What's the point? Solitary Fat Woman.
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I have a different approach. This is my own personal and private journey. It belongs only to me and to no-one else and while giving and receiving support is nice, it is not my prime motivator. Too many of us have been victims to the fashion industry, the beauty industry, the weight-loss industry and to well-meaning family and friends. Because I don't want to place blame on anyone or anything for my obesity, I also want to be answerable to only myself on my journey to health and fitness. Of course, what works for me or you, may not work for anyone else and I do love reading the comments.0
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Hi there, I'm a lurker. I've been really trying to get healthy again this year, and I'm obese.
I love checking message boards for info, recipes, etc. I don't comment all that often, but I do read the advice people give. So maybe you're not helping the original poster, but I'll bet for every grumpy OP who refuses to take the info seriously, there might be dozens of us lurkers taking note.
Before coming on these boards and reading stuff like the "sexypants" article, I only had nutritional information I got from Weight Watchers back in 2009. I had no idea I wasn't eating enough protein (I knew it was important, but I thought one tiny serving would be enough), I didn't know that fat wasn't evil, the awesomeness that is Fitness Blender, and countless other bits of info.
So for every "I'll eat 800 calories a day, if I want to, you're not the boss of me" comments you see, just remember there's people like me who had no idea what their BMR, TDEE or macros really were until they read some info on the boards. When I see informative posts, it makes me do a few Google searches, and I try to make an informed decision.
Thanks! I've lost nearly 16 pounds, I've got boatloads of energy, and my biceps are starting to show!
THIS ^^^ I also rarely post, but am on the message boards almost daily flipping through all of the info on here. I agree, just because the OP doesn't listen dosen't mean there isn't many more off us in the shadows soaking it all in.0 -
If I try to find someone "just like me", I will probably have slim pickings. But if I look for people who have something I want, or have been where I am or are where I wanna be, the field is wide open.0
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For what it's worth, I know that you're very knowledgeable and I continue to be impressed with how you show up with a consistently good attitude and work hard. Hang in there, lady.0
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what is your definition of super fat?
I have depending on what list you look at about 50 more lbs to lose to be healthy
I have busted my *kitten* for the last 4 months to get my numbers under control so I wont have to go on meds
losing weight was part of it but an entire diet overhaul was the biggest thing and getting off my fatass
except for when Im sick (which is this week nasty fever I just can't shake) I exercise every day
yes there are people that have friended me on here that have since quit
the ones that made excuses
the ones that insisted they could not do it
they are right
they are not ready for the change or commitment that comes with this
As for the thin people the only ones I have ever run into IRL and online have been extremely supportive
People can say what they want I know what works for me0 -
Well, okay, so I do understand that super fat means different things for different people but let's say...
I'm 6'1" and struggling to break a 430lbs plateau that I have beat before. I do understand that everyone has their issues and challenges, sometimes I feel like people who haven't been quite this big don't really have the ability to understand.
I do try to brush off people who immediately go into lectures, but even if you can walk away, sometimes it still bugs you. I had to privatize my diary because curious people would look at it, and without my asking for feedback, would send me PMs about how high my dailies are... for example.
For me, I have every intention of not being this by the end of this year but it's really hard because even if I lose 100 pounds this year, I'll be over 300. I'm not feeling sorry for myself. It's just an exhausting concept sometimes.
But I never said I was giving up on that effort. I don't do this for anyone else but me....
Aaaaand I just broke my desk bike. Wonderful. ha Stupid tears.0 -
Well, okay, so I do understand that super fat means different things for different people but let's say...
I'm 6'1" and struggling to break a 430lbs plateau that I have beat before. I do understand that everyone has their issues and challenges, sometimes I feel like people who haven't been quite this big don't really have the ability to understand.
I do try to brush off people who immediately go into lectures, but even if you can walk away, sometimes it still bugs you. I had to privatize my diary because curious people would look at it, and without my asking for feedback, would send me PMs about how high my dailies are... for example.
For me, I have every intention of not being this by the end of this year but it's really hard because even if I lose 100 pounds this year, I'll be over 300. I'm not feeling sorry for myself. It's just an exhausting concept sometimes.
But I never said I was giving up on that effort. I don't do this for anyone else but me....
Aaaaand I just broke my desk bike. Wonderful. ha Stupid tears.
Let me be clear, it's hard. It will always be at least a little hard. In 100 lbs, you will still have days you struggle. However, it's worth it. It's worth the struggle. 430 lbs is a size that can kill you. Would you rather die young or struggle for a few years to lose some weight and establish healthy habits?
