I honestly feel like I can't do this.

Anthony Robbins 'Awakening the Giant Within' taught me how to mentally reprogram myself. It will teach you too. it is called the pain vs. pleasure principle. and it works. I started at 300 lbs and entirely addicted to food. try it. Get the audiobook if you want. i used to listen while i would take my beginner small walks.

Here is a video with a piece:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfSj4_n_C_s

I'm sorry but I haven't read all the replies so I may be repeating what others have said. You said it yourself, you are addicted to food or addicted to the additives, preservatives, the sugar and everything else the food industry adds to our food to make us addicted. I am guilty of it, too, even though I've learned better. If you don't know about the effects of processed food on our bodies and mind, learn about it. Slowly start substituting hot dogs and mac and cheese with real food. Eat more real food, 800 calories are never enough. Train your body to sleep earlier if you can (another big problem for me). And if you're not exercising, start. Best of luck, you can do it, we all can.

I felt this way especially when I started this journey. Amazingly I still feel this way at times even in maintenance when everyone tells me I shouldn't. We are all human. We have good days and bad days, all of our lives. The tools you find and use to get out of a funk will serve you the rest of your life, and you will always need them. I call it sharpening your sword for battle and you will always need to keep your blade sharp for the rest of your life. We may get to relax at times for a few moments, but life is a bit of work until the end.

There is nothing easy about this journey. Don't give up. Keep your eye on the prize. You do not have to be perfect to do this. You just have to have more good days than not. A bad day is not the end of the world. Tomorrow is a new day. Just pick it right up again. Be kind to yourself at all times and never beat yourself up.

Being on a calorie deficit is hard. You can't do this journey on will power alone. You must set up your environment for success. Have a team around you in your real life, not just online. Get trigger foods out of the house. It will take some sacrifice and it's not easy. You might have to say no to some social events sometimes.

Too many changes at once can be hard on some people. I've always eaten healthy so it easy for me to simply eat less. Eating at a calorie deficit is hard on people; even a small deficit puts your body in a state of flux with hormones and such. Everyone is different. Some people can handle a deeper calorie deficit than others, this is not right or wrong, it just is. Stress in your life affects your hunger hormones; lack of sleep, fatigue, job stress, family stress, financial stress, etc. Add in emotional eating issues and it gets even more complicated. Most people can only handle so much change/stress at once, they try to do too much and fail. Sometimes it might be a better strategy to eat at maintenance and make some small changes first, it really depends on how much stress you are taking in at the moment.

For me it's all about a calorie budget. I had less of a budget available when I was losing weight, more to spend now that I'm maintaining and all the tools I used for weight loss come into play for the rest of my life maintaining.

When you have accumulated excess fat, you have accumulated a debt. It is hard to pay off the debt (you have less calories to spend). If you are sitting next to someone your same gender and height and they are not overweight and you are, they get to eat more than you (have more calories to spend) because they are debt free. You have less calories to spend because you are paying off your debt.

There is no mystery to weight loss, everyone thinks something is wrong, their metabolism is broken, they have low thyroid, they have menopause or whatever issue, they are as unique as a snowflake, whatever. I thought a lot of these things once too but once the doctor helped resolve the health issues for me I learned there is still no magic pill. Most people eat more than they need to and are not at good at estimating calories as they think they are. Most people have a lower BMR than they think they do. The only way to know for sure is to go to a lab and have it tested. It doesn't seem fair to have to eat less and feel a little hunger. It's hard to face the truth of it, very hard. It's not fun. It's drudgery at times. But if you learn to enjoy your smaller amounts of food (necessary to lose weight, since the reason we got fat in the first place was eating too much whether we knew it or not), and rejoice in your victories it can be done.

Wishing you the best! -Bobbie

Wow. I am truly touched by every post that I read. I read this entire thread and I honestly teared up a few times (in a good way and because of how true what you're all saying was)

I have opened my diary. I didn't realize people had them opened. You will find it very sporadic as I haven't kept up with it like I should.

I have no idea what macros are, but I'm going to try going to the help post a couple of you suggested.

The 800 thing wasn't/isn't my every day goal. It was yesterday because I was trying "the military diet" to jumpstart my diet.. I was/am going for 1000 calories per day.. I will bump it up to 1200 after reading what you've all said.

I've always ate junk food. Always. My mom could make a 4 course, brilliant meal, and I'd rather eat a t.v. dinner or fast food. The amount I'm eating though definitely changed during pregnancy. I was a partier and drank beer all the time and smoked cigarettes. I quit both of those things while I was pregnant and just constantly ate.

I'm glad I posted this so I can re-read what you've all written when I need to. I've also added tons of new people on here and hope to get to know everyone

I've wanted to change my sleep habits for a long time. I'm going to shoot for going to sleep around 1am. That's early for me.

I am going to try this 1200 thing with exercise and I will bump this thread up in 2 weeks to let you all know my progress.

Thank you again every one of you for taking the time to read and to reply!

THIS is AWESOME! Glad you did not give up.

Like many said before me.. Eat a lot more than 800 cal...
A trick could be to split your day into 5-6 meals...This will help the hunger a lot.

It's just an idea here but...A casein shake before bed could help your midnight cravings... A casein shake is very thick and you're FULL after... It's made to feed your body for 8 hours up...So this might help.

Google "Intuitive Eating". It will explain almost everything you included in your post.

I'm glad that you are doing better and feeling better at 1200! Keep at it and you may want to bump up the cals a little more unless you are very short. I'm 5' 2.5" and I'm now at 1430 plus at least part of my exercise cal. I'm still chipping away at it. I know that you can do this!

1. Read this first: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

2. Eat MORE calories

3. Make wise, filling decisions (okay, so plan ahead in your diary to eat a bunch of baby carrots at midnight, but also eat some almonds that have fats and protein to fill you up if you are truly hungry)

4. Get over the "I can't do this" mentality or you won't be able to

5. Stop thinking that you can only eat 1200 calories to lose weight. Based on your ticker, you have alot of weight to lose, so your body likely needs more calories to function. Which takes me back to #1, #2 and #3.

I've been there girl. I understand. I've actually woken in the middle of the night, still mostly asleep and stumbled to the kitchen to eat. WHY??? I'm not hungry. My body doesn't need food at 2am. It's a habit and a mental block. You can succeed!! You just have to keep at it. Revert back to 1-5 above.