The honest truth!!
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Yeah I find that a lot of people who have issues with weight actually know exactly what they need to do to lose that weight. I also find that most people fitting that description just need a push in the right direction to get the ball rolling. This is why we're inundated with coaches, programs, community type of fitness centers, buddy challenges and of course on-line support groups. Having an accountability partner is awesome. In my case I'm able to easily bulk or lean out as every single day I'm responsible for sending my competition coach my entire food diary along with the macro's. So... if I eat too much, too little, or am plus or minus on one of my macro's I hear about it. She also requires my daily exercise / lifting diary each day. This keeps me right on track. Accountability and ownership.
Also, I find that many folks who are overweight and know what to do, but can't seem to get motivated to do anything don't have any real goals set up. Like... it's one thing to say "I want too, or, I have to lose weight". It's another thing to say "I am going to lose 20 pounds by November 1st". Again... in my case, I have a competition on November 4th... something to work toward and strive for. If I have no real reason to change my body composition why would I?
Also, for many of those people it's become emotional or psychological. Every bite of that ice cream and every one of those chips just feels wrong going down, but it goes down anyway because of depression, hopelessness, etc.
Last... sometimes we know what we need to do and exactly how to do it but we have to wait for that "Aha" moment. Life gets so busy and hectic and crazy sometimes, we are moving at such a fast pace sometimes, it's easy to ignore self-needs until that critical moment when we realize a drastic change is needed.
Just my thoughts...7 -
I get you.
I've lost several huge amounts of weight in my lifetime only to gain it all back.
I lost my first 80 pounds when I was 18. I got a job that kept me so busy I barely ate.. Gained it back plus some more eating out all the time after kicked out of my parent's house.
Next time, mid 20's, I lost over 100 pounds recklessly taking ephedra and eating the low fat diet craze at the time. I had no internet, so I just did what people and GNC said worked. My lowest weight ever and I plateaued because of those Snackwell's cookies, (anyone relate?)..and not knowing what calories were. I gained back the weight after some emotional issues when a couple relationships fell through and a loss of a career. Really packed it on to my biggest ever.
Then, skip a lot of ups and downs, I lost over 100 pounds counting calories, logging what I eat, and educating myself about weight loss and nutrition. I've only gained about 80 pounds of it back over the last few years from some other emotional issues and life curve balls..
Eating to comfort seems to be my weakness.
So, I've learned I have to fix myself from the inside before I can fix the outside. I have to be equipped to handle what life throws at me and stop using food as a comfort.
Losing weight comes easy to me after all that practice and knowing what to do and not to do. Keeping it off is the obstacle I really need to focus on. I have a plan, and will not let anything bring me down to that level anymore.
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in your OP you said "us" not "me"...2 -
binkydriver wrote: »True. Most overweight people are experts at exercise and diets. So, my conclusion is we've all been lied to by the food manufacturing industry. We're also manipulated by the exercise industry as well. One sells us fake foods, with chemicals in it that are making us fat, and the other is selling a "burn it off" Rah, Rah, membership, knowing we won't see results because we are still consuming the fake processed foods--that are also sold as "diet plans" to us.
hopefully this is sarcasm?5 -
janejellyroll wrote: »binkydriver wrote: »True. Most overweight people are experts at exercise and diets. So, my conclusion is we've all been lied to by the food manufacturing industry. We're also manipulated by the exercise industry as well. One sells us fake foods, with chemicals in it that are making us fat, and the other is selling a "burn it off" Rah, Rah, membership, knowing we won't see results because we are still consuming the fake processed foods--that are also sold as "diet plans" to us.
Chemicals don't make you fat.
No but processed food is easier to over-eat on. Many processed foods that are billed as "healthy" are laden with hidden sugar or fat, and the serving sizes are impossibly small.
how are you defining processed?
sugar is no hidden, it is on the label...3 -
Yes and no. Back when I was overweight, I genuinely thought cheese, crackers, strawberries, and wine was a "pretty healthy" dinner-- crackers are better than chips, right? And cheese and strawberries are part of the Canada Food Guide! I was a vegetarian who ate a ton of pasta and chips and bread and I had never even heard of macros. Educating myself was a process. CICO was the starting point, but as I went on I realized that there's more to it than that. For me, if I eat wheat-filled goodness like bread, pizza, and pasta (some of my favourite things) I get bloaty and crampy and generally feel like crap. If I eat a lot of fat and protein and have most of my carbs come from fruit and vegetables, my tummy flattens out and I feel fantastic. Eating the same amount of calories in pasta versus in chicken and veggies will do very different things to my body.
