I just need.......something

poorlittlefish

Hey there,

I don't know what I need. Maybe just to vent? Support? Suggestions?

I am 5'8 and at set at 1380 calories though I workout and eat back all those calories (generally 300 on the days I work out, from running 3-5 miles.). I started at 173 and am now at 163. It has taken me just over 3 months to get here. My ultimate goal is 153. I have hypothyroidism but it is controlled and within normal levels.

Holy crap it is going soooooooo slow. I am very compliant and hit my range most days and the days I go over it isn't by much. But I am just. so. darn. sick of thinking about food, planning, worrying, recording-just the whole damn thing. I am not really having trouble in general with the number of calories, just the whole damn process. I just went away to a friends cabin this weekend and for 3 days I didn't log. Didn't go totally nuts (sure, I ate more than I should indulged in cookies, whiskey etc so I am sure I will be up a bit this week) but just didn't think about it. And it was nice.

I don't want to quit because I will be back where I started but where the hell do I a find the energy to keep going? Where do you all get it?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

Aaron_K123

Honestly, not to be boring or anything but you sound like you are doing well and are on track. I know it can be frustrating to continue to work and work and not yet be at your goal but you are headed there and you will get there if you stick with it. Patience and perserverence is key and is also the hardest part. Perhaps set yourself some fitness goals to keep things interesting and help with your motivation.

You won't erase your progress over a weekend and you won't ruin your diet over a weekend unless you allow that to get into your head enough to quit entirely.

MommyMeggo

There is no quitting!
How do you "quit" anyway? Eat all the things and balloon? Undo the hard work you just did? LOL - Hell no!

On days like today--- STOP.
Dont think about what you ate last week on a holiday.
Dont think about how long it took you to lose 10lbs.
Dont think about the next 10 lbs.
Think about the next 1 lb....
Think about TOMORROW. What are you going to do about it tomorrow?

quiksylver296

You look like you're eating very low calories to lose. I'm 5'9", 178 lbs, and losing on 1930 calories. Do you think you would do better if you had some more wiggle room, around 1700 calories or so?

You can also go on a "diet break" and eat at maintenance for a month or so. I did that over the summer. It personally didn't work all that well for me, because I had a hard time getting back on track, but some people swear by it.

And...you're in the last ten pounds. Those are the hardest. It's going to come off very, very slowly. You can do this. Good luck!

rosebarnalice

You're halfway to your goal!!!! You've done great!!!! Yay You!!!!

Sometimes you just need to hear it from somebody else

wookiepants

You're doing great! Man oh man I can't wait to be 173 again. You can do it. I just got back logging about 3 weeks ago and it is a chore however I keep myself going by thinking of that dream goal of being thinner and being able to wear "cute" clothes. Don't get me wrong, big people have some cute clothes, but not to my liking and the price for em...

Sued0nim

So 10lbs in 3 months = 0.83 lbs per week

= a daily defecit of around 410 calories

That's pretty good for as little as you have to lose

So your TDEE is around 2100 calories, better than many

I'm your height and at goal at 160lbs cos lifting is really helpful to body composition and pulling everything up

If it's too much effort you're not learning new tricks...focus on maintenance, you're only 10lbs away from your goal ...what are your go to foods that mean you can stick at your weight ...what is your activity like

I would keep doing what you're doing but change your expectations...cos from here you're doing well

endlessfall16

poorlittlefish wrote: »

Hey there,

But I am just. so. darn. sick of thinking about food, planning, worrying, recording-just the whole damn thing. I am not really having trouble in general with the number of calories, just the whole damn process.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

OP,

Take other's advices that you are doing great, on track, etc. BUT also consider the possibility that you may very well fail. It's just a matter of time if this feeling keeps up. We all have a breaking point!

Do you dare to take a different route? Try something completely new and perhaps fits you better? Specifically, don't bother with all the counting, thus do away with all the worrying, thinking about food?

Do you dare to eat normally, until you feel full, neither disorderly extremely full/stuffed nor barely filled that leaves you wanting; and then go into fasting or eating plain foods for energy until you drop a couple pounds?

That's what I am doing. I am at my best energy and best weight in decades.

mari5466

If planning is difficult. Take one day a week to prelog your week into MFP, leave a little wiggle room and you can always adjust. But the day you do your shopping,make sure to plan.

kimny72

OP, with only 20 lbs total to lose, you should be aiming for @ 0.5 - 1 lb per week. So you are pretty much right on track! The diet and fitness industry try to make people think that you can make the fat just melt right off of you, but unless you have a lot of weight to lose, that's just not the way it usually works.

If the effort is getting to you, no harm in taking a weekend here and there and not logging. Just try not to go overboard, and make sure you get right back on track. Good luck!

nean4476

Sounds like you are doing great and you are on track! Don't look at the big picture but look at one day at a time! I stared with a trainer three weeks ago and my jeans still fit tight but I can see that my body has changes. Scale hasn't gone down much either and it's discouraging but no way am I quitting now! Good luck!!!

ogtmama

I lost 30 pounds in 3 months this summer and by August I had had quite enough of it. I, like you, was freaking tired of always being organized, always being conscious, never giving in, never splurging blah blah blah. My solution may or may not be of help to you.

