How do i start- advice on exercise and making a start.

The odds are that your body hurts the way it does at least in part due to not moving at all. You have to make the decision that it's important to start moving.

You don't have to start with a long workout. In fact, you don't have to start with a workout at all. When you are truly 100% sedentary, your first step can be simply making sure you move more than usual. Walk extra aisles at the grocery store. Get up and move around the house during commercials. Set an alarm on your phone to make you get up every hour and walk around.

Red Bull and other energy drinks will not do anything other than pump you with caffeine and sugar, and some will have extra vitamins. They will ultimately make you hurt more and be more tired.

Big things about being tired and overweight... We often get there because we are missing important key factors for life. So try this on:

1. Get about 7 hours of sleep every night, and make yourself get up when these hours are done.
2. Drink approximately 1/2 your body weight in water ounces. This means that if you weigh 200 pounds, you should try to get at least 100oz in fluid. People will go back and forth on this, and you should adjust to need, but a big part of fatigue is dehydration for a lot of people.
3. Get your vitamin levels checked. Low Vitamin D is very common and can contribute to fatigue and pain issues a lot.
4. Focus on starting with 3 days a week getting 15 minutes of walking in. If this means 3 sessions of 5 minutes when you are starting, this is fine. The point is to get up, get moving and set a routine doing the easiest there is. If you are not ambulatory, then look for routines developed for non-ambulatory people.
5. Obtain a therapist. It's a very helpful aspect of discovering the root causes of the situation.

A lot of times, when we've lived a burdened life, we left pain and fatigue be the excuse to not do what we have to do, which can be the mask for fear. Don't be afraid of feeling better.

Truth? You aren't going to feel good right away. There is going to be a time of transition where you will hurt, you will ache, you will be so tired and it'll feel so hard but you push. PUSH! Because you'll notice, it becomes a different type of pain, different type of tired. Monitor your food, get moving, and don't step on the scale for a couple weeks. Just focus on being a bit better every day. Then after a couple weeks, step up on the scale.

If you need a personal connection, hit me up. I started at over 500lbs and have been up and down. I've a diagnosed chronic pain condition, and sometimes it feels pointless... but things do feel different. They do feel better. You'll start to lose, I promise. Just make sure you have your doctor and maybe a therapist there to help you along the way. With a doctor in on the plan, they can help you with vitamin issues and setting appropriate goals, and be able to handle any particular pain that isn't just body weakness.

Add me if you like.

Start with walking - whatever pace is comfortable for you. If you can only make it 5 minutes at a time then do that a few times a day. Then add an extra minute, or 5, as you can.

There are also simple body weight exercises you can do. If its uncomfortable you have to decide if its the sort of discomfort that you should work thru, or if its the sort of discomfort that means you should not do the action. I tried to do a squat challenge, each day increasing by 5. Midway thru the month my knees were screaming. I stopped the challenge. I am back to doing squats now (pain is gone) but no longer doing an insane # per day.

Overall though weight loss begins with how much you consume. Careful weighing, logging of food.

Go see the doctor. Rule out physical problems, get a target weight and daily calorie goal, find out what foods you should and shouldn't be eating, discuss your joint pain and get cleared for exercise.

Swim! Swimming is sooo easy on the joints and it burns calories like crazy. If you're that fat, you probably have more muscle than you know. It requires a good deal of muscle to haul all that weight around! Swimming gives you resistance and tones the muscles. You also don't feel like you're working hard. My out aren't all sweaty and hot.

Swimming is perfect. If you don't like how you look in the suit, get a one-piece jogger. And get over yourself. You're going swimming to DO something about that fat. So go with the attitude that people can look at your fat thighs all they want because they won't be fat for long.

If it doesn't hurt, try walking. If it does hurt, don't do it until you discuss it with the doctor.

That's my $.02

Good luck!

