Sigh.
 

Well, I made it 8 days of clean eats.

Then my boss & I went to lunch today. I ordered chicken & veggie stir fry, which seemed like one of the healthier choices. . .swimming in oil. Of course, between a) being hungry from having eaten totally clean for 8 whole days and b) guilt over the starving children in Africa, I ate the whole thing. I'm guesstimating, but probably around 1300 calories?

So, no dinner for me tonight. . .and I guess tomorrow I just start the whole thing all over.

Sigh. I will never lose this weight.

That is not true and stop thinking like that! But of course, I feel the same way. What are we going to do?

Losing Wieght is hard... or else everyone would be skinny. I try to concentrate on my exercise part. I have a hard time eating right, so I try to regulate it more towards myself. I love food to much to give it completely up, so I compromise with myself. You just need to find a way that works for you.

We all have off-plan/treat meals once in while, don't beat yourself up over it. One meal isn't going to ruin your diet. I never skip another meal because of an off-plan meal. If I had an off-plan lunch, I would still eat my normal breakfast and my normal dinner (and, if I were hungry, my normal snacks, although a lot of times I find I don't need them). The only thing I would forego is my low-cal pudding snack in the evening. I might have one of my lighter dinners (e.g., a salad with lean protein instead of meat loaf or pasta), but I'd definitely still eat dinner. It's not good to skip meals.

Also, you really shouldn't be hungry after 8 days of eating clean (eating clean does not mean starving yourself). You aren't going to be able to continue this diet long-term if you are hungry all the time. Maybe it would be helpful if you posted what you eat normally and asked for suggestions on what you could eat that would be more filling.

When I first started, I thought I would never lose the weight either, but it turns out that if you just stick with it, the weight absolutely will come off. A treat meal once in a while is also okay; I probably had one at least twice a month while I was losing weight. One thing that really helped me was to set a long-term goal. I told myself that I would stick with my program for four months and if I didn't see results by then, I'd try something different. That really helped me get past the short-term set backs. By the time four months rolled around, I was clearly making progress.

I didn't even know that this forum existed but I saw the post on the new posts bit and it is the first one that I've seen that shouts "that's me". Su-Bee I am exactly like you and I don't know why i do it either. I'm in a better patch at the moment with "clean eats" but feeling down about some things. I know that I'll eventually do what you've done today. I know this because I'm 35 and I've done it for the last 18ish years.

Nothing I have done has worked so far and like you (albeit I'd bigger than you) I'm overweight but not rolling down the aisles fat. Well I can't carry on doing what I've been doing cos that's got me nowhere. All I know is that in the past when I've had a day like you've had I've just gone sod it and carried on eating. I reckon that I'll have to learn that that was yesterday and I have to do something different today or nothing will ever change. You can do this.

On a different note you finishing your plate is not going to help starving kids in Africa. They were never going to get sent the food on your plate this lunch time so send a donation instead of wracking yourself with irresolvable guilt! ;) Good luck. I'd love to know how you're getting on cos our profiles are quite similar and you seem to have similar habits to me. I came here hoping I'd meet people like you.

Doughnut, your message is EXACTLY what I needed! I logged on just now b/c I am having exactly that impulse - I had a big, off-track lunch, and now I am sitting here at home saying to myself, "Well, I already screwed up today - maybe I should just have something ELSE to eat." Not that I'm terribly hungry, or anything - just, feeling the urge to eat.

I have always been like this - when I am eating healthy, I have no problems, but once the first bite of something bad crosses my lips, the rest of the day is a write-off. It's particularly bad with sugar - one bite of something sweet, and all I do the rest of the day is crave sugar. It's like that one bite just sets me off, and the only thing that re-sets me is going to sleep and waking up again the next morning!

So I am reading your post, and I am saying to myself, it is 8:30 at night. . .there is no reason for me to eat now. . .and it's not THAT long before I can fall asleep, so if I can just make it until bedtime, I can make it through THIS day with no more damage done, and that will be a success!

I just hope my husband comes home soon so he can distract me before this urge for food-for-food's-sake gets the better of me. . .

