An actual fit of rage
 

1

Gosh, you must be really frustrated! I know I would be if I was really making an effort and it got me no results.

Maybe it's time to change things up a little? Do you always just eat lunch and dinner? No breakfast, no snacks?

For me, I have to eat often. Not a lot all at once, but something all the time. I think I am a grazer...maybe I was a cow or a horse in a previous life ;-) And I don't think I would lose at all if I ate any kind of fast food or restaurant food. (I used to have a small frosty every Friday, but that's too much sugar right now until I get back in the swing of things). Too much fat, too much salt, too many processed carbs, and so on.

Maybe you could try having lots of vegetables and some brown rice and a turkey burger at home instead? Or make some sweet potato "fries" in the oven. See if you can find something "cleaner" to eat that you really enjoy instead of that burger and fries. IMHO calories/exercise in the strictest sense aren't always the problem or the answer.

I hope I'm making sense. And at least give you something to consider trying for a bit. Can't hurt to see if eating more whole foods and less processed will help. If not, then try switching up something else until you find a way that will work for YOU!

Barb

I would say to try eating breakfast and to never go below 1500 calories since it seems like you are an active person. Are your NET calories 1500? People often think that they should eat 1600 calories, than burn off 500 bringing their net to only 1100 which is not good. Eat those silly exercise calories back!

Like suggest above, maybe you need to mix it up more. Do a little bit different exercises, do them at different speeds and intensities than you usually do. Do you know how many calories you were eating when you lost those 6 pounds? Have you noticed a different in pant sizes? If you have built muscle, the scale will not budge, but inches will be lost. Maybe try measuring yourself all over and than in a month measure again to see what you have lost.

I read this earlier but had to take a while to respond because frankly...that level of rage and vemon directed inward had me going ... daaaaang!

I'm glad you see it isn't healthy.

But do you see that we are not just a body? We are mind - body - heart - soul.

Obviously you've done a lot of work for body health. But instead of being proud and happy your body has responded to the care you'd been giving it you are hating it for not going as fast as you think it ought to. Why is it separate from you? This enemy rather than a PART of you? I

f this were your kid, would you be the type parent who always demands more? "A- isn't good enough! I want A+!" Probably not. So if you wouldn't talk to your kid that way why is it ok to talk to YOU that way?

I think you are low in mind-heart-soul time. Have you been doing anything to feed and nurture those health areas too? If not, take a break on body.

How's your depression? Is that getting enough support for healing?

Put body health on maintain for now. Stop losing. Just learn the maintaining skills you need later. Take a break. Nobody is saying not to come back to fine tune the body health end.

But dude... you sound terrible for other areas! :(

No wonder you are snappish! Really think about what you do to tend to your mental health needs, emotional needs, and spiritual/soul needs. Top all those back up. THEN come back to fine tune the body health.

When you come back, punch in your stats WITH your activity level.

http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm


I think you are underfeeding at this point. With all that activity, your fire needs just more wood or it's going to go out. No more burn. Then you are left raging at this dying fire that it's not burning and the answer is to take even more wood away? Don't think so. Feed the burn.

But feed your other buckets too -- the mental, emotional, soul bits. You could be body perfect but if those buckets are empty? You will just end up picking at body and not feeling like a happy whole person because the other needs are running on empty.

GL!

A.

Oh boy. All these feelings sound so familiar. I've been fighting with my current weight since 2007.
A nasty break up back then followed by panic attacks, anxiety and depression. Started to take meds and all the weight they bring with them.
I know what's like starving for weeks and gettin on the scale to see no results.
Have tried every possible diet with no success.
I haven't lost the hope though.
I can't really make you feel better as I share the same frustration. I just wanted to tell you that there are a lot of people out there feeling the same.

Take care!

angelskeep - Regarding your comment about "eating clean"--this is part of why I am so frustrated. My husband and I rarely (if ever) eat anything from a box or tube. We make all our pasta sauces from scratch. We eat a lot of game meat (venison, rabbit, Cornish hens, squab) and also a lot of turkey, duck, lamb and goat. Chicken and beef are becoming rarer to find on our menus. They aren't as nutritious as game/lean meats, and they aren't as tasty in our opinion. We make all our soups and stocks from scratch. We buy local and organic. We eat at least 2 servings of vegetables for dinner every night, and 2 of fruit. It's true we don't eat many whole grains, but we don't eat bread or cookies or really anything sugary. We eat a lot of homemade curry, (healthy) pan-Asian foods, and we make our own paninis and burgers.

If you measured what I'm eating, it could hardly be classified as "overeating." Every so often we have a night where we do overeat just for fun, but it's always planned with a long-distance run.

I, too, am a grazer. Here, for example, is what I'm eating today:

Breakfast - tall soy cappuccino from Starbucks - 64cal
Elevensies - half a homemade turkey sandwich - 150cal
Afternoonsies - the other half and a banana - 265cal
Dinner - a homemade country brunch skillet (shredded potatoes, bacon, egg, green pepper, mushrooms, scallions, seasoned with pepper and basil) - 852 cal
After Dinner - hot tea, unsweetened - 5cal
I have a spin class today - assume 542cal burned

Once a week, on the night I run 8-9 miles (with hills) I consume about 2000-2200cal total, before you subtract the burnt calories. 900 of that is from three 8oz cups of plum wine mixed with sake. But I have tried cutting back or cutting that out entirely and there's no difference in monthly weight loss, so that can't be it.

