Discouraged over thighs

[flight301]

Hi!

I lost 60 pounds over the past year and have maintained my weight with intuitive eating and avoiding sugar and junk food. I am very happy with my weight loss and I don't even necessarily want to lose more weight; I fluctuate around 150 pounds. I'm 5'6 and I always start to look too skinny below 140 and it takes me a lot of effort to get to that point or maintain my weight that low. I've basically plateaued at 150 and haven't been as successful at losing more weight. This weight feels good to me upper body wise (my waist is 28 inches and super defined, I have a flat stomach and somewhat defined abs, my arms are fine, even my hips are ok at 38 inches). I have broad shoulders that match the width of my hips, and I'm like an hourglass cursed with stupidly thick thighs which I cannot make a dent on.

My thighs are 23 inches and are thick down to the knee area. From the side, they are the same thickness as my waist! It doesn't look right at all. I don't mind the upper thigh being a little thicker, I like some curves, but I hate that they don't taper down more to the knee; that DOES NOT look good in pants, or out of pants for that matter. I basically am stuck wearing loose pants all the time, which depresses me, and loose shirts to balance out my upper half/lower half. It's ridiculous and frustrating the hell out of me. I have zero interest in having the perfect body, I just want to have more balanced legs/thighs.

My diet is good; I eat a lot of salads, I avoid desserts and sugary things. I'm not perfect, I have cheat days but I DO NOT eat huge portions of cheat foods. For example, I will have pizza once every 2 weeks and eat 2 slices - and that will be the extent of my junk food eating. A girl needs to live a little, and I do so within reason. If I go out to eat, I eat burger and fries, but I leave more than half of the food on the plate. I eat like any naturally thin person I know eats, but am more restrictive with sweets.

I have been exercising consistently 6-7 days a week for 2-3 months now. I do Windsor buns & thighs, Ballet Beautiful inner & outer thigh workouts that are on youtube, and I have started doing callanetics too out of desperation (I modify the original and only do the exercises targeting the legs and thighs because thats all I can tolerate - and the rest of my body looks fine so I don't care to work abs/arms). I do 2-3 videos a night for the most part since they are only about 15-20 min each. I am less consistent with cardio, but I was consistently hiking 2 hours a day 2-3 days a week (not easy hikes, difficult uphill hikes) and that did not make a dent. My thigh measurements have not budged!!!

Can anyone offer me hope that I will someday push through this plateau and maybe reduce my thighs a bit more??? I feel like all my weight loss has been pointless, because I'm still having to hide under baggy clothes...

[cherimac]

Pilates has been my magic bullet and barre made me have saddle bags...and I never ever had them before! So, everyone is different.

So, I would say you could give it a bit more time(you didn't say if you were exercising before the last 2-3 months you mentioned) OR try something totally different, like heavy lower body weights. Some people do much better with that.

Above all, embrace your shape! I bet you look far better than you think you do. We are our own worst critics.

[dnna]

congratulations on all you have achieved and I would love to have that figure! I have seriously changed my legs by doing this lying down yoga workout,about 30 minutes. I have no idea why this worked for me. I also do a chair yoga workout.Jane Adams gentle yoga lying down section and Yoga for seniors chair yoga. I was so afraid I would lose all my good work.
anyway, I also lay down on a matt when I am watching tv, and do pilates moves radomly with a band or without. and lots of stretching with a band , and legs up on the wall and reclining goddess. I think this helps more than you would expect. It is like an extra little pilates session. (I do live alone so I am not annoying anyone)
good luck, I am sure you will get some great suggestions. I would love the pilates chair or reformer but the band will have to do.

Squeeze by tracy effinger has some great moves- the L! and I do that a lot too

[cherimac]

Just having seen your picture, you are DEFINITELY being hard on yourself. I think you look great and in proportion.

[summer breeze]

The above suggestions sound great and I would agree with them. I also think some of the newer Callanetics dvds would be great to add in since many of them have shorter targeted segments like the Callanetics Express dvd. I always felts Ellen Barrett's workouts were good for the thighs with all her plies and side lunges/leg lifts. I just wanted to add that I think you look fabulous in the photo and I really think your thighs fit right in proportionately with the rest of you. Congrats on the weight loss!

[flight301]

I appreciate the positive feedback, and I don't think I have a terrible body - but I also don't think I'm being unreasonable. I don't have the biggest thighs when you compare me to someone who is overweight, but in the attached picture I'm wearing black pants a very baggy shirt and you can't tell that my thighs are the same size/bigger than my waist from the side view. I definitely have heavy thighs, I am not imagining this because 90% of pants do not fit me properly, and while they are smaller because I am at a low weight for my body type, they are still quite large given the size of my hips/waist. I feel like I picked a picture taken at a good angle in my first post, in the current picture this is more of a worst case angle, but you can see how small my midsection is and it looks more out of proportion.

Idk, I was looking for hope that maybe I can lean out more. I don't really want to lose more weight, I just want somewhat leaner less dense thighs.

[dutchgirl]

I had the best thighs of my life when I was spinning 2x per week.

I recently purchased a bike and hope to get back to those great thighs.

That being said, my legs are naturally heavier. I'm aiming for the best version of me knowing I'll never be described as having willowy legs.

[Sissy B]

Originally Posted by cherimac

Just having seen your picture, you are DEFINITELY being hard on yourself. I think you look great and in proportion.

I agree!

[muffins135]

cherimac, what is it about barre that gave you saddlebags? And what is it about Pilates that is a magic bullet for you? I'm very curious about this. I'm hoping Barre will help my saddle bags.

[noodles]

Wow congratulations, you worked so hard and look great in the photos! Personally I've found my thighs really show definition when I use fairly heavy weights, working my legs 3 times/ week, along with hiit/ plyo type cardio. I use mainly Cathe and Ingrid's Booty extreme 2 DVD's and do intervals on the treadmill twice weekly at orangetheory which peeled those layers of fat right off my legs. We're all different but i hope you find something that helps you achieve your goals.
Jamie