How to be ok with it all?

melaniecheeks wrote: »

Can you find a way to enjoy it? Feel a sense of satisfaction when you've completed a day's logging? Give yourself a high-five when you go to the gym (better style, find an activity that you like doing)

I love the positivity of this response... and I totally agree. You have to do like any addict would and take it one day at a time. I don't think ppl should be telling you to grow up, everyone has battles we know nothing about. I concur, working out... eating healthy... these things are hard for those of us who have not been in shape all our lives. Hang in there.. celebrate small goals and remind yourself of all the reasons you are gonna be happier when you lose the weight. eventually it becomes an annoying routine logging/gym/logging/gym/logging/gym... and eventually it makes you proud and happy and accomplished, WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO LOSE?

I want to add that when I first started eating healthy food, I did hate it. I missed the things I was accustomed to eating. I was jealous of people chowing down on cheeseburgers and pasta in white sauces, etc. Bitterly pissed.

I got over it. I don't believe it's an "I grew up" issue because I don't think people who eat junk are necessarily immature, but I did have a sort of "spoiled" side that liked eating junk. It threw little temper tantrums and I had to ignore it just like you ignore a spoiled child. It also calmed down and stopped throwing fits when I got used to eating better food, just like a spoiled child cuts the crap after being ignored for a while.

If you stick with it, it gets easier.

TimothyFish wrote: »

0somuchbetter0 wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

0somuchbetter0 wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

bw_conway wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

bw_conway wrote: »

I get that this all gets tedious; I’ve been on this site logging for over 600 days, and sometimes there are things I’d rather be doing with those 10-15 minutes a day it takes to log my food and exercise. But look at it from this big picture perspective – our bodies seek fattening food and store fat because our prehistoric selves went most of their lives without knowing where and when their next meal would come from. Imagine scratching out your existence day in and day out, scavenging for food, just a bad luck incident or two away from starving to death or being weakened by hunger to the point where you would get killed by predators, either animals or humans. Now fast forward thousands of years, and appreciate the nature of your burden – you are surrounded by such an overabundance of food resources that you actually have to force yourself to limit how much you eat!

Appreciate where we are in terms of human development, eat one of those delicious cakes (but not the entire box), log it, and enjoy the rest of your day as a contemporary, civilized human being

Do you really think that it would make any difference if our "prehistoric selves" had had an abundance of food? There is no evidence to support such a notion.

I’m a little taken aback that you don’t know the basic evolutionary principles behind these types of biological characteristics.

We don't know much about our "prehistoric selves" other than finding a few old bones. Everything else is pretty much speculation, and we certainly don't know what would have happened if our "prehistoric selves" had had an abundance of food. Perhaps they all would've gotten fat and died of heart failure.

We don't have to go back in time to learn about our prehistoric selves. I've worked in international development for 20 years. Look at some of the global indicators for malnutrition in the poorest communities worldwide -- there's all the evidence you need.

So we're fat because children in Africa are starving?

*sigh* No. I don't understand why you say we don't have evidence about how humans lived in prehistory when there are many living examples today of people living exactly the way we lived during the Stone Age.

I don't have a problem with that, but the original claim was that prehistoric man was somehow different from what we are today, but because they couldn't find enough food, they evolved into a being that stores more fat than is required. There is not evidence to support the claim that they didn't already have the ability to store fact and certainly no evidence to claim that if they were overfed that they would lose the ability to store fat.

Sorry...came home from work, had dinner, got distracted, lost interest.

Just sucked it up because I realized that it works and I'd rather log my food than be overweight. I don't mind it anymore.

I would like to eat anything and stay lean like my brothers but my body dosen't work like that and I don't want to be overweight so I have to put in the extra work, If I don't I'm a fat *kitten*.

I get it. I totally agree with you. I hate weighing and measuring and tracking BUT until I got committed to doing this to the best of my ability I was never ever successful at weight loss. I have a long way to go and I am bouncing around between 25 to 30 lbs lost. I have to get on here everyday and put things down good and bad to keep moving forward.

Good luck to you

rebeccag0604 wrote: »

It isn't going to work if you just get angry and have a negative attitude about it.

I dunno about that. I feel pretty negatively about diet, cultural expectation, and a lot of the baggage surrounding diet and the female role in our society, but as long as I'm eating at a calorie deficit, the weight keeps coming off no matter how cranky about it I am.

