Hello, I'm new to this site, and I'm looking to tips, support, and help in losing weight. I'm 21, 5'9, and 210lbs. I would like to loose 60 or 70 pounds. Two years ago on New Years I decided to take charge of my life and loose the weight. I was currently with out a job and wasn't going to school; so I put all my time into loosing weight. My friend and I would go to the gym together, and she helped push me to go. We lived in the same apt building so it was easy to meet. In about 5 months I lost 45lbs. I felt better than I ever had; and I was so proud of myself. Time went by and I got a new job, had relationship problems with my boyfriend, and stopped talk to my friends. It was the worst time in my whole life. Over the last to years I have gained that 45lbs back. I feel so sick about my weight now. I wish I had never let myself go. Things in my life seems a little better. I still have no friends that I see out of work and I find myself to sad and fearful to reach out to people. I don't want to exercise alone and I feel I can't talk to or share my thoughts or feeling with anyone I know. I'm also a vegetarian so I love bread and pasta, which doesn't help when trying to loose weight. Please give me some advice on connecting to people about my problem and tips on trying to find a gym buddy I can be friends with. Thanks for reading. Sorry if I sound winy.

catinair

Hi CAtinair,

The first thing i think would help you is to find a therapist or counsellor. They are if nothing else, supportive. I think people who find themselves quite alone in the world should have a counsellor when they are struggling. We all need support. Go to your doctor, ask them to recommend someone. Or go to your local community centre and ask about. Ask everywhere you go for a good counsellor. This is how you find one that you may like. And don't worry too much if you find you don't like someone, find another one. But once you find someone you like, try to stick with them for a good amount of time. Its not useful to chop and change when the going gets a bit tough.

And if you don't want to go and exercise on your own, You can at least start by adopting a healthier eating strategy. You don't have to exercise to lose weight though its good if you can. You do have to control what you eat.

I'm an almost vegetarian and i love pasta and bread too but its not a problem for me. Don't think you have to give it up. Just cut out all the high fat, low nutrition foods you eat. And add more low cal foods. Pasta is not bad, lots of cheap nasty gooey food you buy at takeaway shops is the problem. If you are not a great cook, do a cooking class and learn more about cooking indian or mediterranean foods. or Asian. Or Japanese. There is so much wonderful vegetarian food out there in the world.

Take a look at my thread in the vegetarian chicks section. I basically learned how to eat this way from the CSIRO wellbeing diet book. I was vegetarian at the time and its a higher protein diet but i adapted the meals to be vegetarian. It wasn't easy but now i believe they have a vegetarian version of their book. It has lots of very useful information and a good format. I strongly recommend trying this approach as something to base your lifelong eating habits on. The women who wrote the book are scientist nutritionists. The CSIRO is an australian scientific institution. Highly respected.

I myself fluctuate between eating well as i do on a diet and eating really badly when i go off it. That's when i put on weight so i tend to cycle a lot. I think i will have to be on a diet (even if not to lose weight) my whole life. I mean i will have to monitor my foods always because i've done this a few times now and always lost weight but like you stuff happens in life and all my good intentions come unstuck. I am resigned to it but i still keep on trying to have another shot that will keep me slim forever.

When i'm dieting, i generally tend to avoid sweets because i have very little control over myself and sweets.

I haven't yet begun my fitness program yet but i will get around to it eventually. From time to time I go on a cycling tour and lose a lot of weight. This year i want to ride with a cycling group. maybe you can look around for one in your area.

I would never go to a gym. I think it must be the most boring way to exercise. I tried rumba and although i liked it, i couldn't keep the motivation up for it. I want to go in a running race later this year so when my weight gets down a bit, i will start running.

I have struggled most of my life with various degrees of social isolation but finally i am getting better at creating friends and acquaintances. Since i joined a local choir last year i have earned at least one new friend there that i do other things with. The choir is very good socially. I enjoyed all the concerts we were involved with. But i am not sure if i was actually depressed if i could get myself along to join up.

There's a depression website i use called depression tribe. You can blog there and talk to others with depression. And its private. If you want no one or just some people to read your blogs, you have that control.

Here it makes more sense to blog my daily food. I think you could do the same here. I would encourage you to find a support group in this site. They are all over the place and oriented towards different things so take some time to find where you want to locate yourself.

As a vegetarian, i encourage you to hang out down there a bit. We need more veggie people i think.

BEing disgusted with ourselves serves us as a way of kickstarting ourselves into action so as soon as you start to take action, you may find you start to feel better. AT least you know you can lose weight having done it successfully before.

Another thing i've learned in recent times is not be impatient about losing weight. Doing it slowly makes it easier to keep off and it also makes it easier to stay on the diet because you are not fighting hunger all the time. I am aware of my current hunger level. Its very low and i can manage it quite well. I am interested in creating a habit of practicing self-restraint so from time to time i will do a one day water fast.

It took me a year and a half to lose 77 pounds, and I still have 15 to go. I'm more of a loner, so going to the gym with my ear phones in my ears works for me. I did do some classes though, they're fun and you meet people there, they're quite motivating, especially spinning classes if you can find them.

Also, I made gradual changes. If I could, I would live on wine and cheese...but, instead of giving them up, I cut them down, and made sure I counted every calorie so that I could still fit them in each day. Lots of veggies helps too, and tons of water. I also made sure not to eat after 7pm every day, if I got hungry, I just had a decaf coffee, that always kind of filled me up.

Keep track of every calorie, eaten and worked off, be disciplined, and be patient, it takes time but you can do it.

Thanks so much for all your help and advice. I plan on trying a lot of things that was suggested.