Your thoughs are normal, but they're just thoughts, they're not reality. It sounds like you may be depressed (because even being humongously fat as I am, even at weights twice as high as I've ever been, life does not have to be as hopeless as you're seeing it right now).
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Originally Posted by Primary Colors Rule
Hi Everyone,
Every night I go to sleep thinking I am going to make a change. I am going to get out and walk. I am going to take my daughter to the park. I only meet these goals 20 percent of the time.
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That 20% already puts you ahead of most people. You need to know this, because you're seeing failure where success is standing. Reward that 20%.
I've lost 90 lbs on far less than 20% success. I STILL don't succeed 20% of the time, but I've learned I don't have to. I don't have to be perfect (or even a specific percentage of perfect), I just have to do better. When I do better, I get better - and every single improvement is worth it.
I'm still hugely fat. I may always be hugely fat, but my life is monumentally better than it was 90 lbs ago. I first started noticing important improvements after my first 30 lbs. I'm not willing to go back, so even if I never lose another pound, I'm not willing to backslide, because my life is better now and I want it to keep being better. I don't have to be perfect to deserve a good life. And to have a good life, I have to make it good.
You can make your life good too. It doesn't have to be perfect to be good, and every little, tiny scrap of happiness is worth holding onto. You can do this, but it does take more than hope.
If you have no hope, you're dealing with depression and have to deal with that. Weight loss can help, but doesn't cure depression. If you're dealing with actual depression, you have to deal with that before, or at least as you try to lose weight.
You also have to be less hard on yourself. Know that most people fail at this. That doesn't mean success isn't possible. The only reason most people fail, is because we have this cultural mindset that there are two options where weight loss is concerned "strictly, perfectly on a weight loss plan" or entirely off-plan. We're taught that there is no middle-ground - if you can't do it "right" then don't do it at all. That's nonsense, and when you stop believing it, there's never any reason to not keep trying.
When we see slow or small success as failure, we stop trying because we think "what's the use." Most people don't quit because they ARE failing, but because they feel like they're failing, because their success hasn't been everything they've dreamed (and we're taught to dream bigger than reality can ever deliver).
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I feel like I am dying inside. My breasts are very large and prevent me from exercising (J-L cup) and my back hurts. I just want to be able to love my body and even if I lose this weight I realize I am still not going to love it any more than I used to because I will probably have loose skin and my stomach, which used to be perfect and the one thing I liked about myself is gone.
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Your body doesn't have to be perfect to love it (or for others to love it either). If that were true, 99% of the population would be unloved and unloveable.
You may not be ready to get in the water, but water excercise would be ideal for you. Which is why I HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE that our culture convinces women that their bodies must be perfect to deserve the privelege of swimming. It's a big lie. You're entitled to enjoy yourself and enjoy your body and what it can do at any size. I was very lucky to have a passion for the water as long as I can remember, so as hard as it was to get in the water (at times, especially when I was younger and cared more about what other people thought, the walk to the water could feel like a deathmarch) I was too in love with the water to let it stop me. Yes it was frightening, and it took a lot of courage, but it required less and less courage each time, until I truly did feel that no one could stop me.
I don't know if that's possible for you, at this point - but it's definitely possible to work up to. If you find an activity that's physically comfortable and fun, don't let **** itself stop you from having that fun.
There is a lot more to you to like than your body (I like you already, and I can't see your body).
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I can't talk to anyone about this because it is embarrassing.
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It's embarassing because you think you're alone. You're not. Fat = hopelessness and worthlessness, is a cultural value. A lot of people believe it (and it doesn't make it true). There are at least hundreds of thousands of women who feel exactly as you do, and sadly, thousands of them aren't even overweight. Many of them look perfect to everyone but themselves.
Practice talking about it here at 3FC, you'll find many of us understand, many of us have been there (or still are) and many of us have conquered that embarassment and the fear it causes.
For me, the support of women who do know how I feel is very important, and I get that through 3FC and my TOPS group (taking off pounds sensibly). TOPS is sort of like a non-profit Weight Watchers, but it's tons cheaper (there's a $26 joining fee, which includes a montly motivational magazine, and my monthly dues are $5 - and there are ways to win back some of my money with various contests).
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I feel like I wont have a chance to date or get married if things should not work out with my daughter's father. I feel perpetually alone.
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I really believe this is depression talking, but if you really believe it, I can tell you it's bull****. Fat does not have to equal alone. I've always been fat (since kindergarten anyway, with a few years close to normal in high school) and I've dated better men than my thin, beautiful sisters and friends - because I KNEW I deserved it, and any man I dated had to know it to.
If you think you're wonderful, men will too (so start finding something about yourself to like besides physicality).
I met my amazing husband at nearly my highest weight (restaurant dates added about 20 lbs), and married him at my absolutely highest weight. We are both fat in our wedding pictures, but we're also gorgeous because our happiness shows through. Happiness trumps all other forms of beauty.
Happiness attracts people too. Even though my husband is also very fat, he is so fun and charismatic that there are always younger, thinner, prettier women trying to take him away from me (some bold enough to attempt it in front of my face, thinking I'm no competition). I'm not afraid of the competition, because I know I have those women beat where it counts. I'm the one he loves, and it's not because I'm beautiful - but he sees me as beautiful because he loves me (love also trumps physical beauty).
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I can't cope with the fact that I am going to be and feel inadequate for the rest of my life. I won't be able to have sex and actually enjoy it. Go to the beach and actually focus on swimming and not everyone laughing at me. Wear clothes that I enjoy or anything.
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You are not inadequate. Not now, not at a higher weight, not at a lower weight. You could have six eyes, and twelve legs and you would not be inadequate. You can enjoy sex at any size (many 500 lb women do). You can learn to enjoy swimming and to nmot focus on anyone laughing at you.
You can enjoy life at any size, and that you're not getting any enjoyment from life sounds very much like depression. It doesn't sound like you're getting any enjoyment from life right now, and that's not natural even for someone weighing 600 lbs. If you're getting no enjoyment in life, not even from the smallest pleasures, that's clinical depression not any external issue like your weight.
It isn't fun to be overweight, but if you're experiencing almost no pleasure, that's not the weight talking, that's something else (possibly clinical depression).
I urge you to get help for the depression. Weight alone shouldn't be holding you back this much. It doesn't have to hold you back this much.
I wish you the best, because you deserve it.