[Persicae]

Hello fellow chickies!

Well, it has been a LONG time since I have logged onto here.

Where have I been, you ask?
Well here is the story:
-In late March, I was dumped by my now ex-SO of a year and a half. In turn, I ended up losing all desire to work out, eat and sleep like I am supposed to (AKA- The Break-Up Diet).
-After a week or two of this, I was down to 192 lbs and I began to eat more again. However, it wasn't good foods (I fell in love with ice cream ) and started binging almost every day.
-I am now back up to 200-202 and struggling to get back on a normal, healthy eating schedule.
-I picked up smoking in April and am now trying to quit AND control my binging.
-Getting back to the gym? Well, that has been a challenge since it is difficult to get back into getting more than 5-6 hours of sleep and I am EXHAUSTED by the time I get off work.
-I am currently living with said-ex and progressivly getting over it. And I now have a new SO.

So.....I need some help getting back on track.

Any suggestions or advices for starting back on the road to a healthy lifestyle?

[Loli]

I think that, first, you need to find YOUR motivation. Why do you want to lose weight?

[Persicae]

Well....

-Vanity (I have never been thin and I would like to feel good when I am in front of a mirror)
-Health (I want to feel better and avoid to the best of my abilities getting diseases)
-To feel lighter and move quicker
-To fit in clothes that are not Large or XLarge and maybe fit in a Small for once.
-To look more attractive to my SO (not that they don't think that I am....it's a personal stigma)

[xxkaleidoscopic]

I think the first thing to do is make sure everything in your personal life is in order. Are you happy? If not, what could you do to make yourself happy? If you're unhappy, dieting is often an uphill battle, more than usual.

Next, start by cutting out things that are obviously bad. Pints of ice cream, for example. Even that will help you drop weight.

[Persicae]

Well, I am having family issues and I am not happy with the fact that I can't seem to get myself on track. I literally just mindlessly finished off 1/4 a carton of low-fat ice cream.

But that is the last time I buy ice cream for a long while.

It's just that my day starts off normal, with my eating and such....and then all of a sudden it is dinner and then BINGE.

It's constantly that "I will start tomorrow" idea.

*le sigh*

[xxkaleidoscopic]

I know what you mean about the "tomorrow" attitude. My best advice is just to buck up and stick it out the first day. The first day is the hardest, and there's not much to say beyond that.

Also, maybe tell yourself you have to be done eating by a certain time, to avoid late-night binges, since yours all seem to occur at dinner and after. For me, I do Intermittent Fasting, so I only eat between 12 PM and 4 PM every day. Some people doing IF have longer windows, like maybe 9 AM to 5 PM. Having a strict time rule like that really keeps me in check. In fact, it's helping me resist this very second!