How do I get out of the mentality of wanting to lose 5lb a week

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Replies

  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
    OP how much weight are you trying to lose?
  • positivepowers
    positivepowers Posts: 902 Member
    edited February 2016
    peaceout_aly wrote: »
    GeexJai14 wrote: »
    i know that a healthy loss is 2lbs a week but I can't get out of the mentality that I need to lose so much so fast aha!

    Just focus on staying consistent and realizing that it isn't going to happen overnight. If you have it set to lose 5-lbs. a week you are most definitely going to binge and lose almost all progress.

    Can you set it to lose 5 lbs/week? I don't think that's even an option in the settings. ETA: OP that should be your first clue to be patient. MFP won't even allow what you want to do.

    People who lose weight rapidly gain it back and them some the same way. Those who lose more slowly tend to keep it off.

    This info from the Cleveland Clinic might help: https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/healthy_living/getting_fit/hic_Maintaining_a_Healthy_Weight/hic_The_Very_Best_Way_To_Lose_Weight_and_Keep_It_Off
  • Vanessalookingood
    Vanessalookingood Posts: 135 Member
    Remove the urgency. Whatever you do to lose the weight, you must do for the rest of your life in order to keep it off. So you may as well make it liveable, sustainable and somewhat enjoyable if you really want permanent success.
  • clark614
    clark614 Posts: 92 Member
    Where can I find Oprah's yo yo story?
  • Orphia
    Orphia Posts: 7,097 Member
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    OP how much weight are you trying to lose?

    Her profile says she has 57 lbs to go.

    I'd like to know what height & weight she is now.

    I lost just under 2 lbs a week for the first couple of months when I was in the obese category and I'm 176 cm tall (5 ft 9.5 inches).

    Since then, it became more and more gradual.
  • elaineamj
    elaineamj Posts: 347 Member
    edited February 2016
    clark614 wrote: »
    Where can I find Oprah's yo yo story?

    Try this to start: http://nypost.com/2015/10/19/oprahs-tried-weight-watchers-before-will-it-work-this-time/
  • jenilla1
    jenilla1 Posts: 11,118 Member
    What's the rush? Do it in a healthy, sustainable way and you can keep it off indefinitely. I lost 1/2 to 1 pound a week when I was losing. It took a while, but the time investment was well worth it. I've been maintaining at goal for 4 years now...
  • GeexJai14
    GeexJai14 Posts: 44 Member
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    OP how much weight are you trying to lose?
    60lbs
  • GeexJai14
    GeexJai14 Posts: 44 Member
    I'm 5.6ft ( my bmi says a healthy weight would be between 9-11 stone im trying to be 10 currently 14.2
    Orphia wrote: »
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    OP how much weight are you trying to lose?

    Her profile says she has 57 lbs to go.

    I'd like to know what height & weight she is now.

    I lost just under 2 lbs a week for the first couple of months when I was in the obese category and I'm 176 cm tall (5 ft 9.5 inches).

    Since then, it became more and more gradual.

  • GeexJai14
    GeexJai14 Posts: 44 Member
    Thanks all In just tired of being overweight and long for the body I used to have. I have been reflecting on what you have all said I guess a loss what ever number is going in the right direction :smile:
  • Vortex88
    Vortex88 Posts: 60 Member
    1-4 lbs per week is the range. 4lbs for large man. 1lb for a small woman. Everyone else in between.
  • ziggy2006
    ziggy2006 Posts: 255 Member
    My advice is to try to change your focus from what might be called the small picture, or the details, the temporary stage of losing weight. There are a lot of people who are great dieters. I am one of them. I have always been wonderful at eating healthily, incorporating more exercise, and losing weight. Of course, once I achieved my goal, I'd bounce right back up to where I'd started in a year or two. I did this over and over and over and over....

    The last time I lost a significant amount of weight (80 pounds) it finally clicked for me. How do I want to live my life even if I never lost a pound? What is the healthiest way for me to eat foods that I enjoy? What kind of relationship do I want to have with food? How can I stay active doing activities I enjoy and actually want to do? What are the flaws in my thinking that are keeping me stuck in this cycle? How can I manage everything to set myself up for success?

    For me, one of the many things I had to learn was to stop empowering my scale. I really, really wanted the scale to be a measure of how healthy my lifestyle was at that moment, and sadly, it can not do that on a daily basis. For instance, I might have a great week where my food and exercise choices were spot on and made me feel great. But I couldn't depend on those results showing up on the scale immediately. The number on the scale did not always reflect my reality, and I had to accept that and move on.

