also click the link from the email you should have received. Otherwise, I'd be guilty of spamming, and I don't want to do that. It's a simple click, no hassle, and you can always opt out at any time.

If you can't find it, please try subscribing again. I don't want you to miss your first edition! Right now, we have 12 subscribers pending confirmation, 3 whose email addresses were somehow undeliverable, and 20 who are good to go. Not bad for a week! Thanks so much!

I used to publish a monthly print newsletter, so a weekly ezine is a new venture but not totally alien to me. It should be fun and helpful, I hope. It will help me have an outlet and focus in reaching goal and then maintaining, and I will do my very best to make it helpful to you, as well! I will probably experiment a little bit, as I learn my way, but we can enjoy the process together.

My intention is to share a menu and recipes for the week, along with a few good tips, tools, strategies, or thoughts. I will post most of these later to the website, but newsletter subscribers will get first peek, in case you want to include a few of my ideas in your planning and shopping for the week.

Hey, just a weekly reminder to stick to plan (or jump back on) might come in handy some day --- for all of us! We're all in this together!

Be watching your inbox!

My Virtual Model (Tuesday's Tips and Tools)

Have you tried MyVirtualModel.com?

It lets you make and save models of yourself at different sizes.

Here is my virtual model at 222 lbs., 136 lbs., and 118 lbs.

























You can even 'try on' various outfits and swimwear, and rotate them to view from different angles. Fun and motivating!

How Many Calories? (Tuesday: Tips & Tools)

I have long heard the idea that we must all have a certain number of calories a day (usually 1200 or more for women, 1500 or more for men) to prevent going into starvation mode. I am just not sure that is the same number for everyone.

I am, it turns out, a little person. (Who knew?)

When I go to The Daily Plate Calorie Calculator and type in my age, height, and weight, then select the setting to lose a standard 2 lbs. per week, the program tells me that I would need to eat 687 calories a day to achieve that.

When I go to FitWatch.com and use the standard Harris Benedict BMR (basal metabolic rate) equation to tell me how how many calories a day I will need to maintain my weight at goal, it generates a number of 1199 calories per day to maintain my body at rest.

That is usually how they calculate how many calories to give to someone in a coma.

My only offset option is to add activity and exercise, which I do. If I burn 400 more, I can eat 400 more, but the underlying physiological equation remains.


I think a great deal of what an individual needs will depend upon individual variables, like muscle mass and activity levels. Other things like thyroid function and so on are also personal variables. It seems that a given individual might actually use 10% to 30% more or fewer calories, depending on those factors.

A good rule of thumb for dieters is to start at the calorie level of your calculated BMR, adding in moderate exercise as able. After a while, you can see for yourself if that is an accurate level for you.