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Lacking time and motivation

samsterhamster66
samsterhamster66 Posts: 2 Member
edited November 2024 in Introduce Yourself
Hello! My name is Sammie and I have struggled with weight loss for about 7 years now. It has always fluctuated to my high in high school of 235 to the lowest I was able to get myself before falling off the wagon last year of 180. I really want to get down to my goal weight by the end of January 2018 (the start of my academic semester), but I have been struggling hard with motivation and finding time to work out. None of my friends are really interested in going to the gym with me. They would rather go bowling, or to the movies so i have been struggling by myself for some time and failing at losing any weight. Was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction of solo weight loss that can help keep my motivation up besides just being a healthy person. Thanks!

Replies

  • RightTrackBaby
    RightTrackBaby Posts: 35 Member
    I'm in a somewhat similar boat. I have two kids; one is 2 months old, the other 2 years. What I find helps is writing daily to-do lists the night before. I'll admit that I'm almost always tired, and I don't always complete my list. I do at-home workouts and I run the length of my apartment every other day, because I can't afford a baby-sitter right now.

    You don't need to work out 2 hours every day. I get a 45-60 minute workout in on my run days, and about 30 minutes the other days with a rest day each week. A good portion of weight loss is about diet. You want to have a caloric deficit, but you also want to eat well for your body. If I consumed less carbs, I'd probably be a little less exhausted on a daily basis lol
  • chyrecef
    chyrecef Posts: 4 Member
    edited April 2017
    One of the only intentional exercising that doesn't feel like torture for me are videos on Youtube by The Fitness Marshall. It's dance/cardio, but it's not super difficult. He choreos all the current songs on the radio, and he's funny too ... makes it feel like you're not exercising. His channel is https://www.youtube.com/user/TheFitnessMarshall Click on the "videos" link and have some fun!
  • taco_inspector
    taco_inspector Posts: 7,223 Member
    edited April 2017
    While I will be the first to applaud getting your exercise plan going... You will be better able to manage weight by first controlling your dietary intake.

    My personal approach was to begin by using MFP to log everything I ate and everything that I did as 'exercise'. Seeing that I was over-eating (and under-exercising), and where those many failures came from allowed me to lose a large portion of my weight without modifying anything more than my eating. I found that eating a bit more in-line with my body's needs helped me to conserve both time and money compared to how I'd been eating previously, and in the time savings, I was able to fit in a progressive resistance exercise program to help preserve my muscle mass as I continued to lose weight.

    While it would be great to have a world full of extra-time and supportive like-minded friends, the only thing/person that you have absolute control over is yourself. If you modify and manage your eating, you'll find yourself miles-ahead of trying to add exercises to a busy life and habitual over-eating.

    Overly simplified: It takes only an instant to "not open" a candy bar, or you can eat the candy bar and then try to burn-off those calories with 20-40 minutes of exercise. Easier to eat properly, if only as a time-saving measure.

    I always recommend that as soon as you're getting on top of your eating (including sufficient protein, of course), that you try to add progressive resistance exercises to help you maintain muscle... remembering that weight is a measure of your entire body, and too many people find that they've dieted-away some of their muscle because they were fixated on the scale and not the condition and sustainability of their body.
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