I'm not trying to be mean. I sympathize with the feeling that this might take forever, but maybe it's time to stop thinking about how long it will take and start thinking about the benefits that you're getting out of it right now. How does your body feel compared to when you started? How much harder can you push yourself with exercise? If it's even a little bit better, that's progress. You. Are. Making. Progress. You're going to have to come to accept that however long this takes you, as long as you're trying, you're progressing.0 -
Don't give up on MFP . . . it's still useful as far as calorie counting and all that, just stay away from the forums. You're right, people post on here wanting to hear the answers they want to hear (like "Yes, it's perfectly safe and healthy to eat 800 calories a day," and "Yes, that supplement/pill/crazy fad diet works wonderfully and you will get thin overnight doing it!") and will not hesitate to argue when they don't get the answer they want.0
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I'm no know it all. I'm new to this myself. But I feel motivated to tell you (OP) this:
Be what you think is missing in the world.
Good luck to you in everything you do.
(edit typo)0 -
You should make friends now when you're fat because you'll never know if the ones you make when you are skinny would have liked you when you were fat and that's not a friend.0
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Hey - yes, you are not alone. I'm neither fat or skinny. I usually read these posts with no intention of replying, but I saw yours and it sticks with me. I'm 53 and over the course of the year have gained weight and had my glucose numbers rise. Doctor said to drop at least 10. I haven't been in a gym in almost 20 years. Got a trainer and have been hitting it. The scale? Not moving. I'm serious. In 6 weeks or so. Not moving an ounce. Measurements are down and I feel better, but I am so far out of shape.
I applaud you and I applaud ANYone who gets up and gets moving - no matter the reason. Go. Do it. I quit in my mid-thirties and I REGRET IT. I keep telling my trainer: tell your younger clients not to quit. I am in pathetic aerobic shape and am weak, but I'm not going to let this beat me. AND NEITHER WILL YOU. Look at how far you've already come. GO YOU.
Don't get discouraged. Keep going and turn your backs on anyone who gives you crap. Do this for you - for your health - and for you feeling better. NO ONE has the right to lecture you. NO ONE.
Only listen to those who will give you love and encouragement - because that is what we are placed on this Earth for: to love and encourage.
"Super fat"???? Really? That's not who you are, sister - you are a soul that is in a body. When my kid was about 4 he asked why some people had different colored skin. I told him, "You know how mommy has a red coat? Daddy has a brown coat? And you have a blue coat? That's what skin is: a coat for our soul. We're all the same inside and when we die, we just take off our earthly coat." Don't beat yourself up because your coat needs a little repair - MINE DOES, TOO. And, so does everyone else who is on this site.
HANG TOUGH.0 -
Let me be clear, it's hard. It will always be at least a little hard. In 100 lbs, you will still have days you struggle. However, it's worth it. It's worth the struggle. 430 lbs is a size that can kill you. Would you rather die young or struggle for a few years to lose some weight and establish healthy habits?
I'm not trying to be mean. I sympathize with the feeling that this might take forever, but maybe it's time to stop thinking about how long it will take and start thinking about the benefits that you're getting out of it right now. How does your body feel compared to when you started? How much harder can you push yourself with exercise? If it's even a little bit better, that's progress. You. Are. Making. Progress. You're going to have to come to accept that however long this takes you, as long as you're trying, you're progressing.
See, I keep coming back to check in and responses like this just... ugh, I'm not trying to be ungrateful. I'm really not. But as I've repeated, I didn't say I was giving up losing weight. This type of response is kind of like saying, I didn't read what you were really saying, Q.
My weight is high. However, it isn't effectively killing me. Asking how my body feels with the progress I've made is a double-edged sword because I have been more sick and in pain in the last two years than I have in my whole life. I don't mean DOMS and the flu... I mean losing the weight has caused hormonal changes, that in turn have created catastrophic problems. At this point, losing weight "slow and steady" could be worse for me than anything else. I know what you're saying though.
The way it's been, I fully expect to lose the rest of my uterus to this. Sometimes I really regret ever starting. I was much happier overall. I could handle being fat then.
I just wanted to try and connect with someone that's dealing with something at least somewhat close, that's all. Facing a longer battle. Maybe even someone that has gotten sick because of it like me.0 -
You should make friends now when you're fat because you'll never know if the ones you make when you are skinny would have liked you when you were fat and that's not a friend.
sillyvalentin - Your ticker is AWESOME!0 -
Well, okay, so I do understand that super fat means different things for different people but let's say...
I'm 6'1" and struggling to break a 430lbs plateau that I have beat before. I do understand that everyone has their issues and challenges, sometimes I feel like people who haven't been quite this big don't really have the ability to understand.