    So, I make choices based on what I know about being healthy, and trust that the scale will reflect that in the long term (over weeks and months). And, yeah, my weight still bounces around in a 10 pound range or so. I am not surprised by it - I generally know why I am at the higher or lower end of that range (and it is almost always related to my activity level, which greatly influences my food choices). Recently, some health issues cropped up that made it impossible to participate in my regular exercise routine, which led to me acting a bit of a petulant brat regarding food choices, and I ended up seeing a rather unpleasant number on the scale. So I'm back to take off that extra weight and figure out how to adjust so I can stay in my comfort zone and silence my inner two year old.

    TL;DR Stop giving your scale so much power over you. In the big picture, it doesn't matter whether or not you lose 2 pounds or 5 pounds or half of a pound this week. What matters is that you are on a trend to become healthier and be able to sustain that level of health for the rest of your life. If achieve your goal weight in September 2016 or May 2017 is an irrelevant detail - achieving and maintaining excellent health is what matters. Make choices that allow you to achieve your goals, and let the details (such as on what date that happens or how many pounds are lost each week) take care of themselves.
  • emmycantbemeeko
    emmycantbemeeko Posts: 303 Member
    Vortex88 wrote: »
    1-4 lbs per week is the range. 4lbs for large man. 1lb for a small woman. Everyone else in between.

    2 lbs is the top of the range for steady loss for nearly everyone.

    Extremely large people with lots and lots of weight to lose may see larger losses in the early days, as they deplete their water and glycogen and reduce their intake (which means less food and water in their stomachs registering on the scale) but 4 lbs is not a sustainable goal for nearly anyone and 1 lb is very aggressive for a small woman.

    Half a pound or less is a very reasonable rate of loss for a small woman. Very reasonable. Achieving the 500-calorie-a-day deficit needed to lose a pound a week is *hard* when your BMR is ~1500 calories. That's not a sustainable rate for most people.
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 14,246 Member
    emmycantbemeeko wrote: »
    but 4 lbs is not a sustainable goal for nearly anyone and 1 lb is very aggressive for a small woman.
    Half a pound or less is a very reasonable rate of loss for a small woman. Very reasonable. Achieving the 500-calorie-a-day deficit needed to lose a pound a week is *hard* when your BMR is ~1500 calories. That's not a sustainable rate for most people.

    Hallelujah!
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
    @ziggy2006 great post :smile:
  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
    It's interesting with weight loss. In so many other aspects of our lives, we complain about how fast the time passes. "Can't believe Christmas is already here". "Can't believe the weekend is over already". "Wish my kids weren't growing up so fast". "Where does the time go!?"

    In almost every other situation I can think of we wish we could slow time down, EXCEPT weight loss. OP with 60 lbs to lose it should realistically take you about a year, maybe a little longer. Even if it takes twice that long, wouldn't you rather slow down a little and not make yourself miserable with either radical calorie restriction that you can't maintain, or unrealistic expectations that make every pound you lose that doesn't add up to 5 lbs/week seem like it's not good enough?

    Expecting to lose 5 lbs/week is unhealthy.
    Expecting to lose 2 lbs/week is unrealistic.
    Losing weight slowly will help you learn the habits you need to keep that weight that you're so desperate to lose, off forever.
    Enjoy the process and celebrate the progress.
  • Orphia
    Orphia Posts: 7,097 Member
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    It's interesting with weight loss. In so many other aspects of our lives, we complain about how fast the time passes. "Can't believe Christmas is already here". "Can't believe the weekend is over already". "Wish my kids weren't growing up so fast". "Where does the time go!?"

    In almost every other situation I can think of we wish we could slow time down, EXCEPT weight loss. OP with 60 lbs to lose it should realistically take you about a year, maybe a little longer. Even if it takes twice that long, wouldn't you rather slow down a little and not make yourself miserable with either radical calorie restriction that you can't maintain, or unrealistic expectations that make every pound you lose that doesn't add up to 5 lbs/week seem like it's not good enough?

    Expecting to lose 5 lbs/week is unhealthy.
    Expecting to lose 2 lbs/week is unrealistic.
    Losing weight slowly will help you learn the habits you need to keep that weight that you're so desperate to lose, off forever.
    Enjoy the process and celebrate the progress.

    So very true.

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