Kinda need help please
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"Thank you so much!! It is very impressive! I do believe that one of my problems is that I am always influenced by the number of the scale and I know that is a very bad thing.."
Let the scale be your friend. Use it to track your weight over time and don't stress about the day to day fluctuations. If it's too stressful to weigh on a regular basis, don't do it. I figure my scales (both my body scale and food scale) are just tools in my "lifestyle change" tool box, just like a tape measure or your exercise gear and for that matter MFP. Use it all to your advantage.1 -
That is a good trick, thank you
At dinner time my mom comes home hungry from work and at that time she puts everything on the table and I kinda eat from everything. Also she and my boyfriend likes sweets too much and eat them sooo..I can't always resit 
Wait. So, your mom comes home hungry and tired after work, and makes you dinner and you overeat?
Why aren't you cooking healthy well-portioned meals and having a healthy dinner on the table when she gets home? That way, you don't have to worry about eating whatever she puts on the table?
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shadowmanlocal wrote: »lifestyle change is the key -I previously always looked on ' dieting ' as some kind of temporary fix which would somehow get me to an undefined goal . But I was doing that in spite of my lifestyle which hadn't really changed much hence unsurprisingly the result was failure . Motivation for me was akin to desperation approaching age 60 morbidly obese - even considered bariatric surgery but didn't do it more by circumstance than anything else . Then I had a serious review of the whole situation nd embarked upon a lifestyle change involving good nutrition , initially light exercise and acupuncture to boost metabolism . I aimed for a deficit of 1000 calories per day out put 2500 intake 1500 - didn't always achieve it but was mostly n the zone . This comes out around 7000 calories or 2.2 lbs loss per week roughly half a stone per month . I'm now 22 months in and have lost 158 lbs and counting ultimate target is to drop a further 42 lbs which should hopefully be another 6 month away but overall year end . Now jogging 35 miles per week to keep output right and eating food I like but with all weighed and counted and a 200 cal buffer for minor indiscretions . Fitter now than anytime since my mid thirties !!!! I was in a bad way before I started - if I can do it anyone can believe me ! Wish you the very best of luck and achievement .
This is extremely motivational. Thank you for sharing your journey. I like your attitude and your dedication
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Thank you everyone for your replies..
I do believe that fasting 5+2 would not work for me because probably I would eat a lot in those 5 days)
So maybe as you said, I have to find my own way I am just scared that it will take me too long and I will continue to gain weight in the meantime
What if it does take too long? How long would that be? What would happen? Why not start logging and maintaining NOW so you don't gain more. Then start gradually decreasing Cals by 100 per day to find a level you're comfortable with. Any progress is better than none. As said above, you have to decide if you really want this and why. Once you decide that, there's no stopping.3 -
ElizabethOakes2 wrote: »That is a good trick, thank you At dinner time my mom comes home hungry from work and at that time she puts everything on the table and I kinda eat from everything. Also she and my boyfriend likes sweets too much and eat them sooo..I can't always resit
Wait. So, your mom comes home hungry and tired after work, and makes you dinner and you overeat?
Why aren't you cooking healthy well-portioned meals and having a healthy dinner on the table when she gets home? That way, you don't have to worry about eating whatever she puts on the table?
No no, most of the times I cook for both of us and put the healthy food on the table, but after or when she is eating what I made, she reach out for more food, usually bad food.
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Krisstastic_ wrote: »when i want motivation.. i look at these photos...
then look at where i am now.
Oh this is amazing!! I have some before and after photos too but believe me or not, I look at them, hate how I used to look but still gave up
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When my motivation wanes, I make a deal with myself to log, with no pressure to eat at a deficit. Just record whatever I eat. Like magic, I eat healthier food and within a few days feel ready to eat less. Just log, no pressure.4
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Forget about motivation. Motivation is a fleeting, unreliable thing to count on to get you through anything.
DETERMINATION is what your focus should be. Give yourself concrete goals and commit to them.
If you want to eat better, think of something you plan to COMMIT to changing, and do so. Don't just say something like "I wanna eat healthier!" That's vague and unhelpful. Try small changes, one at a time, that you can stick with. Maybe, "I want to drink only one soda a day," then "I want to drink NO soda."
