What is your WHY?

My why is that I'd been unhappy with my body for years. Years and years and years, most of my adult life. I am now in my late 20's and one day last winter I realized that this is the time in my life when I have the best chance of being really fit and looking great-- and staying that way. I realized that I was wasting my young adulthood, when I could be very attractive and happy with my appearance, by not being in ideal shape and being disgusted with my body. And I got engaged in the fall, so I was feeling pretty powerfully that I didn't want my fiance/future husband to be with a woman (me) who was just slowly gaining more weight. Yuck! He deserves a trim and healthy partner, being a trim and healthy and wonderful guy.

And I wanted to get in shape in time to make my wedding dress in the size I fully intend to be in a year from now (when our wedding is) and in 10 or 20 years from now, too!

Now I want to stay the same size, for all those reasons; I've just started maintaining at a little below my original goal weight and I think it will be doable!

Vanity reasons were never enough WHY for me. And despite my weight, my health has not (yet) suffered. So for a long time i just didn't have a reason. I always had an easy enough time dating when i wanted to, i never really held back from doing the things i wanted to do (yeah, i am a lazy *kitten* so there wasn't a lot i wanted to be doing i guess).

Now i have a WHY. He's a 4 year old bundle of pure energy and it takes all i have to keep up with him. He's my WHY for everything. He's the reason i need to lose weight and get healthy because i want to see him grow up. I want to be able to run around in the park with him all day and not be the fat lazy momma who just sits by and watches. I want to play soccer with him, go on hikes and see him explore the world. I want to be the fun energetic mom he needs and deserves.

I also want to get on airplanes without worrying about my fat *kitten* taking up too much space. I want to look as good as i feel. I want to avoid the health problems that are made worse by and brought on by obesity. These are secondary, but not unimportant.

I like threads like this that remind me why i am doing this. Really helps me avoid going for that second cookie this afternoon

Because I wanted to.

My why? I'm sick of being ashamed of how I look and hating myself.

My cousin and my closest friend has had a kidney disease since he was 8. He went into renal failure about two months ago. My whole family and I were terrified of losing him, and now we're watching him go through dialysis 3 days a week. I(and several family members) applied for living donor, but I wasn't accepted because of my weight. I knew that I was overweight, but at 225lbs I thought that I might have made the cut. It was obvious that I was in denial. The fact that I could not donate to my cousin even though I was a match struck the fear of death in me. It made me realize that I am not the only one affected by my health. This was my initial "WHY".

Thankfully for all of us, his mother(my aunt) is currently selected as a primary donor and is going through selection, so for now we have high hopes that things will be well. But, all I can think is "what if?". There's a lot of hoops to this process. I decided that if there were to be any complications, I could be that donor at the drop of a hat; all I have to do is work for it. I never want to be disqualified from ANYTHING because of my weight, again.

What I didn't expect to happen next was that my husband jumped on the wagon with me! My brother, who is at 400lbs, has started to work out with us. My mom will be joining us next week, and now my dad wants to get in shape too.

For now, they are my reason why. This will be my "why" to battle depression, eating disorder, and self-hate. You are not invisible, no matter how much you weigh. I can lose this weight for myself, but I can do it to be there for my family, too. I feel like If I were to give up, It'd be like telling everyone in my family to give up, too; and I AM that important. I deserve health!

I want to have children, and be a healthy example for them.

I love working out and looking good, naked or not.

I'm pretty amazing on the inside - just want my outside to catch up

I really like this post.

My why is: I stopped living and I was bringing everyone I loved down with me. That's not who I am. I am a healthy active person who let herself go (though now I am paying for it medically). This really is a total lifestyle rewind- back to how active I was and how I ate throughout my childhood and teen years. I am not comfortable with this body.

Edit: I wanted to add that this is the second time I have "tried" my first reason was a bikini, apparently that wasn't as motivating as people telling me I sucked and was boring now and my doctor saying I was on a very bad path for my health. LOL.

