Hello everyone,

I'm new here from Toronto, Ontario. I didn't know where to turn and I liked the feel of this forum so I thought I'd give it a shot to hopefully get some motivation.

I'm 24 years old and I've been struggling with me weight for my entire life. I used to dance when I was younger, but i stopped when I was around 9-10 years old I think. I was always bigger than the other kids (I really am big boned and have a lot of muscle to me, and I was always taller), but when I danced I was still slim. When i stopped dancing I gained a lot of weight. My mother and father were busy, so quick fast food dinners were almost a nightly ritual.

My heaviest (so I thought) was 210 pounds... in grade 8. Mind you, I was probably about 5'7"at that time. Recently I have noticed that I have gained weight, but my scale says I'm around 205 pounds. My scale has lied to me in the past, so I checked a better scale... and it says I'm 218 pounds. I am now 5'10".

I can't find a way to motivate myself. When I was in grade 10 I stopped eating all together (horrible, I know) and I got down to 170 pounds. Of course, I gained it all back plus some. I do have a gym membership, but I hardly go. I tell myself I'm going to go, then I make excuses. I am always tired and lazy.

I try to go on diets, but a day or so in I get killer headaches and the worst cravings ever. I am so addicted to crappy food that it scares me. I look at all of you beautiful people here and see you losing weight and I wonder how on earth you do it. The headaches I get last hours, I get miserable, cranky, can't think of anything other than junk food. I eventually give in.

Maybe if someone is in Toronto in the same boat as me we can motivate each other. I'm so lost. I'd like to lose 50 pounds (I've been telling myself that since I was 14). I don't know where to even start.

Hi aeliz24!

Your post stuck out to me! I am from the GTA and feel like I am in a very similar boat. I can't even remember the last time I was comfortable in my body. It's been about almost 10 years since I was at a healthy weight.

I'm 23 years old and weigh 220. I have last 10 lbs in the last 5 months, but that is not nearly enough. My biggest problem is sticking through my effort. I have a gym membership, and some weeks I will go 6x, and then won't go for 2 months. I have given up fast food for the most part (maybe eat it once or twice the month) and cut down on my pop intake by atleast 50% (I am struggling to get rid of the other 50%), despite those steps I have made I still struggle with other foods I'm not suppose to eat. I am a feen for sugar and salt.

My hope for joining this forum was to get additional support from people who know what I am going through. My boyfriend and family are very supportive, but they just don't understand. All of my friends are either guys or size 2 girls, so they are also no help. All I want is to be comfortable and healthy in my own body.

grayislosingit:

Sounds very similar to me. I work with all men, have few girlfriends and the girlfriends I do have are all tiny. My boyfriend and family say I'm beautiful and perfect, but damnit, I want to fit into those skinny jeans.

I will get sudden bursts of motivation and workout and eat well then I'm back to doing nothing and eating crap for a month.

I work a job where I am sitting in a room for 8 hours. I work 3-11pm so the only way I would be able to get my workouts in is if I wake up. I love sleep and have so much trouble waking up so when the morning comes I say F it.. I'm staying in bed.

I really really need some motivation. Where abouts in the GTA are you? I couldn't find where to private message you (if I even can?)

Hey! First of all welcome to 3fc, even posting is a great first step.

Nobody has it all figured out from the start! Instead of jumping head first into a diet and feeling bad and getting headaches take it one small step at a time. First of all, what are you eating at the moment? What's an average day like? If you can roughly calculate your calories it'll give you an idea. Then if you work out how many calories your body is using a day... try a bmi calculator and then you can work out what you should be eating to lose.

When I started at the end of February the first thing I did was stop eating as much chocolate/sweets/crisps. I don't even think I fully cut them out just stopped eating them everyday and for a few weeks that's pretty much all I did food wise. I also started keeping a food journal for a few weeks just to see what I was eating and how much etc, it was really interesting to look back over my days and I could see when I was probably eating too much. I started to lose weight by just cutting out some of the extra snacks. Writing things down helped a lot because if I did eat something I felt like I shouldn't have I wrote it down. Then I couldn't just pretend it didn't happen.

Don't worry too much about your gym membership for now, maybe go sometimes and do something light but I'd say even just for starters do an extra 10-20 minute walk everyday. You build up to fitness, I find it's much better to work your way up then to start doing some crazy work out at the start. I did that before and just gave up. I also didn't understand that the best way to lose weight is to control your diet but a combination of diet and exercise is best.

It has to be a lifestyle change so it has to be something you can live with. Work on eating some healthier food and replacing some of the food you love with better options. Something else I do now is that I have smaller portions of whatever food and have a big salad on the side. My portion sizes were completely out of whack before and now my plate still looks really full and it's enough food for me. I'm full without being uncomfortably full (which I was every day before I started).