I hope I don't sound mean or rude by insisting on concrete goals - I speak from experience. I always told myself "I'll eat better!" and never did. Having a numerical standard - 1200 cals/day - gave me a concrete goal to work towards. The same with exercise - "oh, I'm gonna go to the gym and exercise!" lead to me never actually doing so. Telling myself, "THESE are the days I'll go on," (and having a trainer at work who can, and will, find me at my desk if I get lazy and skip) and setting a running goal of "I'm going to run 5k" gave me a concrete goal. I'm two weeks away (according to the app) from actually running 5k
Binging is less about food and more about control. The same principle applies - rely on determination, not motivation. I guarantee saying "I'll control myself better next time" will not be helpful to you. Determination will help. Remove trigger foods from your house, if you have any. Log your binges. Finding hobbies and activities that will distract you from or even remove the temptation to binge. And drink that water!4 -
I use little selfish things to motivate myself. even some of the mean things people have said have been the fire I needed. I ran into someone I hadn't seen in about three years, and I have gained probably 40 0r 50 pounds since then. he was an *kitten*, and said " hey I remember when you used to be hot! " I cried for like an hour when I got home, but then I got pissed! I took a picture of myself from when I was fit, put it on my fridge, and wrote in sharpie " would she eat that? " might sound silly but every time I go to the fridge I see that and it keeps me from grabbing the wrong thing. I have also taken to getting little things for myself as rewards when I hit my goals. a book I have been wanting, getting my hair done, going to eat somewhere nice.. don't know if this would work for anyone else. I guess my anger at the way other people look at me but more so anger at myself for my increasingly lazy life style and it's consequences is what has been the best motivation. good luck on your journey, and feel free to add me if you need some more support : )4
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Just like inspiration is to an artist, motivation is fleeting. Determination and practice are what gets us to succeed.
Lots of good advice here. The trick is to find out what works for you. Try and try again to find out what does. Look at your lifestyle and appreciate what you are doing right. Then see where your pitfalls are and make changes.
I like to snack at night, so I pre-log what I'm going to eat and that keeps me on track to fit it in without a problem.
Also, I really think you need to take control and start cooking for you and your family. Start planning and cooking meals so you stay on track and you feed your mom nutritious meals. I would love to help you with this -- add me as a friend if you'd like.
Personally, I was completely inspired by Michael Pollan's Cooked series on Netflix. He explores our relationship to food. And he celebrates food, where it comes from, its traditions, how to make it healthier for our bodies, etc.
https://www.netflix.com/title/80022456
It is a little slow but that is by design...preparing and cooking our food takes time. The more time we spend in the kitchen, the healthier we tend to be. Because home cooking is totally different than industrial cooking (restaurants, packaged foods, etc.).
I am inspired by making sure I get all my nutrition from food. I don't want to spend money on a pill if I could be eating delicious meals! So every week, I look up a vegetable I've never eaten before and look up its nutrition and recipes and experiment. It doesn't always work, but sometimes I find a new favorite to put into rotation.
Good luck on your journey.1 -
Wicked_Seraph wrote: »Forget about motivation. Motivation is a fleeting, unreliable thing to count on to get you through anything.
DETERMINATION is what your focus should be. Give yourself concrete goals and commit to them.
If you want to eat better, think of something you plan to COMMIT to changing, and do so. Don't just say something like "I wanna eat healthier!" That's vague and unhelpful. Try small changes, one at a time, that you can stick with. Maybe, "I want to drink only one soda a day," then "I want to drink NO soda."
I hope I don't sound mean or rude by insisting on concrete goals - I speak from experience. I always told myself "I'll eat better!" and never did. Having a numerical standard - 1200 cals/day - gave me a concrete goal to work towards. The same with exercise - "oh, I'm gonna go to the gym and exercise!" lead to me never actually doing so. Telling myself, "THESE are the days I'll go on," (and having a trainer at work who can, and will, find me at my desk if I get lazy and skip) and setting a running goal of "I'm going to run 5k" gave me a concrete goal. I'm two weeks away (according to the app) from actually running 5k
Binging is less about food and more about control. The same principle applies - rely on determination, not motivation. I guarantee saying "I'll control myself better next time" will not be helpful to you. Determination will help. Remove trigger foods from your house, if you have any. Log your binges. Finding hobbies and activities that will distract you from or even remove the temptation to binge. And drink that water!
OMG! I have never thought this way. You are so right! I often don't log my binges because I somehow think that if I don't log them they magically disappear haha
I should take your advice and make some goals for myself, maybe this will help me 1 -
Just like inspiration is to an artist, motivation is fleeting. Determination and practice are what gets us to succeed.