I would measure more by the weekly caloric average than one meal. Its ok to have a few high days among some low and average days; keeps your body guessing and takes the rigidity out of weightloss and your daily life, and it still works. As long as you consistently have some low days, you can have a few higher days and still be good. My weekly average has been between 1700 and 1800 calories per week, but in that week I may have a few days with 1500 calories, some with 1900 and I even had one with 2200 calories last week; I've still been losing about 1 to 1.5 pounds per week.

Su-Bee did you make it through? I'm glad if my post helped. Yours really helped me. I'd just posted on the UK forum about how slowly it was going and was feeling really down and then saw your post which helped because I could relate to it and that made me remember why I came here.

I have two really bad eating habits that I need to change if I'm going to succeed after all these years. The first is not to go "s*d it, I've blown it I might as well eat everything I can find" and the second is that if that does happen not to say "that's the end of this diet then". I know all of this in my head it's just I seem to have a really hard time putting it into practice.

The bit you said about one bite of sugar and it's a free for all? I can really relate to that. I'm not a great proponent of diet books because I think most of them are a rip off. However, there's a book called "only fat people skip breakfast" by Lee Janogly which is all about sugar and how to avoid doing what you and I do. It's fabulous - the only diet book I'd ever recommend.

Well thanks to finding this site I've had an unexpectedly great week so I'm off to change my tracker :carrot:

I made it through, Doughnut, and it was all because of you! It was HARD, though. I actually CRIED because I wanted to eat - wtf?!? I woke up this morning RAVENOUS, had a single bowl of oatmeal, and was absolutely fine until lunchtime. So that is the difference between starting a day off right, and starting one off wrong, at least for me!

I'll have to check out the Lee Jangoly book - I've not heard of that one before.

Congrats on your great week and your weight loss - is that 4 lbs just this week? Amazing!

You made it - yay! I was just off to the kitchen to have a snack I didn't need when I checked in here, saw your post and now I'm not going to - thanks. That's another problem I have - sometimes I have a really great day and blow if for the sheer **** of it. ??? And your wtf? Tell me about it, it's like how can I be in so in control of every aspect of my life and then get reduced to a gibbering wreck over a biscuit?

I lost 3lbs this week. I started on 27th December and only lost a pound the first week. Joined this site last weekend I think and then 3 lbs gone since last Wednesday. Am well chuffed :D

SuBee, it happens to all of us... When I overeat though, I don't skip my next meal :nono: ever, it just puts me in that WTF mode and I'm so ravenous that I WILL eat something bad... so I eat again, a protein and a clean carb and lots of veggies, and chalk it up to experience... As someone said, just look at your overall weekly caloric intake, it's all in the big picture...

Here's my wtf for today -

Weight yesterday was exactly the same as it was the day before - so the off-plan eating did not cause the million-pound gain I was fearing, which is awesome.

Then, yesterday, I ate like a little angel - calories even came in a bit on the low side - and today I am up a whopping *2.6* pounds! Huh?!? I am blaming it on starting my period and on doing leg weights yesterday, which in the Ladies who Lift thread they say often causes the muscles to retain water - I don't know what else it could be, b/c no way did I consume an extra 6,000 calories in my sleep! But WOW - that is a LARGE overnight gain! I'm okay, b/c I know no way it can be a "real" gain - but it is still a wtf moment!

And Doughnut - CONGRATULATIONS on staying out of the kitchen! I know how hard it can be! Sunday night, I again wasn't hungry, but I was in the kitchen opening cupboards, checking the fridge, moving stuff around - my husband asked what I was doing and I said, "Looking." Why is it that we go for food like that when it is not really what our bodies want???

