How did you choose a goal weight? I have been going back and forth. During high school I was in the 160-175 range, but a normal bmi would be 150 and below for me. My surgeon set the 60% of excess weight goal, but I definitely want to do more than that... Any pointers? I don't want to be too wishy washy with myself and do less than I should, but I also don't want to set an unattainable goal.

How did you handle your goals? Right now I have my surgeon's goal (207), a personal goal (175) and then a couple of stretch goals (160, 145). I feel like I need to set some kind of goal for personal accountability, but I really don't want to feel like a failure if I don't make it... How did you end up deciding on goals? were they Fluid or set?

My Dr. said early on I should have a BMI of 25 and under. So for me 150-155lbs. I told myself my goal would be 160 first and then go from there. The thing is (and I'm sure you're heard this a million times), everyone's body is so different (body type, size etc). I love that I lost all the weight, plus some, but I am 100% happy at where my weight is now. I'm am currently hoping to tone, and maintain. I'm fine with no more weight loss, and my Dr. said I could stop loosing if I was comfortable with where I was with my weight. I just would look anorexic if I was in a size 5/6 (currently I am a 8/10). That's just me, I just don't have the body type to be super thin. Some people look great, I look like a bobble head.

I suggest you read up on BMI. BMI is different based on gender and age. If you plug in your height, you should get a low BMI weight and high BMI weight, which is a pretty wide range. From there, I would experience how you feel as you are losing weight and get a sense of what's feels best to you.

I went with a healthy BMI for my age & height.

This is a great question! I have never been within spitting range of my healthy BMI, but, like you, the lowest range would leave me looking like a bobble head! ????

I chose my goal weight (150) as what I weighed in my mid 20's when I was a fit, ripped, in shape raft guide and ski instructor. That just so happened to be the high end of normal BMI. My surgeon's goal was 10 pounds more than that. As I was losing I actually would have been happy at 170. But I passed my personal goal at 7 months I ended up stabilizing around 138-140....10-12 pounds LESS than my original goal weight. You never know what you can accomplish until you try!

That's a good question, but for me, I'm just going to see where the journey takes me. I'm only about seven months out, and if it stopped here, I'm still happier and healthier than I was a year ago. So I would'nt be disappointed. But it's not over, I'm still going strong, in fact I have more enthusism to get healthier today than any time since surgery. With spring coming, I can't wait to try out this new body, I move with a lot more ease and I'm feelin' good.