Lots of good advice here. The trick is to find out what works for you. Try and try again to find out what does. Look at your lifestyle and appreciate what you are doing right. Then see where your pitfalls are and make changes.
I like to snack at night, so I pre-log what I'm going to eat and that keeps me on track to fit it in without a problem.
Also, I really think you need to take control and start cooking for you and your family. Start planning and cooking meals so you stay on track and you feed your mom nutritious meals. I would love to help you with this -- add me as a friend if you'd like.
Personally, I was completely inspired by Michael Pollan's Cooked series on Netflix. He explores our relationship to food. And he celebrates food, where it comes from, its traditions, how to make it healthier for our bodies, etc.
https://www.netflix.com/title/80022456
It is a little slow but that is by design...preparing and cooking our food takes time. The more time we spend in the kitchen, the healthier we tend to be. Because home cooking is totally different than industrial cooking (restaurants, packaged foods, etc.).
I am inspired by making sure I get all my nutrition from food. I don't want to spend money on a pill if I could be eating delicious meals! So every week, I look up a vegetable I've never eaten before and look up its nutrition and recipes and experiment. It doesn't always work, but sometimes I find a new favorite to put into rotation.
Good luck on your journey.
Thank you!
I cook for my mom almost every day and I always go for healthy meals! I love cooking and experimenting with food, but the bad thing is, that she like to eat chips and sweets so she buy and bring them home. My boyfriend likes to eat junk food too so it is hard to not give up and eat bad. I tried talking to my mom about it, she stops buying the wrong food for a small period of time then she brings them home again.
I know it also my fault and I think that it is easy to blame her and my boyfriend but in the end, I have to step up and do/eat what it is good for me0 -
I eat VERY little for breakfast and lunch and save my calories for a real dinner. Psychologically it just feels better to know I can eat comfortably with my family, and then I'm not starving for snacks before bed.1
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Wicked_Seraph wrote: »Forget about motivation. Motivation is a fleeting, unreliable thing to count on to get you through anything.
DETERMINATION is what your focus should be. Give yourself concrete goals and commit to them.
If you want to eat better, think of something you plan to COMMIT to changing, and do so. Don't just say something like "I wanna eat healthier!" That's vague and unhelpful. Try small changes, one at a time, that you can stick with. Maybe, "I want to drink only one soda a day," then "I want to drink NO soda."
I hope I don't sound mean or rude by insisting on concrete goals - I speak from experience. I always told myself "I'll eat better!" and never did. Having a numerical standard - 1200 cals/day - gave me a concrete goal to work towards. The same with exercise - "oh, I'm gonna go to the gym and exercise!" lead to me never actually doing so. Telling myself, "THESE are the days I'll go on," (and having a trainer at work who can, and will, find me at my desk if I get lazy and skip) and setting a running goal of "I'm going to run 5k" gave me a concrete goal. I'm two weeks away (according to the app) from actually running 5k
Binging is less about food and more about control. The same principle applies - rely on determination, not motivation. I guarantee saying "I'll control myself better next time" will not be helpful to you. Determination will help. Remove trigger foods from your house, if you have any. Log your binges. Finding hobbies and activities that will distract you from or even remove the temptation to binge. And drink that water!
OMG! I have never thought this way. You are so right! I often don't log my binges because I somehow think that if I don't log them they magically disappear haha
I should take your advice and make some goals for myself, maybe this will help me
I know that it TOTALLY sucks to go back afterwards (because let's be real, I often don't remember in the MIDDLE of binging) and realize OH MY GOD I ATE, LIKE, 700 CALORIES OF JELLYBEANS on top of this and that and the other... but it also has made me realize that it's not the end of the world. Sometimes 400-500 calories of Cheez-its is absolutely within my limits. Sometimes (like Saturday) I'm 1000 calories over for the day - and that's only because I have exercise as a calorie buffer. Sometimes I just quick-add the calories because I don't wanna enter in "Cupcakes, 4" or "Chocolate Cake, 1/2" or "Chinese buffet, the entire lo mein counter tbh". In either case, logging binges you to see them for what they are, for better or worse.