Sue, keep in mind that what you eat can take days - sometimes even a week - to show up on the scales. What you ate yesterday may not even be completely digested when you weigh in the morning, so today's weight isn't really an accurate snapshot of how yesterday's food affected you. ;)

Likewise, when the scale goes down, it's not simply a result of what you ate yesterday ... it's the cumulative effect of everything you've been doing for the past week or two. :)

I sure wish my 2 weeks of clean eating and 30 minutes of cardio every morning would show it's cumulative effect!!! ;) LOL

It will! Did you know that when fat cells empty out, they sometimes fill up with water? And until your body dumps the water, the scale won't move, even though you've already lost the fat? A weight loss researcher at Columbia Med School told me this - he said that often what we think of as a 'stall' or 'plateau' is just water retention. Ever lose two pounds overnight? That's a water whoosh!

Thanks Meg. That may be the pick-me-up that I needed!

I didn't know that Meg, great info as usual!

C'MON, water whoosh! Over here! I'm waiting for ya!

MEG thanks for the information - anybody who's lost as much weight as you I'm listening to :D I asked the question about how long it takes for extra cals to convert into fat on the UK forum but nobdy seemed sure. It's something I've wondered about for years.

Su-Bee, I got so p'd off with nonsensical increases in my weight that I finally splashed out on body fat monitor scales. These saved me last week - I was well cross about losing only 1lb but saw that my water percentage had gone up 1% and my body fat had come down by 2%. That kept me going till I found this site.

I have the body fat monitor scale, but I get so p.o.'ed every time it tells me that I am in the "obese" range (I mean, c'mon - I need to lose weight, sure, but I'm not OBESE by any means!) that I've stopped using the body fat function. :)

LOL. My scales tell me I'm obese too but I pay no attention to that function or the one that tells me how many stones of me are (or aren't) muscle! I'm sorry to laugh at your plight but I've never told anyone that my scales have rated me as obese before - I'm relieved it's not just me!

Doughnut, I think you're my new best friend. :)

Tomorrow is my "official" weigh-in day (I promised myself that the fluctuations don't matter, b/c only Fridays count) - so wish me luck for my water whoosh! I wanna change my ticker!!!

Hello there. I was feeling so disgusted with the lack of weight loss these past couple weeks, even though I have been or thought I was doing so well with food and exercise. My body did seem to be changing and I seemed to be losing fat around my middle but I NEED!!! the scale to go down. I mean, why does it take so long for the scale to move?!!? :shrug:

I usually post on the 21-day challenge thread but had thought about coming here, thinking that maybe it's just because I'm not THAT fat, still....I have a LOT of fat on me and, yes I too would probably be (AM) in the obese range when it comes to those bodyfat monitors.

Sigh..sigh..reading the posts between Doughnut and Su-Bee were just what I needed too. I need someone to mope with and yet still keep trying. I need people who realize just how hard it is to lose the weight, or seems to be.

I mean, do you have to be that vigilant to lose 30 lbs? That seems like a lot more than featherweight material??! At 70 kg, I'm no featherweight...but why is it so hard to budge the fat on my body?! Sorry, all, I'm just so disgusted and depressed and angry about things not going my way...... :^:

Hello Redballon! I know what you mean about not being a featherweight. I wouldn't have had the presumption to check out this forum if it weren't for the fact that I found this particular post by Su-Bee by accident. When you read something that it so similar to you that you wonder if you actually posted it yourself you know you have to answer!

I think you do have to be that vigilant to lose 30 lbs. I have to say that I have no idea how tall you are or how much you weigh cos I can't convert metric (pathetic i know) but 30lbs is a couple of stone and it's usually the absolutely top of healthy or just a bit overweight. I think that that can be the hardest range to be in cos you can still kid yourself you're OK. Maybe that's just me trying to justify a pig out :)

Anyway you sound a bit down but keep going. Thanks largely to 3FC and Su-Bee I've managed to keep going but I'm approaching danger time. This is really sad but I rarely manage to keep going for more than 3 weeks! We've gotta keep plodding or it won't change. ;)