I decided I don't care how long it takes to lose the next 30. I've set my goal to a pound a week so that when I feel up to it I have a decent goal to shoot for but so long as I don't go over maintenance, I don't think about it too much.

I lost 1 pound over the last month and I think that's fantastic. I'm living like a completely normal person and by next summer I'll be at least one size smaller without any freaking out!

Best of luck!

ashjongfit

We all have this idea that weight loss is or should be a super fast 30lbs in a week deal. Its slow often, but your losing so be patient! Its taken me years to lose 145 lbs and probs awhile more for the last bit

MarlowJo13

You're doing great and in the final stretch!

katkearro

(TL;DR - live, learn and lose at your own pace)
I really understand your sentiment. At the end of my last DietBet I was so focused on losing weight I started worrying that I was developing an unhealthy attitude toward food in general. The constant focus was time consuming and exhausting. I decided to just stop. Stop the tracking, obsessing, denying... I stopped for three months. It was bliss.
In the meantime I went to China and drank way too much beer and ate ALL the dumplings. I also walked through six UNESCO sites. At the end of the three months I had gained two pounds.
What this taught me was that I am making better choices with food and being more active, but I still had to be accountable if I wanted to lose weight. But I didn't want to go back to the psycho calorie hoarder I had come so I simplified my daily targets and reduced the calorie restriction. I increased my activity level to compensate. Now I am losing weight - not my mind

poorlittlefish

OK, thanks everyone. Reading these has really helped. I will keep on pushing!

lynn_glenmont

quiksylver296 wrote: »

You look like you're eating very low calories to lose. I'm 5'9", 178 lbs, and losing on 1930 calories. Do you think you would do better if you had some more wiggle room, around 1700 calories or so?

OP has lost 10 pounds in "just over three months," which means OP is at a daily deficit of a bit under 400 calories. If OP moves from 1380 calories to 1700 calories, s/he will barely be at a deficit at all. If the OP is frustrated at the current pace of loss, moving to barely below maintenance doesn't seem like a good solution.

@poorlittlefish , I have had far more success counting and logging calories than I have ever had with any other approach -- I find it gives me more flexibility than any other approach that ensures a deficit. Logging doesn't bother me. I've only skipped a handful of days during three years when limited Internet availability collided with heavily scheduled trips that involved all-day activities with other people. Sometimes I have to estimate, so I do my best. It doesn't worry me. I don't feel like I'm always "thinking about food" or "worrying."

But I can understand that logging isn't for everybody. You need to find an approach that you can live with that will assure that are in a calorie deficit. Whether you do that by planning and tracking, or by sticking to some limited list of foods and meals that you know will keep you in a deficit without having to log each meal, or by intermittent fasting (if you're sure you won't consume too many calories in your eating window), or by some other method, it doesn't matter. Do you think that you've gotten a good sense for how much you can eat of various foods and remain at deficit? Maybe try taking a break from logging and see if you can maintain a deficit and continue to lose.

ahoy_m8

Echo you're doing really awesome. Your deficit is a little aggressive; 250 cal daily deficit for 0.5lb/wk is the rate normally recommended for the last 10. I realize if you feel it's too slow already, this may not be a welcome thought. It's true, though.

One way to reduce your weekly deficit is to have a higher day on the weekend. Maybe that would break the monotony and give you a break?

trinidadio

Totally agree with ahoy_m8. A cheat day, or even just a cheat meal, is enough for some of us to stay on track. I know I'm going to fail at some point, so why not schedule it! Though it's not for everyone, 'cheating' can be a powerful tool;-) (oh, and you are doing awesome btw)

jillianhannie

-Eat more foods that give you energy.
-Drink more water to cut out craving.
- do not weight yourself frequently instead go off how the food you put in your body make you feel.
- Check out http://www.calculator.net/weight-loss-calculator.html to make sure your good with your calorie intake and other health levels.

jlabraescudero

Hey OP, just wanted to drop a line and say that you're doing great so far, way to stay on track, regardless of onesies or twosies here and there.

As far as what seems to be bothering you, the almost neurotic process of constantly thinking about calories and how-much-is-this, etc. If this is your first time doing counting and logging, let me be the first to congratulate you on making 3 months! That's a long time, especially if you're not accustomed to counting and logging. For some people it becomes second nature, for others its a daily set of mental exercises. I personally both love it and hate it; love it because I like quantifying things and it works (no, really, CICO makes so much sense and really does work), but i hate it because its that ever-present thing at the back of your mind, every time you eat something, you're thinking "I need to log this" or "Does this fit into my plan?" and worrying about meal-prepping. It can be a chore, mentally, and it can be draining, though for others it might be a freeing task.