We make our own burgers at home. We really do. And they're delicious. But there's just no WAY my once-a-week In N Out day can be keeping me fat, is there? How could I possibly get fat when on that day I eat a total of 1600 cal including the treat??? And do a 3-mile run with my dog?

The only thing I haven't tried is getting 8 hours of sleep a night during the week. Everything else has been tried--exercising more, exercising less, water-drinking, less salt, no alcohol, no fried foods, using a food scale and measuring ingredients.

Don't discount your ability to lose pant sizes. My hip bones are really wideset, too. Since the 180s I have had no fat over them on the front or the sides. Just hard bone. My pants sit on them and it bothers me. Anyway... as I've lost weight from other areas (like thighs and backside) I've dropped several jean sizes. It's amazing how your body can shift.

Nyx,

Maybe you could take a break. Continue doing healthy things for yourself, BUT it sounds as if you are too obsessed with a number rather than enjoying your life. As you said, "Would that weight loss really be worth it if I couldn't enjoy good food any more?"

Last Saturday I was hanging out with a girlfriend and we ended up having dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. She ordered from the "regular" menu and I order from the "skinnyliscious" menu. It took me forever to make that choice but I ended up getting a meal that was listed as being under 600 calories. I drank only water during the meal and I didn't eat any of their cheesecake. Anyway, the point is this. After the waiter took our orders, BOTH of us felt bad about the choice we made. I felt bad because I believed I was denying myself some joyous food. Because the "healthy alternative" was considered a punishment to me. A punishment for being fat. But my friend (who is similar in weight to me) felt bad because she didn't order the healthy alternative. She felt like she was being a "fat cow" (her words not mine) by ordering something that was "unhealthy." Then she started talking about how she wanted to go to a fitness bootcamp, etc...

The point is, when I got home I got to thinking. Why do we think that eating healthy and exercising is a punishment for being bigger than we want to be? Because for sure, once we get to our desired weight, we can't start eating at Burger King every night. We'll still have to be healthy. We'll still have to order from the skinnylicious menu in order to maintain our weight loss and not backslide. Are we going to continue to see this as punishment and deprivation?? If so, what's the point?

So I worry about your stress levels. I know you said you were slow burning (regarding your temper and what bothers you). But if something is in the back of your mind constantly, maybe you have stress that you don't even acknowledge as stress because it's your baseline of operation.

Just try to enjoy life. When I look back to the times when I lost the most weight, it wasn't when I was dieting and exercising. I lost weight when I was happy. And that was because food wasn't such a big part of my life anymore. I ate when I was hungry, didn't eat when I wasn't. I was active and didn't worry nearly as much as I normally do. But when I started to look at my weight, it wasn't the "perfect number" so I stopped being happy and started obsessing over my weight and what I ate. And here I am 50lbs heavier than I was then.

You haven't gained weight since August 2011 (which is more than I can say for myself), so try to be happy about that as well as the other gifts in your life.

Also, I have a larger muscular frame as well. I've found that I tend to lose weight when I eat primarily veggies. I've been doing a lot of Asian stir frys. I'll use either a small amount of chicken (like one boneless thigh) or I'll substitute it for a good tofu. Also, do you have a cut-off time for eating? My body seems to be VERY sensitive about when I eat last. Right now my cut-off time is 7:30pm. And like you, I also have an unsweetened cup of hot tea at night. :)

Good Luck and Good Life!

I'm not a super active person. I consume about 1400 calories on days I do not exercise. Whenever I do exercise, I always eat those calories back plus a little bit just because I am usually starving. So on days I exercise my net calories will be at about 1500-1600. I should point out though that I am not nearly as active as you. I do a boxing class once a week (1 hour), a deep water boot class once a week (1 hour) and than maybe two days at 20 minutes of Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred. Other then that I am a student so I am always sitting during lectures, or sitting while studying. However, this seems to be working for me so I can't complain. If I were more active, I'd definitely have to up my calories. Since you have a heart rate monitor, it should be easy to determine how many calories you've burned so you know how many to eat.

I'll also point out that weight comes off in odd places sometimes. I have lost weight around my underbust (so my band for my bra is to big now), my fingers are smaller, and my butt lost 2 inches. I am still waiting to lose inches in my stomach and hips. It will come off eventually, my body just decided it wanted to take from the lamest places first lol. I'd probably cool it on the exercise a bit if possible. Maybe just do 45 minutes 4 days a week and see how that goes.

OMG, I can completely relate to this. I used to be fit. I used to be skinny. I used to hike and rock climb and inline skate and jog or do something like that every single day. I had no weight problems until I was 28. That year, despite nothing changing with my diet and exercise, I gained 10 lbs. Next year, the same thing. And on each year for 9 years. After putting on 90 lbs, I could no longer do the things I used to do. I was baffled. I mean, I see people say- "I'll cut out the soda" and they lose 10 lbs. Right? But I didn't drink soda. I didn't drink alcohol. I was eating healthy and in healthy portions. I was working out an hour a day or more, HARD. I could not lose a pound to save my life- all I could do was gain. I was baffled. Finally I found out I had Hashimoto's disease, a thyroid condition. When I began treatment for that, I began to lose. I've lost 35 lbs since I began treatment. It's not easy. It's not just melting off. I have to work hard and watch what I eat, and I admit readily I'd have lost more if I was doing a better job of that. But I can finally lose! And I know some day I may even be fit and at a healthy weight again.

I can't say what's going on with you, but I do understand your frustration. And I hope you get your own "A-Ha!" moment and figure out what it is.