I have been reading a lot of posts, here and at a couple of other weight loss sites and almost all of them bring me to tears. I feel so much empathy and compassion for all of you, my sisters in this journey-I remember feeling so depressed and most of all frustrated -I WAS eating less and less AND making GOOD food choices -and yet I wasn't losing much weight. I felt there must be a secret key that I didn't know about.
Well, it isn't really secret, but I have found, over the years as I lost weight and KEPT it off for 30 years (and now gaining back 10 and losing it again)- that for me the "secret" really truly is EXERCISE!
It IS a "magic pill" - it just takes an hour a day to take!!!
I fought it at first too- I thought I WAS exercising - but found that 20/30 minutes of cardio was simply not enough!
I almost feel you have to trust me on this - or someone else who has lost and maintained. I have NEVER met any adult who is truly slim AND fit and healthy for any length of time who doesn't work out. It is impossible. AND YES, IT will be hard and you will probably be exhausted and discouraged and you will no doubt NOT like it at first. BUT PLEASE, just trust me and work through it PLEASE, TOUGH it out for a few weeks - IT WILL get easier!
You have to get to a point where you are seriously working out about 45 minutes to an hour a day 5/6 days a week. Through 30 years of helping others lose weight this is what I have found - that is what it takes. And NOT wimpy strolls either - you need to move at your target heart rate - you need to breath hard and sweat!
People in America are dieting and dieting and taking pills and eating less and less and NOT losing weight...They ARE NOT keeping it off - clearly they aren't suceeding because they aren't doing something right. I am positive they aren't exercising enough.
For me it was running - maybe for you it will be something else. I choose running because it was the exercise I could do on my own time rather than a class, I could do anywhere I was and the calories burned for minutes preformed were high. I had three kids when I started and then 4, 5, 6 and 7 while I was running. I didn't have time to mess around!
BTW, I HATED running at first. I gasped, I choked, I had to use my inhaler a lot...I threw up a couple of times. IT was so horrific I thought I was going to die. BUT I was so desperate to lose that weight that I trusted my husband who swore I wasn't exercising hard enough or long enough...on a side note he said the day he made that claim was the only time he has EVER heard me swear or call him a vulgar name!
So maybe you will have to trust me - I really don't think YOU are exercising hard enough or long enough - feel free to swear or call me names - I can take it and understand your resistance! AND I know all your excuses - I used most of them up already...
All I know is once I got into the discipline and routine of running every day - I started to look forward to it - I started to (gasp) ENJOY it! It became my fun and my recreation - I ran with my husband, with my kids as they got old enough - with friends -oh my gosh it was awesome in those days! I felt, as I said in another post like the QUEEN of the universe. I had and still have tons of energy.
What I couldn't do and keep up with when I had three kids and a small house, I was doing easily with 4/5/6 kids and a 5 bedroom house!
And, of course, you still cannot "over-eat" BUT by exercising and gaining muscle you can eat more calories a day and still burn them off! Even at my small size I can burn close to 500 calroies in an hour of running! I also started wanting to eat better food -my tastes changed -I stopped eating sugar and white flour easily AFTER I started running.
So that is my rant for now! I post it only because I still meet desperate women trying to lose weight that are totally focused on THIS diet and that diet and they don't work out enough! I wish someone had told me the "secret" long before they got brave enough to do so!
Of course, if you have medical conditions that you need to address you should consult your Dr. I had to change Dr.s twice to find one who would let me run with asthma though, so you might consider that too.
Bless you all - I wish you the best - to be strong and healthy and have lots of energy and zest for life! HEY, I just thought up a great slogan - "JUST DO IT!"