Exercise, Healthy Eating, Busy Life, and Fatigue

lolitasunrise
lolitasunrise Posts: 6
in Motivation and Support
I was hoping I could get some advice and motivation on my current situation.

I'm sitting at 160 lbs right now, four pounds down from when I decided to start losing weight, but I've sort of plateaued here for about three weeks. My biggest challenge is juggling, well, everything.

I want to work out every day. I would love to commit to this. The problem is, between cutting calories and running around a college campus all day, by the time I have time to go to the gym, I'm so exhausted all I want to do is lie around and sleep. If I do commit to working out every day, I can't maintain the calorie restriction. If I maintain the calorie restriction and put in the effort to make healthy foods, I'm so mentally burned out that exercising on top of school is just the most daunting thing ever. It's like I have portion control, fitness, and food quality, but I can only pick two to juggle with school and my jobs or else my head explodes. I'm a little discouraged.

A little background on my level of fitness: I do ballet, barre, and heated yoga/pilates, at least an hour of each once a week. (So 3xs a week bare minimum.) Occasionally between workouts, if school and work permits, I jog around my neighborhood if the weather is nice or use the elliptical machines at the gym 30-60 minutes. I try to be passively active, like doing light barre exercises in my room if I'm watching a movie or heavy stretching every 30 minutes if I'm studying/doing homework.

Sometimes I wonder if the fatigue is born partly from a lack of motivation. It's like I'm not really tired until I think about working out on my own, then suddenly my brain just shuts down. Help? :D

Replies

  • WillowWindow
    WillowWindow Posts: 100 Member
    Sounds like mental as well as physical fatique. College can be tiring for sure and you are doing well to fit in all that exercise. The one thing I can think of is that you might build some fun and relaxing exercise into your routine and concentrate on aerobic rather than more repetetive strength or stretching exercises. Maybe gentle swimming, walking rather than running, or even some fun sports like tennis/badminton or pick up games of some sort, whatever you enjoy. Try to make these exercise periods social and fun and just moderately paced. I think the key is to do stuff that you really like and will continue rather than painful and tedious stuff that you will want to drop as soon as the pounds do. If you schedule them as social time/ time to meet freinds you can do two things at once rather than tryng to find more time in your hectic schedule for exercise alone.

    Good luck!
  • love4fitnesslove4food_wechange
    love4fitnesslove4food_wechange Posts: 6,897 Member
    How many calories are you eating?
  • victoriannsays
    victoriannsays Posts: 568 Member
    When I first began my fitness journey I was eating 1200-1300 calories because MFP said so. I was doing cardio 30-60mins a day. I go to school full time, work 2 days a week, volunteer and a 24/7 mommy. I WAS EXHAUSTED.

    It just wasn't working for me. So I found something that did.

    I am in a small caloric deficit and I lift 3x a week and do yoga. Calculate your TDEE and -20%. Add some lifting. Don't workout everyday. You don't have to and you'll exhausted yourself like I did.

    Find what works for you
  • lolitasunrise
    lolitasunrise Posts: 6
    I try to keep the net calorie intake (eating - working out) around 1200 to 1400.

    Dance and yoga are really the only two things I've found that I really enjoy enough to commit to. I want to lift more, because the one summer I did it with a friend I dropped weight really fast, but I just don't enjoy it. It's so repetitive and painfully boring for me that I almost always quit after a couple of weeks.

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