I do try to brush off people who immediately go into lectures, but even if you can walk away, sometimes it still bugs you. I had to privatize my diary because curious people would look at it, and without my asking for feedback, would send me PMs about how high my dailies are... for example.
For me, I have every intention of not being this by the end of this year but it's really hard because even if I lose 100 pounds this year, I'll be over 300. I'm not feeling sorry for myself. It's just an exhausting concept sometimes.
But I never said I was giving up on that effort. I don't do this for anyone else but me....
Aaaaand I just broke my desk bike. Wonderful. ha Stupid tears.
When I first started I had 100lbs to lose. The thought devastated me. I broke it down in to 25lb increments. It was the only way that I could stay motivated. Then I started looking around...there were people that had 200-300-400lbs to lose. I knew that if they could face that task then I could handle my own 100lb loss.
I chose to do this journey without the support and encouragement of others. I needed to learn to care enough about myself to do this. I needed to trust myself...to find my own motivation...my own encouragement. I had to learn that I am worth it and not rely on others to help. This journey is about so much more than just losing weight or getting fit...it is about living our lives and facing our fears...tearing down walls....brick by brick.
This is your journey...it is not about what others think...what comments they make...it is all about you.0 -
Well, I don't know what I can say that anybody else hasn't already said. Trying to get healthy, and live healthy is a journey. Its a change. It sounds like things don't look so hot for you right now. Hang in there. Each day is the opportunity to do something better than you did yesterday. Its these small, incremental changes that eventually change you.
It ain't easy. Over 260 lbs my knees and hips hurt when I started C25K. Down to 225 lbs, now my back is starting to bother me. I just decided that as long as I could go forward, that's what I was going to do. Only you can decide what hurts too much to continue. Do listen to your body though. I've made that mistake too.
I hear ya. I've been in your shoes. Not done yet, but better than where I was.0 -
I understand how you feel.
Everyone sees things from their own perspective.
I see a combination of things happen in these threads.
A lot of people genuinely want to help the person asking a question.
We all have different ways of expressing ourselves, language is a complex thing. Sometimes people become defensive and react like they are under attack when they aren't really.
Often people genuinely want to impart important nutritional advice because the person is contemplating something they know probably isn't going to work and the other isn't willing to listen to experiences of people who just might have a clue.
Anyway, its going to keep happening.
I'd like a dollar for every person who gets on here and says"I can't eat the 1200 cals what can I do?" Like - if your over weight you've been doing it for years, duh.
Anyway I wish everyone well - don't give up!0 -
I was super fat at my highest. Not 400+, but trust me, 320 was "super fat" enough.
This is going to sound really harsh, but I don't deal with a lot of "super fat" people in real life. Most of my friends are thin, I don't build friendships around eating, and I don't gravitate often toward intimate relationships with people who have "fat" as part of their identity. My wife struggles with her weight (though she's not super fat), my favorite cousin is about 400 lbs, and my sister, who is one of my best friends, just had gastric sleeve. So while I have fat and super fat loved ones in my life, I don't have a lot overall. Why? Because I REFUSED to define myself by my fat. Being fat was detrimental to my self image and self esteem, so the last thing I would be attracted to is people who are either defined by their obesity, or defined by an endless list of excuses for why they are obese. I was never blessed with that particular kind of self delusion. I neither made excuses for my size nor excuses for staying at my size. Past childhood, it was all my fault. I find that so many fat, obese, and morbidly obese people are chalk full of an endless array of justifications and excuses, and when you're trying hard to beat back your own fat body you don't need to be surrounded by that. So finding a lot of "super fat" people who are done with the excuses, and ready to bust their *kitten* to get out of that boat, in and of itself is very limiting; afterall, most wouldn't be in that boat at all if they naturally had those traits.
On the flip side I didn't discuss my weight issues with the thinner, fitter, leaner people in my life. I wasn't interested in acknowledging my struggles with people who couldn't truly understanding, asking for help I did not need from them, or casting myself as the fat, whiny guy.
When it comes to other people, I learned to largely go alone on this road a long time ago. It's God and me. Even when it comes to talking to my wife and sister about weight issues, it's not about getting help or support for myself, but more supporting them. That way my successes speaks for themselves, and the failures are my business, and my responsibility, alone.
It just seems that this is often destined to be a lonely road. Even when you start out with like minded, like bodied people, it is just so very common for them to fall by the wayside as the journey goes on. We make a huge deal about weight loss because, at the end of the day, RARE is the person who makes it to the finish line, and even rarer still runs the long term race of maintenance. I think support is great if you can find it in other people, but it's best you find an inner fire and resolve to carry you through the long, lonely stretches.0 -
Where are all the super fat people that have stopped feeling sorry for themselves all the time, and are actually taking this seriously?
