Has anyone had medical reasons that kept you from losing?

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  • JenniBaby85
    JenniBaby85 Posts: 855 Member
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    I have an underactive thyroid, and PCOS. They both make it SO hard to lose weight.
  • breasyd2
    breasyd2 Posts: 32
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    I have hypothyroid, PCOS and endometriosis. I eat correctly for my disorders, am on meds, and work out like a mad woman. I do all that just to avoid gaining weight and in order to be healthy. It is frustrating to do all this and still be incapable of losing weight, but it so much better than the alternative of continuing to gain weight and not be healthy.

    If you do find that you have medical reasons for not being able to lose, do what your doctors say and don't give up even if the road to weight loss is still really difficult.
  • Melodypharmon
    Melodypharmon Posts: 57
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    PCOS. Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome
    Way to combat it is to have a low carb diet (eat like a diabetic would to control blood sugar) and take a bunch of cinnamon pills.
  • squirrelzzrule22
    squirrelzzrule22 Posts: 640 Member
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    Some types of birth control. Gained excessively and COULD NOT LOSE on Yaz. Went off it for a while then switched to a different bc and had a much easier time. Every woman is different and will respond differently to different hormones but on Yaz I went from a stable weight to gaining about 30 lbs in less than six months.
  • bdur76
    bdur76 Posts: 155 Member
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    You've lost 22 pounds. Great job on the loss!

    Make sure your accurately tracking your calories. Weigh and measure your food, give it time and the results will come.
  • JWB42
    JWB42 Posts: 112
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    I truly believe in the 80%/10%/10% theory.
    80% of weight loss is what you eat.
    10% is exercise
    and the other 10% is genetics.
    So, you can control 90% of what you do to help you lose weight.
  • htrshort
    htrshort Posts: 5 Member
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    I didn't have the time to read all the other posts, so forgive any repeats. Everyone would tell me "as long as you burn more than you consume, you have to lose weight." yet, 16 months later, I was 115lbs heavier. Yes, there are some common medical conditions which can cause your body to hold onto weight, hypothyroid being the most common. But, there are a lot of lesser known things as well. I was on a 1200 calorie a day diet for 6 months and gained 40lbs. Yet all my labs are in the "normal" range. I have a serious neurological condition, am on a bunch of meds (none of which are known to cause weight gain, by the way), and can't be as active as I used to. One of the things that happened to me was that those and other issues confused my metabolism into thinking I was starving. So, every single calorie I ate was converted to fat since my body didn't think it knew if I'd get a meal tomorrow and it wanted to horde energy so it would have something to burn if it didn't get any food.

    I completely disagree with the comment that you should rule out all non-medical issues first. Assuming you have a decent relationship with your primary care physician &/or decent insurance, there's no reason to not mention it. Lots of insurance companies cover preventative care at good rates to encourage this. If there is something medically going on, there is no good reason to let it continue longer just to test out non-medical reasons. Not only will that make you continue to pack on pounds (lengthening the time it'll take to get them back off), but usually medical stuff that impacts your weight will be impacting other body systems which you might not yet notice. Plus, even if there's not one thing medically going on, your Dr can make suggestions about the best types of proteins, carbs, etc, ensure you're not sacrificing nutritional elements you need as you cut back calories, etc.

    There are also some really good medically supervised weight loss programs. I did weight watchers and wanted to shoot myself in the head. Then, I found a medically supervised program and, after gaining weight every single day for 16 - 18 months, I've now lost 16lbs in 7 weeks. Because of my unique issues, I see the Dr every week with this supervised program. My husband's doing it with me and doesn't have any medical issues, so he doesn't see the Dr except every 6 - 8 wks or something. But, they do blood work on both of us every 3wks. If anything shows up out of range, they retest the next week. They send the labs to our Dr too, so he's completely aware of what's going on with us and, if something shows up out of range and I don't call to make an appt, his nurse calls us to make an appt. It alleviates any concerns about any medical issues which might be causing weight retention as well as ones which we might have developed by being over weight for a couple years. It also ensures we're accurately tracking everything. It's so easy to think you're writing everything down properly, but it's amazing how off our perceptions almost always are on actual portion sizes, etc.

    I hope that some of this is helpful for you. Best of luck in your weight loss! Try not to get discouraged - not only is it completely normal for loss to wax and wane, but also if you're working out you can be getting healthier and more fit and not actually lose weight. My mom got into the habit of working out every single day. She gained weight, but lost 2 sizes. An inch of muscle weighs more than one inch of fat. So, if you're burning fat and building muscle, you may weight more but be a smaller size. Try to focus on body fat percentage and how your clothes fit just as much, if not more, than the actual lbs on the scale

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