I got a little carried away with indulgences and gained back about 10 pounds, so here I am again. And this time you're right, it's not that I don't know the right things to do, I just got lazy about it. So now I'm back doing the right things and I've lost 8lbs in about 4 weeks. I suspect 5lbs of that to be water weight-- I tend to retain like crazy around a certain time of the month, and when I'm eating the wheats. Still, it's motivating me to keep doing what I know works, and to rely on the knowledge of what my own body needs instead of the myriad bits of advice out there.4 -
We know what to do because we learned it in order to lose weight. We are still learning. That's why we are on here.
Losing weight is harder than maintaining weight and many of us have to work on breaking life long habits.
If someone was raised to eat unhealthily its going to take a lot of will power to unlearn these behaviours.
You make weight loss sound like its a walk in the park and we are just too lazy to bother.
We are all here actively working towards weight loss. We may stumble along the way but none of us would be on this forum if we were not taking this seriously.1 -
Have you ever noticed that us, un-fit over weight people , are the ones with plenty of knowledge about working out properly and eating healthy, but yet we're the ones struggling to slim down.
Nope. I know tons of extremely fit professional athletes - they are knowledgeable, have tons of professional advice, and are incredibly meticulous in their diet and fitness regimes. To a level most here would consider beyond OCD.
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I find the exact opposite to be true. Most unfit or overweight people lack essential knowledge on energy balance, basic biology, and physiology.10
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Some people are trying their best to fight a losing battle, and if we feel like we do everything/know everything there is, we gain some kind of control over the uncontrollable--or at least absolve ourselves of the guilt we've accumulated and feel superior by being able to say, "at least I try unlike all these others. See? Look at how good In doing. I'm one of the good ones!"
It's a rough road to go; if we spent a fraction of that time and energy towards nearly anything else, we'd all be lauded experts in our chosen fields. I'm thinking maybe that's a better goal for me personally, any way. I'm losing consistently but I'm ready to be preoccupied by other things now, I think.1 -
Have you ever noticed that us, un-fit over weight people , are the ones with plenty of knowledge about working out properly and eating healthy, but yet we're the ones struggling to slim down.
No. The ones who struggle or the ones who are trying to influence others are the people who speak up about something. You give a recommendation on something if you are blown away by how well it works or if you are incredibly annoyed that it does not do what you expected it to do. If it is just normal, fitting into your normal life, it is nothing you think about and nothing you speak about. The people who speak up about something in public are positively or negatively passionate and thus a biased sample for deciding what kind of people care about it.
I care about being clean and showered, but it is a normal thing for me. I neither shower less nor more than I would see as normal and I don't talk about it usually. (Unless I am using it as an example.) I still do it regularly and enjoy it very much. So you would know nothing of my knowledge of loofa-sponges and nicely smelling shower gel.
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Have you ever noticed that us, un-fit over weight people , are the ones with plenty of knowledge about working out properly and eating healthy, but yet we're the ones struggling to slim down.
Nope. I know tons of extremely fit professional athletes - they are knowledgeable, have tons of professional advice, and are incredibly meticulous in their diet and fitness regimes. To a level most here would consider beyond OCD.
I hate that term as someone who actually has OCD.
But yes "incredibly meticulous" would be accurate for professional athletes. I know very few who blindly do what they're told without actually learning, adjusting, and constantly questioning methodology by their team.0 -
Have you ever noticed that us, un-fit over weight people , are the ones with plenty of knowledge about working out properly and eating healthy, but yet we're the ones struggling to slim down. What is it?? Low self esteem, no willpower, or is it that once we lose a few pounds we get comfortable and gain it all back. The sad part is that we can't blame no one but ourselves for that, cuz if I could blame someone, I would be on top of that person day and night lmao....till then, let's keep the struggle going, y'all are not alone my friends lol
I don't know if I had "plenty of knowledge" before. I always though weight loss meant crazy & restrictive diets that were painful to stick to long term. MFP is the first program I have tried where I still loose weight, however, I do not feel hungry or deprived in the process.1 -
rainbowbow wrote: »I find the exact opposite to be true. Most unfit or overweight people lack essential knowledge on energy balance, basic biology, and physiology.
