I recommitted to my journey towards health and weight loss in late March and came back to Sparkpeople to give it an honest try since I had been kind of lurking but not using all the tools off and on for years.

My only real goal was to just stick to tracking my food no matter what and try to exercise at least 4 times a week, and I had a bunch of long term goals, but no real structure for myself. One thing I did differently was reach out to the community of Sparkpeeps and I eventually found myself on some teams and started seeing things about challenges and goal setting. I was intrigued. It seems like most of the people who have lost weight had pretty solid short term goals and long term goals and held themselves accountable.

On a whim (and maybe Sparkpoint greed!) I bought the book "The Spark" and have been devouring it. I am NO STRANGER to dieting in general. My first diet was Richard Simmons Live-It Diet back in the 80's (Tootsie Rolls anyone? Not the candy, the exercise) and I've been to Weight Watchers through SEVERAL spokespeople from Vanessa Redgrave to Fergie, Duchess of York. I called Jenny. I tried Nutrisystem and lasted two days before eating a week's worth of freeze dried cow pucky in one sitting because I was ravenous. I did Medifast in the 80's and the revamped version about two years ago. I did the cabbage soup diet. I did the Weigh-Down Workshop (But not for long), and had the most success with Overeaters Anonymous which isn't a diet, but a 12 step program. What I'm saying is that dieting -- and the full on REJECTION of dieting is not new to me.

What *IS* new to me is all this goal setting. I have read a lot of articles about SMART goal setting and joined a few challenges that have small simple goals each week. It's like HALLELUJAH up in here! Lightbulbs, fireworks, angels singing. I think I friggin GET IT NOW.

So as far as April goes, I didn't have very solid goals so I don't have very measureable results unless I run my reports from the trackers.

In April I lost 6.5 lbs.
I tracked my food every day
I drank at least 8 glasses of water every day
I stayed withing my calorie range 14 days out of 30
I burned 11, 095 calories
I lost 1.5 inches off my waist and 2.5 inches off my hips.
AND I set some goals for May.

I put my May goals on my Sparkpage so I can see them every day. I'm going to work on staying in my calorie range for at least 6 days a week. I am going to do the Spring Into Shape Bootcamp exercises every day. I'm going to weigh and measure my food so I get used to correct portion sizes. I'm going to continue to avoid white sugar and white flour. I am going to track my goals and hold myself accountable. I hope to have more movement on the scale and measuring tape by June 1.

Oh yeah, June 1. I am running a 5K. I am in denial about this, but it's happening, I just got an email asking me what size t-shirt I need.

I am DONE with nebulous ambiguity when it comes to goals!