Goals give you something to look forward to. Maybe your goal for now could be to figure out which foods are your trigger foods, and then to gradually phase them out?1 -
I eat tiny meals for breakfast and lunch, take a big loooong walk, and save the majority of my calories for a completely satisfying dinner. That way I can keep the cravings at bay waiting for dinner, and then not need any snacks afterwards.2
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One thing that helps me is "budgeting" my calories in a way that works with my habits and life and cravings. For example, I know my weakest time is between 5 and 10pm - I could eat my arm off then, and it doesnt matter how much I already ate that day. But I have pretty good willpower in the morning and early afternoon. So I take my 1600 calories budget and allocate 300 calories for before noon (whatever and whenever I want to eat so long as the total is under 300) and 300 calories between noon and 5pm. Then I have 1000 calories for the evening. I can definitely plow through that, but since it feels like a lot I can usually keep from going over. I make it a challenge to eat as much as I can for the 300 morning/noon ones - I.e. a HUGE salad (90% lettuce and veggies which have very few calories), or carrot sticks for snacks etc. Its pretty easy if I know I get to eat well that night.
Another trick I used to use that helped for awhile - I had an issue where I felt like I had to eat ALL DAY LONG. I was always hungry and just couldnt make real mealtimes. So I figured 1600 calories is 16 x 100 calorie snacks. I am awake 16-18 hours a day, so I could basically eat 100 calories an hour. Sometimes that was a half a protein bar, sometimes a decent specially made salad, sometimes a beef jerky, etc. KNowing I would never have to make it more than an hour was very helpful. And it got even easier when I tried eating my snacks slowly so they lasted at least 10-15 minutes of the hour!
Eventually I changed that to 8x200 calorie snacks, then 4x400 calorie "meals'. Different times in my life, different styles.
If you are a visual person, you can go buy 16 of those thin gold bangle bracelets. Start the day with all of them on one arm, and every 100 calories you eat move them to the other arm. When all are moved, you stop for the day. It can be helpful visualizng.
I just keep coming up with something different to try. When that stops working, Ifind another trick or mindset. Its just mind games, but they can work for the right people. Work with your weak spots and cater to them a little, then gradually adjust.2 -
One thing that helps me is "budgeting" my calories in a way that works with my habits and life and cravings. For example, I know my weakest time is between 5 and 10pm - I could eat my arm off then, and it doesnt matter how much I already ate that day. But I have pretty good willpower in the morning and early afternoon. So I take my 1600 calories budget and allocate 300 calories for before noon (whatever and whenever I want to eat so long as the total is under 300) and 300 calories between noon and 5pm. Then I have 1000 calories for the evening. I can definitely plow through that, but since it feels like a lot I can usually keep from going over. I make it a challenge to eat as much as I can for the 300 morning/noon ones - I.e. a HUGE salad (90% lettuce and veggies which have very few calories), or carrot sticks for snacks etc. Its pretty easy if I know I get to eat well that night.
Another trick I used to use that helped for awhile - I had an issue where I felt like I had to eat ALL DAY LONG. I was always hungry and just couldnt make real mealtimes. So I figured 1600 calories is 16 x 100 calorie snacks. I am awake 16-18 hours a day, so I could basically eat 100 calories an hour. Sometimes that was a half a protein bar, sometimes a decent specially made salad, sometimes a beef jerky, etc. KNowing I would never have to make it more than an hour was very helpful. And it got even easier when I tried eating my snacks slowly so they lasted at least 10-15 minutes of the hour!
Eventually I changed that to 8x200 calorie snacks, then 4x400 calorie "meals'. Different times in my life, different styles.
If you are a visual person, you can go buy 16 of those thin gold bangle bracelets. Start the day with all of them on one arm, and every 100 calories you eat move them to the other arm. When all are moved, you stop for the day. It can be helpful visualizng.
I just keep coming up with something different to try. When that stops working, Ifind another trick or mindset. Its just mind games, but they can work for the right people. Work with your weak spots and cater to them a little, then gradually adjust.
These are for sure some good tricks! Thank you so much for your answer0 -
Don't make it a struggle. Don't push yourself to have a massive deficit if it will only make you hungrier and eat more.
For me, every time I decided to cut out something completely because it was bad for me (chocolate) i lasted a good couple of weeks then caved. Now, I have chocolate and every day and still lose weight.
It genuinely is a lifestyle change and how you look at your food. Sometimes I look at a Snickers bar (around 250kcal) and think while it would be yummy, it only would be for a couple of minutes at most then its gone. Plus, I don't want to have to workout for 45 mins just to burn it off again.
It's all about finding what fits and what works for you. No food is a demon, just find the right combination for your goal. The first couple of weeks will suck but you'll find that as your body gets used to your adjusted intake, your mind will follow.1
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