I also get really bad migraines if I skip meals so I know how that feels..so as I said no need to jump into some fad diet.

It's not a race, remember that! And good luck, you can do it this is a great place for motivation and support so stick around.

I feel like I hardly eat to be honest. I don't usually eat breakfast (I know... worst thing to do!!), but I wake up feeling full and uncomfortable. The thought of eating makes me want to puke. Then, of course, I get hungry, I'll stop at Tim Horton's on my way to work and grab a smoothie and muffin. At work I will bring my own lunch. It's usually a sandwich with ham, mayo, margarine, maybe some lettuce and mustard. I'll usually have a yogurt, a piece of fruit (whatever we have, typically it's a banana), maybe some carrots.. I bring pasta for lunch sometimes, and those disgusting frozen pastas have become a ritual because they're so easy to grab. Other than a smoothie or a coffee I have some days, I drink water. I typically fill up my water bottle 3-4 times at work. Then some days I will get home from work and I will say to myself, "goodness, I hardly ate anything today. I need more calories." So I'll eat something like a pudding, maybe a granola bar, maybe something worse like chips if we have it.

All bets are off on the weekend. I think because I feel like I eat so little during the week that I can splurge on the weekends. Chips, chocolate, going out for dinner...

Maybe I've been living in such denial for so long that I feel like I don't eat a lot, but I do know that I don't eat as healthily as I should.


Writing all of that really put my eating habits out in the open for me. Like you said, I feel like if I don't acknowledge it then it didn't happen. All that with no excersise.. I know why I'm at where I'm at.

Hi and welcome to this website. I am from GTA, too. I am trying to lose weight for the last 15 years and until this year I never thought I will succeed. None of the diets that I have tried before worked for me as I am not very patient with counting calories, points, etc. I found now the right diet for me and I lost almost 50 lbs in the last 3 months. It’s been hard, but I feel great. I started to exercise only a month ago, as I was too weak in the beginning. Now I swim, walk and use my stationary bike almost every day. I tried going to the gym , but as you said, I am too lazy or not in the mood.
I hope you will find the perfect diet for you and believe me, after you lose the first lbs your motivation will skyrocket. Good luck. We are here to support you!!!

What diet are you on?

Hmm, you'll eat extra calories because you think you haven't eaten enough but do you know how many you've eaten and how many you need? I used to say stuff like that to myself because I didn't understand how many calories that I specifically needed. I was basing my ideas on packages etc that said that the RDA was 2000 for women and 2500 for men. I actually need to eat 1600 or less to lose. These days I don't strictly calorie count as I have a rough idea in my head and I'm getting better at portion sizes but if you're unsure maybe you could invest in a food scale and cups for measuring. And some days I'm hungrier than others so I'd estimate my calorie intake to be somewhere from 1200-1800 most days. There's a calorie counters section of this forum so if you have any questions I'd ask them

Also if you don't want to eat breakfast don't eat breakfast! Seriously there's no reason to eat if you're not hungry then. A lot of people do intermittent fasting. They don't eat breakfast and then eat 2 larger meals later on in the day. You'll figure out what works for you as this goes on, you can change things to suit your lifestyle etc

Another thing is that even healthy food has calories, fruit can have quite a lot of calories. I'm not sure what size smoothie you have (I am in no way saying not to eat fruit or enjoy your smoothie just to be mindful of what you're eating/drinking). For me it's totally easy to forget about calories in drinks.

Anyway you're not eating really badly or anything and you're totally capable of doing this looking at what you eat in a day I'd say to start with cut out the extra food you think you need because you need the calories. If you're genuinely hungry eat something and have something healthy that you can grab. Are the pasta meals for dinner or do you stop eating at lunch?

Hi Aeliz24... I am on metabolic balance diet and it really works for me. It's a German diet, you can reaserch online.

Hey Aeliz,

I'm from Toronto too, and I know how hard it is to motivate yourself to make the lifestyle changes necessary to lose weight. I started out counting calories, but I would either not eat enough (because I was desperate to lose weight), or I would end up trying to fit terrible foods (and alcohol) into my daily allotment. After a month of little progress on that plan, I switched to the South Beach Diet. It has been incredible. If you follow it strictly (and the first two weeks are kind of strict), you will absolutely notice a difference in the way you feel and the way your clothes fit. It helps you get past your cravings for terrible food, and learn to make healthier choices for the long term. Plus, most people lose a fair amount of weight in the first two weeks (usually 10% of what they want to lose total), so it gives you some amazing positive reinforcement.

Go check out the South Beach Diet subforums here on 3FC. There's lots of amazing info about this diet. If you're interested, you can either buy the book, download it online or get it from your local library. You can also find most of the information about it on other online sources.

I've had so much success with SBD that my mother is now trying it!