QFT!1 -
I used to be overweight and unfit but once I had a solid understanding of CICO I made the move to the other side. I do, however, find that a lot of people in general *think* they have a lot of nutrition information but are quite unaware.4
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janejellyroll wrote: »binkydriver wrote: »True. Most overweight people are experts at exercise and diets. So, my conclusion is we've all been lied to by the food manufacturing industry. We're also manipulated by the exercise industry as well. One sells us fake foods, with chemicals in it that are making us fat, and the other is selling a "burn it off" Rah, Rah, membership, knowing we won't see results because we are still consuming the fake processed foods--that are also sold as "diet plans" to us.
Chemicals don't make you fat.
No but processed food is easier to over-eat on. Many processed foods that are billed as "healthy" are laden with hidden sugar or fat, and the serving sizes are impossibly small.
Maybe for you, but that's definitely not the case for everyone. For example- I can rack up hundreds and hundreds of calories in nuts and seeds without even thinking about it. But I eat one scoop of ice cream and I'm done with it.
There's all sorts of 'natural' foods that are calorie bombs.
And then there's the debate about what 'processed' even means-is dairy processed? Whole grains? What about homemade muffins made with whole grains and fruit, like I made this morning-whole wheat, freshly ground flax seed, local blueberries, peaches etc. I'd label them pretty 'natural', but they're still calorie bombs.5 -
OliveGirl128 wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »binkydriver wrote: »True. Most overweight people are experts at exercise and diets. So, my conclusion is we've all been lied to by the food manufacturing industry. We're also manipulated by the exercise industry as well. One sells us fake foods, with chemicals in it that are making us fat, and the other is selling a "burn it off" Rah, Rah, membership, knowing we won't see results because we are still consuming the fake processed foods--that are also sold as "diet plans" to us.
Chemicals don't make you fat.
No but processed food is easier to over-eat on. Many processed foods that are billed as "healthy" are laden with hidden sugar or fat, and the serving sizes are impossibly small.
Maybe for you, but that's definitely not the case for everyone. For example- I can rack up hundreds and hundreds of calories in nuts and seeds without even thinking about it. But I eat one scoop of ice cream and I'm done with it. There's all sorts of 'natural' foods that are calorie bombs.
Almonds are my downfall:)2 -
Tiny_Dancer_in_Pink wrote: »OliveGirl128 wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »binkydriver wrote: »True. Most overweight people are experts at exercise and diets. So, my conclusion is we've all been lied to by the food manufacturing industry. We're also manipulated by the exercise industry as well. One sells us fake foods, with chemicals in it that are making us fat, and the other is selling a "burn it off" Rah, Rah, membership, knowing we won't see results because we are still consuming the fake processed foods--that are also sold as "diet plans" to us.
Chemicals don't make you fat.
No but processed food is easier to over-eat on. Many processed foods that are billed as "healthy" are laden with hidden sugar or fat, and the serving sizes are impossibly small.
Maybe for you, but that's definitely not the case for everyone. For example- I can rack up hundreds and hundreds of calories in nuts and seeds without even thinking about it. But I eat one scoop of ice cream and I'm done with it. There's all sorts of 'natural' foods that are calorie bombs.
Almonds are my downfall:)
Aldi now carries an amazing mix of raw cashews, walnuts and macadamia nuts-it's killing my calorie intake
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OliveGirl128 wrote: »Tiny_Dancer_in_Pink wrote: »OliveGirl128 wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »binkydriver wrote: »True. Most overweight people are experts at exercise and diets. So, my conclusion is we've all been lied to by the food manufacturing industry. We're also manipulated by the exercise industry as well. One sells us fake foods, with chemicals in it that are making us fat, and the other is selling a "burn it off" Rah, Rah, membership, knowing we won't see results because we are still consuming the fake processed foods--that are also sold as "diet plans" to us.
Chemicals don't make you fat.
No but processed food is easier to over-eat on. Many processed foods that are billed as "healthy" are laden with hidden sugar or fat, and the serving sizes are impossibly small.
Maybe for you, but that's definitely not the case for everyone. For example- I can rack up hundreds and hundreds of calories in nuts and seeds without even thinking about it. But I eat one scoop of ice cream and I'm done with it. There's all sorts of 'natural' foods that are calorie bombs.
Almonds are my downfall:)
Aldi now carries an amazing mix of raw cashews, walnuts and macadamia nuts-it's killing my calorie intake lol.
Nope, nope, nope.2 -
OliveGirl128 wrote: »Aldi now carries an amazing mix of raw cashews, walnuts and macadamia nuts-it's killing my calorie intake
Mmm, that sounds delicious. Whenever I get nuts or dried fruit I measure out single serving portions in advance (I'm a bit of a reusable container fiend), and only bring one to work a day. Nuts are just too easy to go nuts with.2
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