Aren't you being hypocritical? Maybe people feel like you do. Alone and unmotivated.
I've been the fat friend and I've been the skinny friend. Both sides are lonely on the weightloss road. Sometimes you just need to do it for you and to stick it to the other people that A) Don't help you or
Don't take you serious.
If you want to add me, I'm always on this damn thing.
Well, I guess if you want to take my reaching out as feeling sorry for myself, that's okay.
I was intending more to reference the very obese people who, rather than suck it up and do something already, just lament on being fat, and let it be an excuse. I won't claim perfection by any means... But it's very disheartening to be active on here and working and trying and friending people to mutually motivate and most of the time, I end up with friend bloat and wondering what happened to that initial driving force.
I'm not unmotivated. I'm anything but. I am just tempted to give up on MFP. My lamenting of being alone is about feeling like the only 400+lbs person busting my booty.
Ultimately I was just trying to reach out because I felt particularly depressed. Have had some really hard thoughts going through my head today that I don't think smaller people will understand... So I was hoping maybe someone would pop up and be like *beast arms*
When I started here, I had mostly very obese people on my FL, thinking that they'd better be able to know what I'm going through. That didn't work out so well. Mostly because our personalities and goals didn't always mesh. Then I started adding people based on attitude, and that went much much better. Can they always get exactly what I'm going through, mentally and physically? Hell no, nobody REALLY can. But, I can't always totally get what Amber is going through, she has medical conditions up the wazoo. That doesn't mean that I can't get that it's hard, and that I treasure her as a friend. There are many others on my list with other struggles. From brain hemorages to debilitating back issues. Sometimes it's just HARD. Mentally, physically, all of it. Please don't limit yourself to people who have gone through exactly the same thing. Good solid friends can help each other, even if they haven't had the same struggles.0 -
Don't forget that a lot of the thin people here who talk like they know it all used to be super fat people who got lean and are just sharing their experiences about what works and what doesn't work, and really do know a lot and just want to share what they've learned over the years.
Don't assume that what you see in their avatar pic is what they've always been like. Some people here have successfully lost a huge amount of weight.......... even many who've not lost such impressive amounts have still succeeded and have a lot of useful information to share.
Yes, I know... What I was saying is that people take my stats or my goal and go, there's no way she knows anything about anything and they lecture me about my goals and my calories and everything without prompt. I can accept that anyone on here can bring good info to the table... I just wish more people did too.
did you ever consider it may be because they have had success and they are trying to pass along knowledge to you?
Why would you not want to take advice from people that are now fit????
confuzzled...0 -
What's the point?
I usually get involved with comments when people seem to really want help... but in the end, they write-off what they don't like reading. It can be legitimately helpful and informed, but it doesn't matter. There's always a reason why it doesn't apply when you don't like it... That's the nature of life I suppose, but if you're not open to opinions, you shouldn't ask the public.
My heart is heavy, I guess. I'm struggling to see the point in being social while working the fat off. I can't seem to find anyone else of my comparable efforts and plan that has any interest in doing anything other than commiserating and being validated in their excuses for not doing what they admit they know they should be doing.
Where are all the super fat people that have stopped feeling sorry for themselves all the time, and are actually taking this seriously? Who have moved past letting their heavy body be an excuse for why they don't exercise? Who will help me feel like I'm not so alone in fighting an almost impossible beast?
Where are the thinner people who are genuinely interested in partnering and motivating, who don't assume that because you're super fat, they automatically know more than you? Those that will have a legitimate conversation about health topics, instead of going into lecture mode on the assumption that you brought up the topic because you're obese and don't know anything about it?
Do these people even exist? Or am I just doomed to feel alone?
Yeah, I know, there are a lot of people on my list and they like my goofy updates and my photos, but rarely engage me in discussion of anything of merit...
I guess I'm sad about it all, and about to give up on MFP. Could use some motivation to keep it going.
I had to deal with disc issues too while losing weight - it's much improved now, but I still have challenges. I never let my weight or the injuries be an excuse - I kept on fighting. And it paid off. Here's my story: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/ihad/view/my-thanks-to-the-man-of-steel-407835
I find a lot of value in the social experience here. There are people at all levels of fitness willing to engage in good discussion, share inspiring and thoughtful moments, talk about their real struggles and challenges, and have fun along the way. You just have to keep an eye out, but we're here, I promise. There's lots of different ways to engage people, and seeking them out can half the fun. I like blogging, and I meet a lot of interesting people that way. For all the chaos on the forums, I do see a lot of knowledgeable, personable people who pop up too.
Don't lose hope. You're not alone.0
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