I sort of think of it like an alcoholic, or a Diabetic. In other words, no, it's not really fair that we can't just relate to that substance in a normal way. But too bad, life's not really fair. ( Understand, I'm not being harsh on you, this is how I've had to teach myself to think about it) You do what you need to do in order to get the results you desire, and sometimes it's really hard.

lemurcat12 wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

0somuchbetter0 wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

0somuchbetter0 wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

bw_conway wrote: »

TimothyFish wrote: »

bw_conway wrote: »

I get that this all gets tedious; I’ve been on this site logging for over 600 days, and sometimes there are things I’d rather be doing with those 10-15 minutes a day it takes to log my food and exercise. But look at it from this big picture perspective – our bodies seek fattening food and store fat because our prehistoric selves went most of their lives without knowing where and when their next meal would come from. Imagine scratching out your existence day in and day out, scavenging for food, just a bad luck incident or two away from starving to death or being weakened by hunger to the point where you would get killed by predators, either animals or humans. Now fast forward thousands of years, and appreciate the nature of your burden – you are surrounded by such an overabundance of food resources that you actually have to force yourself to limit how much you eat!

Appreciate where we are in terms of human development, eat one of those delicious cakes (but not the entire box), log it, and enjoy the rest of your day as a contemporary, civilized human being

Do you really think that it would make any difference if our "prehistoric selves" had had an abundance of food? There is no evidence to support such a notion.

I’m a little taken aback that you don’t know the basic evolutionary principles behind these types of biological characteristics.

We don't know much about our "prehistoric selves" other than finding a few old bones. Everything else is pretty much speculation, and we certainly don't know what would have happened if our "prehistoric selves" had had an abundance of food. Perhaps they all would've gotten fat and died of heart failure.

We don't have to go back in time to learn about our prehistoric selves. I've worked in international development for 20 years. Look at some of the global indicators for malnutrition in the poorest communities worldwide -- there's all the evidence you need.

So we're fat because children in Africa are starving?

*sigh* No. I don't understand why you say we don't have evidence about how humans lived in prehistory when there are many living examples today of people living exactly the way we lived during the Stone Age.

I don't have a problem with that, but the original claim was that prehistoric man was somehow different from what we are today, but because they couldn't find enough food, they evolved into a being that stores more fat than is required. There is not evidence to support the claim that they didn't already have the ability to store fact and certainly no evidence to claim that if they were overfed that they would lose the ability to store fat.

I don't think that's the argument. The idea is more like: prehistoric man lived under conditions where food was scarce, so being able to store fat efficiently aided in survival, and those with that ability were more likely to live and pass on their genes than those who did not tend to store fat well/deal well with conditions of scarcity.

In theory, if we spent a lot of time under conditions of surplus where tending to become obese led you to be less able to survive and pass on your genes, natural selection would select against those who seemed inclined to become obese IF the effect was to kill them off before they reproduced or made it less likely that their children would survive until adulthood (the latter being more likely in a primitive world with a problem with a surplus of calories plus inactivity).

What you stated sounds like Lamarckianism.

My point is that we don't know what Stone Age man was like. He could've been just like us, for all we know. Actually, considering that the animals in store fat also, it is most likely that they were like us. The problem with thinking that natural selection would lead to less obesity is that obesity tends to get worse as people age, so the children of the obese are likely to survive anyway.

This is such a great question with SO MANY excellent responses.

I find it helpful to think of myself and much of my behaviour as simply a collection of habits.
Some good, some not so good, most I didn't choose or decide to make part of my life, they just sort of... happened.

And the great thing is that once I became aware of them, I now have a choice on which habits I like and which I'd like to change.
But first you have to figure out what those habits are and sort through them, like a bunch of stuff you have in the attic.
Make a mental 'keep' box and a 'needs attention' box.

Then pick one thing. An easy thing!
Like, at lunch I always order the bacon cheese burger from the diner on the corner.
Instead, order something else. It doesn't have to be lettuce with no dressing, just choose something a bit healthier.
And repeat.

It takes an average of 66 days of repetitions to form a new habit. Less if the habit is an easy change, more if it's something really hard.
So, if the change you decide to make is to order the grilled chicken burger for lunch, that might become automatic after just a couple of weeks.
If you're trying to train your brain to choose the dry lettuce instead, it might take over a year.

So choose wisely

The really awesome thing is that you CAN and WILL change. Which is amazing to me.
Slowly, deliberately, mindfully, you can create who you want to be.

The reason you're struggling and fighting against all this right now is that you're looking at ALL your habits at once and are being told 'everything you do must be changed'.
Well, no one can deal with a whole attic full of stuff at once.

But you CAN deal with ONE thing. Maybe two.
I find that I can handle about 2 'medium difficulty' changes at once- I usually pick one 'food' thing and one 'exercise' thing, like "I'm gonna walk to the whatever place instead of taking the car".
Repeat until it's automatic and you've left the house and didn't even think about the car keys.
Then pick the next thing.

The things you do right now all started out as something else. They're not 'who you are' they're just what you're used to right now.

And you know, you might find yourself in some pretty weird and unexpected situations down the road.
Like, I've had to come to terms with the fact that I now LOVE kale. I'm not proud of it, it's weird, but I friggin loooove the stuff. I...uhm, I get kale cravings. Ok, I've said it. There.

Somewhere down the road you might eat a cake and think 'ugh, I'm not sure I can finish this thing' then have a moment of 'what just happened and who just said that??!!!'