So I've really worked hard the past few weeks on the weight loss thing. I'm exercising 3 times a week. I have a meal plan that I've been sticking with. And I lost those first 8 pounds pretty quickly. Fortunately/Unfortunately I think that was mostly water weight. So now that it's tapering off I'm worried that I'll get discouraged by how slow weight loss occurs. And I know, it took awhile to put on, it'll take awhile to get rid of. And I know that I shouldn't stare at the scale every day. But my obsessive personality is making that difficult. So how do I accept that I might only lose a pound a week? How do I keep going knowing that this is such a slow process? How did you push yourself forward when the number didn't change?

hey!you know what? yes it sounds discouraging at the outset- but the thing is, it's not time consuming.

at first, you can expect to lose upwards of 2 lbs a week, then you might plateau, then you might find something else that works- life life as normal, and go on. 2 lbs a week is a huge ammount!

I see your goal is to lose 50 pounds, if you lose 1 pound a week that will be 52 pounds in a year.
Ask yourself this, "Do I want to regain everything I have lost and give up or do I want to persist and do what it takes to lose and reach goal?"

I "only" lost a pound a week (on average) for more than two years and now I weigh 114 pounds less than when I started.

If I hadn't stuck with it, if I'd given up because "only" a pound a week wasn't fast enough, you know where I would be today? Still fat, that's where.

Time is going to pass anyhow, whether you stick with your plan or not. Would you rather spend that time losing "only" a pound a week? or spend it maintaining your current weight or even continuing to gain?

I know what I chose - and I am super glad I made that choice. You can make that choice too. Stick to your plan! An average of a pound a week (really 4-5 pounds per month is a better way to think of it, because a week is too short a time scale to measure fat loss) is an excellent rate and will get a long way before you know it.

Think about how quickly 2011 went by. 2012 will go by even faster. Don't you want to spend that time losing weight? yeah, I thought so.

Everything we do consumes time- watching TV, talking on the phone, internet surfing, working, etc. I agree with other posters to focus on the result. I watch TV, but I am aware that it doesn't give me any lasting result or benefit. Working provides an income, a necessary result. Planning what we eat and exercising takes time and, while the result may not be as immediate as we would like, it is there. Everyone pound lost is a step towards a potentially healthier life and to a weight goal that was important enough to begin a lifestyle change.

I made the mistake of sacrificing for faster weight loss. I lived on shakes as part of a medically supervised fast for nearly a year and lost over 100 lbs. Surprise, surprise, I gained it all back and more in under a year after going off the shakes.

Now I am losing about 1 lb a week and while it would be great to see my weight go down more quickly, I am confident that these pounds I am losing so slowly won't come back. I can choose to give up, but that will be a choice to be clinically obese for the rest of my life. Or, I can celebrate and honour each step, no matter how small, towards my goal. I am willing to spend a year or more continuing with my lifestyle change for the payoff of a healthier, slimmer me for the rest of my life.

The time is now. You can do this. Just think of how happy and proud you will feel in a year if you keep it up and tap into those feelings as much as possible with every day and every step you take toward your goal. There is so much inspiration to be found on this site- people who have put in the time and effort and who have reached or exceeded their goals and maintained their success.

I tend to stall and plateau a lot, but I have to remind myself that even if I'm not showing a loss on the scale or by measurements the healthy choices I'm making, the exercise I continue to do, and sticking with my plan is making me feel better about myself, overall a healthier person and helping me to stay dedicated to my healthy lifestyle. So in the end its worth what I put into it.

I am in a plateau right now and also feel discouraged, and I am losing weight at such a slow rate that I also thought the way you are thinking. Then I realized life does not stop while we lose weight: there are lots of things to do, to learn, to enjoy in the meantime, and the less we think of time, the better. Go on living, don't wait to start living till the moment you reach your goal... and time will fly!

I get discouraged sometimes by how slowly my weight is coming off but every pound off, however quickly it comes off, is a pound in the right direction. It's also important to not compare your losses to anyone else's - I used to be a member of another forum which was horribly competitive and having people say they were following the same plan as me (calorie counting in my case) and losing 7lbs a week every week was soul destroying!!

What everyone else said is so true, time will pass regardless of what you're doing so make it count