So, I am mostly ticked off at myself but I really need to vent.
I started PP before the holidays and I was doing well - losing at a good pace, but I took the holidays off and then the holidays stretched.....well anyway it wasn't good, but I finally started back 2 weeks ago. I had gained all the previously lost weight back and 2 extra pounds.
Well the past 2 weeks have gone really well food wise and I have been exercising regularly. I even quit diet soda completely (a big vice of mine) and now I only drink water.
Well, in the past 2 weeks I have only lost 2 pounds. A pound a half the first week and a half a pound this week. I am trying to stay positive, but if I only lose a half a pound a week I will only lose 20 something pounds for the whole year.
I have over 50 pounds to lose and at this rate it will take me about 2 years.
I am so frustrated and mad at myself. I can't believe I let myself gain this much to begin with and stay at this weight for so long (since my son was born 4 years ago). I want to be the thin me again and the thought that it will take 2 years to get there makes me want to cry.
You have to just take it a day at a time- I'd also compare what you are doing now to then- could you be eating less points? Or eating some food that has hidden carbs/sugars in it like pre-roasted chicken? A friend of mine was doing everything right but wasn't losing a pound and then found out the roasted chicken she was buying from the store was FULL of sodium and all sorts of sugars and what not from the marinade.
Are you exercising also? I find for me exercise actually SLOWS me down so right now I'm concentrating solely on diet (I'm not doing WW btw).
You just got back on the plan---so give yourself a break! You may need to find ways to incorporate more AP's or eat less of your WP's to speed up the weight loss, but SUSTAINABLE WEIGHT LOSS is at a rate of 0.5-2 lbs a week! Also, if you lost two pounds in two weeks, it will only take you one year, not two, to lose 50 pounds (52 weeks in a year). Wouldn't you rather lose the weight the right way then to starve yourself to lose it faster, only to gain it back? 80% of people who lose weight gain it back, and I think the major reason is because people don't do plans that are sustainable for life! It sucks that it takes a long time to lose weight, but it is better to lose it in a healthy way than to lose it too quickly and gain it back.
Stick with it, and you'll see a steady loss! It has taken me 5 weeks to lose 8lbs on PP, but the good news is, if I stick with it, I'll be at my goal in 4-5 more months, better than 31 years of losing and gaining!
I know the weight will come off eventually - it's just annoying and I needed to vent. I have just never had such a slow weight loss before when dieting. To only lose 1.5 pounds during the first week or dieting is pretty pathetic. Oh well.
ETA - I am glad I am not gaining. Before I restarted WW I was gaining at a rapid pace for some reason so I am happy about that.
Last edited by chubbymommy724; 02-14-2011 at 11:17 AM.
I understand that it is frustrating---but I personally find it much more frustrating to gain weight and when I go off plan, I always gain weight a lot faster even then it came off! I guess my point is, for me at least, it is about life-style change, doing things I can sustain. I lost weight rapidly on a low calorie diet, but you guessed it, I gained half of it back! Slow and steady is really the only way to go, I still have treats every week and can still go out to eat, rigidity is what makes me fail every time. Stick with it, and 1 pound will turn into 10 will turn into 50 if you just live your life on a doable plan
I understand your frustration too. I'm losing ounces some weeks but i look at the big picture. A pound a week loss until Summer is alot of weight, even if it's half a pound a week. A loss is loss. There's no race, it took time to gain the weight so to take it off won't happen over night.
Slow weight loss is NOT pathetic. I am NOT pathetic. All of my 88 lbs lost has been slow weight loss, not even averaging 1 lb per week (I've been averaging about half a pound a week for the last two years).
If you think of it as pathetic, you're going to think of yourself as pathetic, and you're going to give up, and if you give up you're going to regain.
You can celebrate the small miracle, or you can throw it all away because it isn't a bigger miracle.
If only I had accepted small miracles in the past. Instead when weight loss slowed to less than a consistent 1-2 lbs per week every week, I'd feel pathetic and quit.
This time, I chose the smaller miracle, and I've lost more weight and kept it off longer than any previous weight loss attempt (and I've made and failed thousands of attempts in the past four decades).
I have to give some credit to my doctor's words of wisdom. After I complained that I should be losing at least 1-2 lbs like "normal" people, he told me I was making false assumptions about "normal" (his actual words were along the lines of "where did you hear that garbage?") He pointed out that "normal" isn't losing 1-2 lbs a week, because "normal" is giving up after a few weeks and regaining it all, and that my 1/4 lb a week (at that time) put me ahead of most "normal" people, just because I wasn't giving up. A consistent 1 lb per month put me ahead of the pack, not trailing behind.
You only see the people ahead of you, you never see the people behind, and you forget that progress, no matter how slow, will eventually get you where you want to go. Giving up will not.
Slow weight loss is NOT pathetic. I am NOT pathetic. All of my 88 lbs lost has been slow weight loss, not even averaging 1 lb per week (I've been averaging about half a pound a week for the last two years).
If you think of it as pathetic, you're going to think of yourself as pathetic, and you're going to give up, and if you give up you're going to regain.
You can celebrate the small miracle, or you can throw it all away because it isn't a bigger miracle.
If only I had accepted small miracles in the past. Instead when weight loss slowed to less than a consistent 1-2 lbs per week every week, I'd feel pathetic and quit.
