I feel like all I do is talk about losing weight and I dont ever actually do it. I dont know where to start or what to do. No matter how many books I read or people I talk to I fail. Coming here reading success stories make me happy but not enough to push me. It just makes me doubt myself and think Ill never do it. My life is finally in order. Now if only i could get my eatiing on track and stop binging. Today I did decent. Im just not sure what else to do. Someone help me. What did you do to start out???
Well, you just -start-. With the Very Next Decision you make with food and exercise. You make a better choice than you might otherwise. Maybe you decide to plan out what you're going to eat tomorrow, or make a commitment to exercise just for today.
You make that decision, EVERY decision. And if you make a less-ideal decision once or twice, you just start again at the Very. Next. Decision. And so on!
Agree with mandalinn about just starting with better decisions.
Everyone is different and works for one might not work for others. What works for me is incremental steps. For example, if I try to ditch all my bad eating habits at once, I fail. But if I work on one thing at a time, I can do it. It takes longer, but it works. For example, first I stopped eating all fast food. Now that I no longer crave fast food, I am working on sweets. My eating has improved so much, but it took time. Same thing with exercise - I eased back after a fracture in my foot and am up to most days of the week. Again, it took time to get here. But if I had tried to start out doing too much, I would have burned out and quit.
So you might need to experiment to see what works for you. But as suggested, be mindful of your choices. It's the best way to start.
i started off saying i would walk on the treadmill for 10 minutes a day and now i'm at minimum a half hour to an hour. i started my diet by doing one day being perfectly on plan and one day eating as usual until i finally was able to make good choices every day. i also read books like retrain your brain reshape your body, the end to overeating, books in general on overeating etc.
i don't see myself as successful by far, we all always struggle but i think the most important thing i have learned this time around is that If I ever do something wrong one day, I will not go into a week long off plan binge. I will tell myself that the next day I will be on plan no matter what and just keep going. the key is to keep going - someone on here said, i tripped but didn't fall. if you trip it doesn't mean you have to fall just keep going
I posted in your other thread, but I'm happy to share how I started.
It was mid July - I had been wanting/longing/dreaming about being thin for about 20 years. I had lost weight and gained it back. I desperately wanted to be thin - all those years.
Several things happened in July:
1. My "loose fit" size 18 Eddie Bauer jeans I wore EVERY DAY got so tight I had to keep them unbuttoned. My boyfriend at the time said to buy bigger jeans, but I was horrified at the idea.
2. My slender beautiful mother wanted me to come visit for Christmas. I was so ashamed, I had not seen her in at least 2 years (maybe more, it's a little fuzzy).
3. I went to the bathroom at the movies. Sat down and cut the outside of my left outer thigh on a sharp-edged metal trash receptacle. A normal person would have fit, but my thighs were too big, I was too big. A lifetime of airline belt extenders flashed through my head. I sat and cried.
So, all of that was swirling around. I was walking through a Borders flipping through weight loss books - I was always such a sucker for weight loss/diet books, I must have bought 20 over the years. I picked up Super Foods Rx: 14 Foods That Will Change Your Life and I was transfixed. It was like a grabbed an electric fence.
I knew, right then - how to lose weight and keep it off forever.
I had always wanted to diet - I thought I could do ANYTHING to lose weight - painful hungry days, foods I hated. I wanted to diet for a short time and then eat normal. For 20 years, I had cut my calories back to deprivation levels and two things always happened:
1. I would restrict so much, I would hopelessly binge. Then I would feel guilty and restrict, then binge. And then completely give up, feeling like an out of control loser with no willpower. Any weight lost would be regained.
2. Less frequently, I would reach a goal weight and give up. Any weight lost would be regained.
I knew this time, I had to change my normal, give up the idea of dieting and change how I ate. It was no mystery to me why I was fat (although I told myself some pretty excuses about being gentically destined or big boned or some other lie) I ate over 3K+ overly processed sugary calories a day and didn't exercise.
So - the super foods book was a relevation. All of my grandparents had died young (cancer, cancer, diabetes, alzheimers) and the author made the science of nutrition so accessible to me. All of a sudden, I knew that I could eat better to make myself the healthiest person. I would eat super foods!
And that's what I did. Instead of planning to start the next day or Monday or the next week because the weekend was something special, yadda yadda yadda, I started that very second. My plan has evolved and changed, but the heart is the same - eat good, whole foods, limit processed foods.
I make grocery lists, I shop, I pack lunches, I cook, I practice portion control, I use my food scale, I journal. From day 1 to today. And although it is WORK, it WORKS.
I never dreamed I would be slender, skinnier than high school. I never dreamed I would have so many pretty clothes or look so fab in pictures. I never dreamed I would have so much energy, be so happy, smile at strangers, have a great driver's license picture.
I've always said that losing weight was both the hardest and the easiest thing I have ever done. Everyone knows that an apple is a better snack than chips, but it's far more difficult to have the apple handy when you're hungry.
And just to add - if you had told heavy, fat, depressed, lethargic Jennifer 5 years ago that I wouldn't eat scones or muffins or nachos or fast food, I would have thought you were crazy. Those were my FAVORITES, I loved those foods, I ate them all the time, they were so yummy!
I don't miss them AT ALL. Not a bit. I've had that chance in my life - to eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, it didn't make me happy. It might have tasted good for a minute, but I was an unhealthy, unhappy, miserable person who longed to be thin.
Now, I eat carefully, mindfully, lots of fruit, vegetables, lean protein and I am happy. I do have the occasional treat - but it's never a free for all like the past, and I'm okay with that.
My life is so different, so much better, it's worth 1000 scones or 100000 M&Ms.
Breanna--You had one decent day. Now, build on it. Have a decent day tomorrow. And, keep on doing it. If you have a bad day, get right back on and keep going forward. Once you get some momentum going, it really helps.
You don't need to wait for motivation or the right time, it might not come. Losing weight is never going to get easier. In fact, it will only get harder the more you gain (I know this from experience). Start right now. Next year at this time, you will be so incredibly glad you did.
For one week, cut out all other drinks but water. No soda or alcohol or anything. The next week, cut out all fast food - and replace it with fruit. The next, candy. And so on.
It will take awhile, but eventually you will get to where you want to be. You have to be confident in yourself. This is YOUR life. Don't let food run it. Take control and make those baby steps.
Write your reasons why you want to lose weight. What are you missing out on in life due to your weight? Really, write down the advantages of being leaner and the disadvantages of a higher BMI. Do some research on obesity and the consequences of staying heavy and how it changes your life negatively, if you continue to stay that way.
There is no magic pill and everyone has a different methodology. The only constant for everyone is calories in-calories out. We all have to burn more calories than we eat to lose weight.
Pick 3 things to change. Work on those until you have a good grip on it. Then, choose another 3. Good luck.
FRUSTRATED WITH MYSELF (little rant)