My friend has been large all her life. She goes on spurs and wants to lose weight for summer or her wedding, but she confided in me that she only does it because of social pressure and in about two months she is back to her regular routine. She doesn't mind her weight and she is comfortable in her cloths/skin.

Why? To enjoy amazing sex, duh! Because sex while fat isn't fun... trust me, I once knew this.

This had me laughing my *kitten* off. You're right! this is at least half the reason. Lol

I know right! For me, this is the alpha and omega. If I can't feel comfortable naked in the presence of my partner, then what's the point?

First off, I want to say that I read this thread a few days ago and it totally made me reevaluate myself. I had been inconsistent, but now I'm back, all in, guns-a-blazing :laugh:

My old why was just about vanity. I wanted to look better, because that's what you're supposed to do, right? Once I got halfway to my goal I started slipping, and it took until now to regain my determination.

My WHY:
- I'm a type one diabetic, and want to be as healthy as possible to avoid complications later in life.
- I just registered for my very first half marathon, and want to be FIT when I finally compete in October
- I can't even explain how much happier I am when I feel good about my weight. It affects my confidence, which affects how others perceive me, which affects my friends and family and my interactions with them. I'm still trying to make new friends in a new-ish city so this is a big one.

Fantastic post! I love this so much!

My whys: I got tired of waking up and hating, absolutely hating, the body I was waking up and living in. Tired of fooling myself into thinking that I don't feel that bad and didn't look that bad. Tired of using food and alcohol as a drug to cure my boredom and my self esteem issues.

Instead, I decided I want to wake up and use my body to surprise myself, find out all of the fantastic things its capable of doing. I wasted the first 15+ years of my adult life being ashamed of it. I want to look in the mirror and realize that while I don't look perfect, and what I see is flawed, it's pretty awesome. I want to have a relationship with food that is about not JUST about enjoyment, but about fueling my body.

This!!!

my WHY: I want to be able to take a photo, and feel like I look good. I know that is bigger self esteem issue than just my weight, as I am skinny fat so you can't even really tell in pictures, but to me it matters.
I hate being in a group picture and feeling like the biggest one there.
I hate taking photos with my stick thin partner (lucky *kitten*, good genes) and feeling like an elephant next to him.
I hate seeing the flab or extra weight, instead of a nice toned body.

I also want the health benefits of being fit. I am tired of always being sick because I don't take care of myself properly. There is no reason I shouldn't. I have been given a life in a good economy, and a body that at it's best has made me the envy of many friends.

I want that back. I want to feel good inside and out.

Thank you so much for this post, this has really motivated me to stop half arsing it and actually stick to my goals.

bumping to read later :flowerforyou:

WooWW!

This is a big WHY now for me, all my others have been the tiniest whys in comparison.

In February I had a 4KG tumour removed from my abdomen, I found out one of the reasons it was so big was because of my size, I didn't even know it was there, tucked right under my rib cage, but that was before it was shrunk down to 4KG.

Luckily it was benign, but it was the biggest kick up the butt I could have had, just a warning shot across the bows you could say, lol.

I realised that I've wasted the 22 years of my life (I was slim and very very fit up until I was 20) I don't want to waste the remainder. My husband, even though I've been moaning about it for ages but it fell on very deaf ears, noticed that when I was in hospital how small my meals were, when I came home portions went down by half straight away, (he cooks) first step completed.

My first mission was not putting on any weight at all whilst recuperating, which was pretty tough going, but as soon as I got the all clear from my consultant to resume activities, I changed my macros, started lifting heavy again 5 times a week, which I love, I get such a buzz from it :bigsmile:

Trouble is now just had a bit of a pull and have to stop for three weeks, probably pushed just a little bit to hard!!!! :grumble:

I really feel I'm in a good place now, been at it for six months now 18lb down so far, but about 10 inches lost in total so the longest I've ever kept at it. The goal is to be bikini ready for next summer, so watch this space.

Good luck with everybody, and may all your WHY's be big ones!!

p.s. Just remembered, my lovely Mother said not to worry about the scar at my age, (42!!) it's not as if I'm going to wear a bikini or anything similar!! Well here's to proving her wrong!!