accountability

I do always

No not at all

My life, my journey
My decisions and my health.

I am responsible for it and when i dont do it i have to accept all the (bad) consequences that it will bring when i dont lose this weight.

The only person I need to answer to throughout this process is ME! :]
If I decide to throw in the towel, it'll ME that's depriving myself of my goal - it doesn't affect anyone else.

I keep my diary open as the idea that sometimes people might look at my odd choices keeps me in line to some degree, but that is just a tactic - it is still me keeping myself in line.

I know this because when people do make snide remarks about my diary, I really don't like it and get annoyed. I like the idea of silent witnesses, but I don't really want some nosy person commenting on every little thing.

I also wonder at the numbers. I see a lot of people on forums reaching out for others to hold them accountable. I think we would be short of policeman types and have too many people looking for policeman types. I also wonder if anyone actually is a consistent policeman.

If you are worried you are going to lose interest and slack off unless someone else watches you and hits you with a stick or something... what does the person with the stick get in return? You might think you would police them back, but would you really? If you don't have the discipline to keep interest in the fine details of your own plan, would you really have the stamina to be constantly checking the diary of the people on you friends list? If you can't promise that you can do that for them, don't be surprised that no one has the bandwidth to do it for you either.

It all varies person by person. If you want someone to call you out when you aren't doing what you should, by all means seek friends out that will do that for you.

MsFit97 wrote: »

Does anyone else feel like they need someone who will keep them honest and just check-in with

No, because I am 100% accountable to myself. I have the tools to be in charge of my own weight loss journey.

For some people, that can really help them stay on track. I think it could be a good idea. But I feel like I need to be completely anonymous and discrete about my weight loss. Before I started MFP, I lost 10 pounds on just eating right (now, I'm going to try to incorporate an active lifestyle), but the 10lbs is somewhat noticeable and I feel like I need to wear more clothing to hide the fact that I lost a little weight.
Telling someone(outside the web) about my goals would just stress me out.

The hard part is that it's a lifestyle change so my family members notice that I go out a lot more to "odd" places. Like the recreational centre for swimming. Or when they buy loads of junk food, they offer me to eat it, and I don't really feel like eating it...but at the same time, I don't want them to question why I won't eat it. If I don't take their offering, they make a big deal about it. It's just not part of their culture to be fit. Eating, drinking, food is such a massive part of our culture, but since I came as a kid, I have adopted lots of Western views of food and being active. I remember one time, my parents said, "back in our country, you would never see an adult still playing basketball or running around - that's for children. People here continue to play like children". That being said, my parents aren't even close to being a little over-weight...so I can't really propose that their culture being deeply embedded with food is damaging their health.

But that perspective definitely makes it harder to ask for accountability. I prefer to hide my weight losses, and my more active life.

I never needed it and i'm glad now that I didn't. I'm still a fair way away to my goal and people close to me have started the "Oh you're too skinny!" "Why don't you eat X, you'll be fine, you're so thin!" "You're not anorexic are you??"

Yes while i'm at a "healthy weight", i'm not where I want to be. If I needed other people to keep me in line, I would have slacked off by now and be back where I started.