Ah, Doughnut, thanks so much for your message. I was just getting ready to go to bed. Today has been awful. I once again ate too much and ate sugar, which I had been totally off for nearly two weeks. I had been feeling great, keeping off alcohol as well and then, bang, I just lost it and it's all falling apart. The lack of weight loss just got to me, even though I was losing inches. I just so much wanted to see the scale move...I don't know...yes, I was really down. Your message has made me feel better though, just knowing someone is out there who feels the same and is going through the same thing. I'm embarrassed to say that I don't think losing 30 lbs will make me slim, then again, it might. I am only just over 5 feet at 5 feet 1.5 inches, but I do have big bones and a lot of muscle. Still, 70 kgs is 154 lbs and my goal of 55 kgs is 121. At my height that doesn't sound very low but I don't know I've never been below 60 kgs and then I didn't have any muscle, just tone. Years of weight training have given me quite a bit of muscle. Anyhow, I'm babbling on, am tired and just came home and cried a bit. I overate and didn't care about the sugar eating, thinking I will get it out of my system, wipe the tears and start over from tomorrow. Maybe I can now...since I've found you. Thanks again. :^:

Hi Redballoon.

Yeah, I had a bad day yesterday too. . .not foodwise so much as, well, alcohol-wise. I hadn't had a drink since New Year's Eve, and so when hubby and had a drink last night, it was so yummy that I didn't want to stop at one! And then of course this morning, I had that feeling of, "Well, I've screwed it up now - so, why don't I just suggest that we go out for lunch? And, who cares if I skip the gym - it's Saturday." But I put that aside, and have eaten good so far (although we have an event at church tonight that may be my downfall. . .) and DID go to the gym.

And I am really glad to hear that I'm not the only one who sometimes cries over food! :)

Hi Su-Bee :wave: Good to hear from you. Ah shucks, it musts have been in the stars yesterday, eh? That's exactly the way I was with the alcohol too. You see, I do all these 21-day challenges over on the support group forum and I have no sugar and no alcohol and other things and I'd been doing just great. I hadn't had a pint since Dec. 29 (which had been a week with three year-end parties!) and then I just wanted to celebrate some good news at work (oh, it's sooo relative though) and had 2 pints, which was OK. But it seemed to just have started me going, thinking, oh, what the heck, I need to TALK with people instead of going home. I work at a newspaper and the place is full of big drinkers and I enjoy discussing things over beers. However, the last two weeks totally off beer just felt great as far as my health went and clear-headedness, no late nights, no lost mornings etc. So anyhow, the two-pint night was followed by a Friday with many more and I felt I'd really let myself down. Probably that feeling coupled with the effect of the alcohol just had me sooo depressed, so yesterday was a wash....sigh. I did ride and do my crunches (another challenge) so it wasn't ALL lost. You got to the gym too. I guess we have to try to balance some very tough discipline with allowing a bit of laxness without beating ourself up over it. It's really tough, isn't it? It does mean our weight loss at this point in the game WILL be halted or slowed to the point of not being recognizable, right? Well, let's hang in there. Doughnut has written me as well and I feel so much better to have some friends who are in the same boat. Let's do this together! :yes:

I know exactly how you feel. I love having discussions over a pitcher of beer (which in the past has been too often accompanied by wings or nachos. . .), or having cocktails at night with my husband. For some people, eating is social, for me, drinking is!

Although sugar is a BIG trigger for me IF I eat it, I have absolutely no cravings for it if I don't take the first bite. Alcohol (and the socialization it represents) are definitely my downfall. . .that's why it's been so hard for me seeing the scale really not move these past few weeks - except for that one night, I had COMPLETELY stopped drinking, which seems an awfully big sacrifice if the numbers aren't going to go down!

But, as I don't want to give up and just BE this weight, I guess there's no choice but to persevere and have faith that whatever's going on in my body right now, EVENTUALLY the calories in v. calories out discrepancy that Fitday swears I have will have to show up on the scales.

It will, won't it?

Yes. And hopefully it will be sooner rather than later as it sure seems to take forever for us featherweights to get to our goal. Imagine being able to lose 10-15 pounds in a month! I've seen some posters do this, but they are so far from their goal it is like a drop in the bucket for them whereas it would mean reaching our goal if we were able to do it. So I'll gladly take what appears to be a 1 pound loss for this month regardless of the fact that it may be my only loss for the month.

wow, what a great thread you guys. so much to relate to, thanks for the inspiration!