This time, I chose the smaller miracle, and I've lost more weight and kept it off longer than any previous weight loss attempt (and I've made and failed thousands of attempts in the past four decades).
I have to give some credit to my doctor's words of wisdom. After I complained that I should be losing at least 1-2 lbs like "normal" people, he told me I was making false assumptions about "normal" (his actual words were along the lines of "where did you hear that garbage?") He pointed out that "normal" isn't losing 1-2 lbs a week, because "normal" is giving up after a few weeks and regaining it all, and that my 1/4 lb a week (at that time) put me ahead of most "normal" people, just because I wasn't giving up. A consistent 1 lb per month put me ahead of the pack, not trailing behind.
You only see the people ahead of you, you never see the people behind, and you forget that progress, no matter how slow, will eventually get you where you want to go. Giving up will not.
I was talking about that loss being "pathetic" for a first week on a diet - not in general. Applying my use of that word to yourself was obviously not what I intended at all. The last time I really dieted I lost 20 pounds in a span of about 4 months, but 7 of that was actually the first week, so for me, compared to 7 pounds, 1.5 seems really for lack of a better word, pathetic.
Thanks for the input everyone. I had a realization about this. I think the thing I like about PP is also the thing that I don't like. I like that you get to eat more but I dislike that your weight loss is slower.
I like to eat more, so I will take the slower weight loss. If I don't feel so deprived I know I am more likely to stick with it long term. I am just grouchy today and I know that weigh in bummed me out.
I am so not a fan of Valentine's Day, although I did enjoy some conversation hearts for 3 PPs.
My point wasn't that I felt accused of being pathetic, it was pointing out that we're so used to labeling non-spectacular weight loss as pathetic, that we see success as failure because it isn't the most rapid weight loss we've ever seen.
It isn't just comparing ourselves to others that messes with our heads, it's also comparing ourselves to former versions of ourselves. When I was 14, and weighed 225 lbs, and was prescribed amphetemine diet pills, I lost 11 lbs my first week.
My whole life, I've been comparing myself to that one week. I managed to acheive 11 lb loss a few other times (always only the first week, and only at weights far higher than the 225 lbs I weighed at age 14). Each time I felt "cheated" (and pathetic) because I "should have" been able to lose more. In my head, since I had lost 11 lbs the first week at age 14 at 225 lbs, that meant I should be able to lose a proportional amount at 300 lbs (14.6 lbs) or 350 lbs (17.1 lbs) and at 394 lbs (19.25 lbs).
Those 11 pounds taunted me for years, and even when I acheived them, I was disappointed because it was at weights so much higher than 225 lbs that I felt cheated. Even 11 lbs wasn't "good enough" on some level. And when the weight loss slowed to less than 2 lbs a week, why it was hopeless, and yes pitiful. When I felt pitiful, when I felt frustrated long enough I gave up.
In terms of rate of weight loss, it's been "all downhill" from my 14 year old self. I've never lost as much, as quickly. Each and every weight loss attempt, even though always starting at a higher weight has been slower with less success than the previous attempt (it's why I know that metabolism really does decline with dieting, at least for some people. It was the same 1500 - 1800 calorie diet that I always returned to, but the results were less and less and less with each successive attempt. I worked harder, but lost less and could never sustain it as long. I was more and more pitiful each of the thousands of attempts I made).
When I've compared myself to former versions of myself, I've felt alot worse than when I compared myself to others, because it felt as though if I could do it once, I "should" be able to do i t again. All that should piling up left me feeling disappointed, frustrated, cheated, angry, helpless and hopeless (because I was trying every bit as hard as I did then, and the results still weren't the same).
I didn't have to just learn to stop comparing myself to others, I had to stop comparing myself to younger me's. And that was the hardest, because I was most intimately familiar with all those younger me's. I remembered the weekly weight losses of more than 8 lbs a week (still not good enough, because they weren't 11). I remember quitting every time the weight loss slowed to less than 2 lbs a week. My first big weight loss success (with the amphetamine diet pills) was 70 lbs. Then I lost 65 with nutrisystem. Then I lost 60 on TOPS after herniating a disk in my back (to avoid surgery). Then I lost 40 lbs a few times. Twenty pounds many times, always feeling more and more pitiful than the time before.
This time, I've lost the most I've ever lost. I've done it with no drugs, and I've done it slower than I was losing at every quitting point in my life. I always quit before I began averaging less than 1 lbs per week, and "this time" I didn't even start losing that much. The first year I lost 20 lbs without trying (long story, basically the result of cpap treatment for sleep apnea and possibly metformin for insulin resistance). The next two years I lost nothing (despite trying). Then I lost 1/4 lbs a week for about a year. In the last two years that's risen to an average of about 1/2 lb a week. (For once I'm working "up" to better weight loss as opposed to seeing less and less, but that's not really the difference, the difference is chosing not to see any weight loss as pathetic).
I truly believe most people give up, not because of failure, but because of success that they're disappointed in. It's not because of "no" weight loss, it's because of "pitiful" weight loss. When you define success as failure because it's not impressive enough, failure starts to feel inevitable (and it is if you keep comparing yourself to younger, fitter versions of yourself).
I am ticked off and I need to vent