My first time I tried logging, I only logged for about 1.5-2 months, at which point I reached an intermediary goal and took a quick break from logging and went into low-key maintenance for a bit. That didn't mean that I just went overboard and splurged on anything, but I wasn't measuring and logging everything that went into my mouth either. What I did is I learned how my body felt and reacted and I used a scale weekly. I know that for myself, my weight can fluctuate +- 2.5 lbs. That's a 5 lb range centered around my avg/target weight (between how much food and waste is in my system, how hydrated I am, etc) that I just call a cumulative "water weight". I'd weigh myself once or twice a week and if I start to notice a trend in a direction I didn't like (like slowly edging upward, exiting that range, etc), then I would take steps to correct that situation, sometimes through the use of logging, sometimes without. This allowed me to track myself and catch potential issues early on and make small course corrections as I went along without needing to revert to a stricter, more measured approach. And then when I felt I had had enough of a mental break from the logging system, I went back into it, and continued my journey to my goal.

This is just what worked for me and I just felt like your post really reminded me of where I had been after my first time logging, where it just felt like I was going to lose my mind. I hope that this may help you in some way, whether its some idea for your own system or just as motivation/inspiration to keep up what you've been doing. This worked for me, but YMMV. Sometimes you just need to reach out to the community and vent for a little bit and see that you're not alone in this. That's what I had to do when I stopped smoking (something I'm working on once again, lol).

I know it can seem like reaching your goal can seem like forever, but sometimes it takes a bit of a mental attitude change. I'm going out on a limb here and gonna guess that once you reach your goal, you want to maintain that and not revert to where you were. With this comes the acceptance that this is more than just a 6-month thing or 1 yr thing, but a lifetime objective. That means a shift in attitude and thinking about what you're doing. Its a change in lifestyle and it truly can be something which changes your life (almost always for the better). And this is true not just about maintaining a healthy weight and body image but about other things as well. Again, going back to my smoking example, the time I was most successful in putting down the cigarettes, it came down to that realization, acceptance, and embracing that philosophy (now I need to re-embrace that philosophy once again). Similarly people who used to hate running and now love it (yes, they exist) probably have had similar realizations, that it is about lifestyle change and needing to embrace that.

Once again, GREAT work so far, you're coming along really well. I hope that this post and those of others have helped you to deal with your frustration with the system and I wish you the best of luck on your ongoing journey and through your endeavors in life.

SLLRunner

poorlittlefish wrote: »

Hey there,

I don't know what I need. Maybe just to vent? Support? Suggestions?

I am 5'8 and at set at 1380 calories though I workout and eat back all those calories (generally 300 on the days I work out, from running 3-5 miles.). I started at 173 and am now at 163. It has taken me just over 3 months to get here. My ultimate goal is 153. I have hypothyroidism but it is controlled and within normal levels.

Holy crap it is going soooooooo slow. I am very compliant and hit my range most days and the days I go over it isn't by much. But I am just. so. darn. sick of thinking about food, planning, worrying, recording-just the whole damn thing. I am not really having trouble in general with the number of calories, just the whole damn process. I just went away to a friends cabin this weekend and for 3 days I didn't log. Didn't go totally nuts (sure, I ate more than I should indulged in cookies, whiskey etc so I am sure I will be up a bit this week) but just didn't think about it. And it was nice.

I don't want to quit because I will be back where I started but where the hell do I a find the energy to keep going? Where do you all get it?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

Hey, chin up, you are doing fantastic! 10 pounds in 3 months is approximately 3.33333 pounds a month/.5 pounds a week. You don't have much left to lose, so it will come off slowly.

Do not give up because if you work it right this will be a lifestyle change for you so that you can learn how to successfully maintain your weight.

SLLRunner

quiksylver296 wrote: »

You look like you're eating very low calories to lose. I'm 5'9", 178 lbs, and losing on 1930 calories. Do you think you would do better if you had some more wiggle room, around 1700 calories or so?

You can also go on a "diet break" and eat at maintenance for a month or so. I did that over the summer. It personally didn't work all that well for me, because I had a hard time getting back on track, but some people swear by it.

And...you're in the last ten pounds. Those are the hardest. It's going to come off very, very slowly. You can do this. Good luck!

I would normally agree with this, but given the slow weight loss I suspect she is eating more than she realizes. I say this because she said her thyroid levels are within a normal range right now.

However, those last ten pounds come off at a snail's pace.

JeromeBarry1

So, you vented. You went and lost 10 lb because you did what fat couldn't tolerate, you kicked it to the curb.

Do it again.

Chadxx

If the process is the problem, simplify the process. Once you know how many calories you have to work with, all you have to do is stay within those. I have the app but don't use it and I don't keep a log. I limit myself to 2000 calories. If I have 500 for breakfast, 450 at lunch, and 600 at dinner, I still have 450 for a snack and protein shake. It doesn't have to be complicated.