Discouraged

melverous

This is truly discouraging.
I've been on hiatus from MFP since the beginning of the holiday season.
The 27 lbs. that I lost, I gained 10 of it back.

I tried Jillian Michaels and her Yoga Meltdown and I melted down to HELL.
Winter is not helping either.
I can't afford a gym membership nor can I take long walks during this time.

Any suggestions?
Tracking food is tough when you cook at home and not everything has a bar code

Lizzy622

Sounds like the season has you down too. You may want to invest in a sunlamp. You can do it.

I have mainly just been staying in calories and also have been having trouble getting my exercise in. I do some sit ups and such but usually don't log. Just keep with it Spring will be here soon.

melverous

Hmm..sunlamp - does that boost mood?

MB_Positif

You can enter your own recipes in the recipe builder on the app/website. Once you enter them one time you can save them and add them anytime. I have been on this site for 3 years and never actually used the barcode scanner.

As far as workouts go, maybe get the app You Are Your Own Gym? You can do it at home with no equipment.

melverous

I'll start doing that from now on.
I've just gotten used to scanning stuff that making my own food is a new ball of wax.
Thank you for the app suggestion. I will do that right now!

MysteriousMerlin

Tracking food is easy, though it may take some time. I cook at home quite often. I enter quite a bit of my meals as recipes, which really helps, and will make my own entries if I'm not finding exactly what I need. I may not be getting a completely accurate calorie count, but better than not logging at all. It helps to weigh and measure things out, rather than eyeballing.

CorlissaEats

If your discouragement is connected to the season (Ie Seasonal Affective Disorder) then maybe go out and buy some D-drops. Much cheaper than a sun lamp. Most of our vitamin D comes from exposure to the sun, and shorter days equals less Vit D for anyone further away from the equator....

knra_grl

Tracking food is easy, though it may take some time. I cook at home quite often. I enter quite a bit of my meals as recipes, which really helps, and will make my own entries if I'm not finding exactly what I need. I may not be getting a completely accurate calorie count, but better than not logging at all. It helps to weigh and measure things out, rather than eyeballing.

Yup this and you can add and remove ingredients if you don't make it exactly the same all the time.

You can also find some good workouts online to do at home with or without equipment.

Good Luck OP! You were successfull with the weight loss before and you didn't gain it ALL back so you are on the right track coming back to start your logging! Spring is just around the corner!

THECaptainObvious

Vitamin D drops is a really good idea! Try just random dancing at various times of the day... it really helps blow off steam and get the endorphines flowing (and it's free)!

sallytoister

try the app - workout trainer by skimble. It has great workout sessions at three different levels (casual, moderate, hard) with duration of 7 min to over an hour, and can select no equipment or at home gym. Best part - you can link it with MFP to automatically log your activity...and it's free.

kaypee65

I live in Alaska and agree with the suggestions of using a SAD light and Vitamin D.

Next have you gone to your local library to borrow workout DVDs? Often they have those available to borrow. It's a nice free way to exercise at home.

I do all of my own cooking too. It's a bit inconvenient, but I enter my recipes into MFP to stay accurate. Last night I "invented" red curry vegetables with Thai basil because I had carrots, potatoes, asparagus and Thai basil that I needed to use up. A big bowful has about 250 calories and was so filling. Now I have five more meals of the veggie dish in the fridge and a very accurate calorie count to point click and add. A bit of work, but better than the alternative of progressively worse health and fitness.

jmv7117

I agree with Vitamin D for SAD and even then it can still be a struggle or at least it is for me. On days when the sun is out, I sit by a window which helps a little. MFP is great for monitoring your calorie intake. Do you have a scale? If not, it would help and at about $15 or less might be something you can afford right now. Simply weighing your food does make a difference. There can be a weight variance between "medium sized anything" including eggs. I also use the recipe calculator a lot on MFP because I cook from scratch a lot. Individual serving sized foods (eg. cheese strings, yogurt, oatmeal) can take the guess work out of portion size. I avoid anything mass produced that is diet targeted like energy bars, meal replacement shakes, and that type of thing. I do however, make homemade versions of these where I can control the ingredients and size.

Technically you don't have to exercise at all to lose weight. All you need is a calorie deficit. I purposely chose not to join a gym. I do have an elliptical trainer, core toner, a set of 3 lb dumbells, an exercise mat, a pedometer and a Mio Petite pedometer/HRM all acquired at greatly reduced cost. The elliptical is a couple of years old but everything else has been acquired since November when I started with MFP. I checked out the APPS section (above) then signed up for Runtastic. Runtastic has several apps that feed results to Runtastic then to MFP. I started with the free versions of pedometer, squats, six pack, situps and runtastic. Then after testing them I upgraded to their Pro versions for all but runtastic which cost me about $11 total. I may upgrade runtastic when the nice weather hits and I start walking a few trails. I also use Hot5 (free), Sworkit Pro ($.0.99) as well as a few fitness videos from You Tube. The Fitness Blender videos are good! Just keep up the pace to burn the calories. I set a walking path through the house (end of hall, through hall, down the stairs, on the landing, down next stairs, to back of house, through back hall, turn around and do the route in reverse). My goal is to consistently meet my 10,000 step challenge daily. It is surprising how many steps there are just in regular daily activity in the house. If you live in an apartment building, you could get your steps in walking the halls. If that isn't an option, a lot of folks I know walk through the mall. I set my routine to do a 90 minute session each day with the apps and videos, a 15 to 35 minute session on the elliptical, and as much walking as possible. If you eat out, there are a couple of free apps to help with the calorie counts - Calorie Calculator and Fast Food Check. Chain restaurants have their nutritional values available online as well. Don't discount calories burned via NEAT. Something as simple as housework does burn calories so you could record that just for the motivation. On a travel day, I add certain NEAT activities as a motivator simply because in my mind it says I was at least moving not sitting. I use http://calorielab.com/burned/ and sometimes just search for the calories burned for a NEAT activity.