You can do this. I started at needing to lose around 165 lbs and am down around 22lbs right now. Get up and move, even if its for 5 minutes. And tomorrow do just a bit more. Don't set a workout standard that is too difficult for you. Right now, I try to walk 4 or 5 days a week with a friend, 5 to 6 miles a day. The most important thing is to just start moving.

oinkyoinkerer wrote: »

I am 30-35kgs (66lbs-77lbs) overweight and have no muscle mass, my joints, hips and knees hurt and I am exhausted all the time. These are all my excuses/reasons for not exercising. I know I should suck it up and exercise but I could cry, I am so tired and sore. Is it pointless to have a redbull or something to get me going? What do you do? I have tried to lose weight many times before and I guess this time I want to actually do it not just say I am going to but nothing has changed.
(reposted this here as I posted it in intros by mistake)

1) Walk - but start off really slowly. Just walk 5 minutes away from your house and then 5 minutes back. 10 minutes, that's it. That's how to start. Then, make a tick on your calendar to note that you have done it.

This video is really worth watching. It will tell you the value of walking/medically. It's 10 minutes long but it's really worth the time. Keep this video in mind and mark it so that you can play it back and remind yourself of the tremendous value of "just walking".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUaInS6HIGo

2) If you can afford to, buy a good pedometer. Fitbit is top shelf and it will keep the records of your walks - steps, distance, flights of stairs.

3) Don't expect benefits to show up right away. Just start with 10 minutes. Do that as many times a week as possible. When it really becomes a habit - say three months from now - add a second 10 minute walk at another point in the day.

4) Eat sensibly and in a moderate amount - set your program at no more than 1 pound weight loss per week. Realize that feeling good and having energy is dependent on good nutrition, activity - and proper sleep.

5) Make an appointment to see your family doctor for a comprehensive physical where they take your blood, urine, blood pressure etc. (Sometimes you can feel tired all the time because you are anemic - for example. So, this will ensure that your general health is okay. Sometimes feeling tired can also be a sign of depression - so just a chat with your doctor is a great idea)

Realize that it really does take time to change habits and lifestyle. So, small changes, like a 10 minute daily walk and moderate change in your eating habits, really get you a long way over time. This is often why programs fail - people make major changes and those only last a few weeks because the changes are too drastic.

Think about this - a 10 minute daily walk from Monday to Saturday is actually an hour of activity every week! Then, after 3 to 4 months, or when you really feel it's become a habit - add a second walk. If you approach things this way, by spring of 2015 you will be a "daily walker" and reaping many benefits because of it!

Hope this helps.

I hear you - I'm 100 lbs overweight and have used my body pains as an excuse (plantar fasciitis is just horrible). However, here are my thoughts for you:

1) You can exercise all you want, but if you don't eat right, you won't lose. I have a seditary job, so I try to do both.
2) The more I move, the less I ache. Believe it or not...
3) I have found success in learning to swim laps. Start slow, do what you can. Once you are ready, add walking, biking, etc.

Good luck!

For exercise, start small. Pick an activity you like. Anything that will get you moving, walking, a bike ride, even just dancing around the room if you want. Time how long you can go; do this time limit for a week; every week add another minute or so and just keep going.

Every time you don't want to exercise, remind yourself that you never regret it when you're done, only when you don't do it!

Agree with the start with walking part, plus its free. Alternately at the Y or a local gym, water aerobics are a great start.

Quasita wrote: »

You don't have to start with a long workout. In fact, you don't have to start with a workout at all. When you are truly 100% sedentary, your first step can be simply making sure you move more than usual. Walk extra aisles at the grocery store. Get up and move around the house during commercials. Set an alarm on your phone to make you get up every hour and walk around.

This. When I started I was really out of shape, and I just decided to walk everywhere I could. I was 80 lbs above a 25 BMI and had an ankle injury that interfered (aggravated by weight, I believe) and our sidewalks were consistently covered with ice and snow (this started last January, during a terrible winter), so I wasn't able to go the distances I thought I should at first, but still, once I started, it soon became second nature and even enjoyable.

After a little I added in the stationary bike and started easy, for a half hour, during a show I liked. I gradually moved it up and started adding in other things (swimming, eventually running and biking outdoors) as I lost weight. Lots of people seem to think you have to be working out like crazy from the beginning. You don't have to work out at all--although I think it makes it a lot easier--but you should teach yourself to enjoy it, and how to do that is go at a pace that makes sense for you and focus on activities that appeal to you or that you can make fun (listening to music or podcasts while doing it, perhaps).