I want to be healthy, but I dont want to obsess about it

robbielyn83
robbielyn83 Posts: 5 Member
in Motivation and Support
A couple of years ago I lost around 75 pounds. My start weight was about 278 and the lowest I got was 195 and maintained around 205-210. It felt great to see the scale there but I was starving myself (1200 calories/day) and miserable. I couldn't eat anything if I want to continue to lose or even maintain. For 6 months of 1200 calories and yoga 3x per week and cardio 2x a week, I lost nothing. Not a pound, nor an inch. Socializing was with a couple of girlfriends at thet gym and then ai wpukd go home because eating out was too difficult too do at 1200 calories. I was at work, home, or a work out facility. I loosened the reign and started to enjoy life more. The pounds piled on instantly just by putting my calories up to around 1700 every once in a while. Then I met a great, but skinny guy and he crazy about me regardless, so the pounds piled on even more. Life got complicated and now I have a very full work schedule. School, and obscene amount of homework, 2 part time jobs. Now years later, I am back at 250. I hadn't stepped on the scale for almost a year. The shock devastated me. I am back on mfp and starting to do yoga again. Motovation is fairly weak, but I KNOW I NEED TO BE MORE DEDICATED TO BEING HEALTHY!

So here's my thing. I want to get to a healthy weight, but obsessing over calorie counting makes me crazy and horribly depressed. Can anyone help me get past this? Suggestions or just a friendly chat are greatly appreciated.

Replies

  • angelamb328
    angelamb328 Posts: 2 Member
    I'm in the same boat as you. Stepped on the scale today and it was higher than the number in my head. I have tried so many diets. Calorie counting and tracking my food makes me more accountable and helps me to identify trends with my eating habits. I hope this helps, it's a journey worth taking. I wish you the best of luck!
  • clucklucky
    clucklucky Posts: 8 Member
    This is something I've been working on, too. In general I tend to approach life with a little myopia, I'll get SUPER into something for a while and its all I want to do/think about/learn about until I spin myself out on it and then it's onto the next. As you can imagine, this approach has led me to yo-yo in terms of both weight and health over the years.
    I'm really trying to just remember that there are other things in life besides focusing entirely on food and exercise. I spend some time each week planning meals and snacks, and then I try to just trust the plan. I indulge my interest for some time each day to keep my enthusiasm up and maintain my focus, and then I make a point of doing something completely unrelated. Read a book, work on some knitting, do some chores.

    It's a tough one, I'm not going to lie, but you're not alone :) And I fully believe it's something you can figure out - just like we create healthy physical habits, we can create healthy mental habits too :)
  • LLT38
    LLT38 Posts: 172 Member
    robbielyn83 wrote: »
    A couple of years ago I lost around 75 pounds. My start weight was about 278 and the lowest I got was 195 and maintained around 205-210. It felt great to see the scale there but I was starving myself (1200 calories/day) and miserable. I couldn't eat anything if I want to continue to lose or even maintain. For 6 months of 1200 calories and yoga 3x per week and cardio 2x a week, I lost nothing. Not a pound, nor an inch. Socializing was with a couple of girlfriends at thet gym and then ai wpukd go home because eating out was too difficult too do at 1200 calories. I was at work, home, or a work out facility. I loosened the reign and started to enjoy life more. The pounds piled on instantly just by putting my calories up to around 1700 every once in a while. Then I met a great, but skinny guy and he crazy about me regardless, so the pounds piled on even more. Life got complicated and now I have a very full work schedule. School, and obscene amount of homework, 2 part time jobs. Now years later, I am back at 250. I hadn't stepped on the scale for almost a year. The shock devastated me. I am back on mfp and starting to do yoga again. Motovation is fairly weak, but I KNOW I NEED TO BE MORE DEDICATED TO BEING HEALTHY!

    So here's my thing. I want to get to a healthy weight, but obsessing over calorie counting makes me crazy and horribly depressed. Can anyone help me get past this? Suggestions or just a friendly chat are greatly appreciated.

    You can lose weight without being so extreme. The reason you've regained so much weight is you chose a weight loss method that wasn't sustainable for you in the long-term. If you read the stories from people here who have been maintaining their weight loss for years, you'll see a few things in common. They found a way of eating they could continue for the long-term, many of them fit in daily/weekly treats, they continue their way of eating even if they have a bad day or week and they didn't give up. Many of them took months or years to read their goals. So they didn't look at it as a diet where they starved themselves until they got to a goal.

    I was in the low 260s at my highest weight in 2010. I joined MFP in December at 220 lbs and I've lost 32 lbs since then. I am currently around 188 lbs. I haven't lost as quickly as many people but I am eating in a way where I can keep doing this. If you want to be successful, you'll need to find your way of eating that makes you feel satisfied and you are eating foods that you like. Your weight loss could take a while. But time will pass anyways - you could be a lot closer to your goal at the end of the year or unhappy that you haven't made much progress. Good luck. Feel free to add me if you'd like.
  • middlehaitch
    middlehaitch Posts: 8,486 Member
    Try looking at it as planning a lifestyle you can live with.

    A calorie deficit is the key to weight loss, exercise is for health.

    Put your info into MFP to maintain.

    Start by just tracking what you eat now with a digital scale for solids and liquid measuring cups and spoons for solids.


    Do this for 2-3 weeks, then look over your data and see how much you are eating compared to maintenance calories. Look where you can start cutting back portions or even eliminating things.

    If you are eating more than maintenance drop your calories to there.

    In a couple of weeks when you are used to that goal re set your goal to .5 lbs a week. Eat to that.

    Slowly cut your calories to a level you are comfortable with. If you can handle the .5lbs a week but 1lbs makes you struggle. Stay at .5lbs.

    Eat back at least a percentage of your exercise calories, 50-75% depending on keeping within your rate of loss.
    It is important to have the energy to exercise well without compromising your everyday activity. Too few calories and lack of energy will make one of them suffer.
    It also means if you have to skip a workout you will still hit your daily deficit.

    MFP has your deficit built into your basic goal and is designed for you to eat the exercise calories.

    Cheers, h.
  • ShrinkingMuslimah
    ShrinkingMuslimah Posts: 99 Member
    I'm right there with you!

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