When you have to lose LOTS...

A website like this with lots of support helps. It also helps to be around like minded people in your journey.

Well, you don't have to go to the gym to lose weight. It's all about calories in < calories out, so just eat at a deficit.
You don't have to eat only salad - soups can be quite low calorie, nutritious, and warm!

And this last point is just to say that 50-75 can often be done in the course of a year. I'm just about to hit 50 down and have 50-75 to go. It's discouraging to look at it as a whole picture, so break it up:
1 pound a week gives you 10 pounds down by April! And that can actually be EASIER because you have such a long time line, so there's no PRESSURE to lose quickly, just consistently.
10 pounds is often a dress size.
A dress size might mean new jeans or a new dress.
Look at belt notches, pay attention to how much easier it is to climb stairs or even SLEEP.
Slow weight loss makes it EASIER in the long run, not harder, if you only change your mind set.

abbeyminor wrote: »

How do you stay motivated, losing just a pound or two a week, when ultimately you need to lose 50-75? And how do you convince yourself to go to the gym when it's -15 outside? And eat salad when all you want is something warm? These are real questions, I swear I'm not just lamenting

The time is going to pass whether you lose the weight or not. After you've lost the weight, you'll need to keep it off (hopefully forever) so does it really matter if it takes 12 or 18 months to get to maintenance? Experiment to find a comfortable way of eating at a calorie deficit and just settle in.

I'm not a gym person. I didn't exercise at all until I got close to my goal weight and now I walk. Find something you like that involves movement and that way it may be something you look forward to doing rather than feeling like a chore.

I eat the warm thing. Honestly, salad tends to have more calories (the way that I fix it, anyway) so I don't eat nearly as many salads now as I did before I got serious about weight loss. My main meal yesterday was a can of soup with a lot of veggies added. It was warm, filling, and delicious for about 400 calories.

I totally understand. Personally, I set short term goals. Like losing 8-10 pounds each month. And a reward system when I reach certain goals. For example a pedicure, or nails done or buying something for myself.
As far as salads, you can add a hot protein to eat with it or instead of salad you can do broccoli or something else warm and healthy. Try doing in home workouts, look some up on YouTube.
I’m currently trying to reach 20 pounds lost but understand that it takes time. So far I’m at 16 lost but hope to hit 20 by the end of the month. Slow and steady wins the race!

PS... You didn’t gain all the weight overnight, so don’t expect to lose it overnight!

I have tried for years to reach a goal weight by working out at a gym, drinking diet shakes, eating salads...you know...the stereotypical stuff. The only thing that changed was that the next time I tried, the amount of weight I needed to lose increased. So, the last time I decided to get real about my health, I did some deep reflecting. And here's what I realized and how I decided to solve it:
1. The only kind of cardio I like is cycling, but if I have to drag myself to the gym to do it, I quit going after a month or two. So, I bought a stationary bike.
2. I can only do shakes and salads on a regular basis when it's warm outside. When it's cold outside, I crave warm things and wind up eating out (and not in a healthy way) if I don't have warm-food options on hand. So, I left the kids with the husband and went to the store and spent a LONG time reading labels, checking recipes that looked good on my phone and on here, and I found things...I'm still working on building the list of things that are low calorie, filling, and yummy. As someone else said, soups are good. I also do baked potatoes a lot.
3. If the only goal is the end goal weight, I give up. For me, my end goal weight is a long-term goal. Every goal-setting guru out there will tell you that you need to set short-term goals to help you reach that long-term goal. So I set smaller goals. I also realized that if my only motivation was the number on the scale, I either give up pretty easily when it doesn't change very fast or get lax when I get close to my goal (which leads to no weight loss, which leads to me giving up). So, my first goal was just to work out 5x's and log my food every day for 1 week. Then 2 weeks. Then a month. Then I got close enough to 200lbs that it seemed attainable to get under 200lbs. So that's my next goal, but I try to make them non-weight related. I still find myself saying things like, "If I ever get to 145lbs, I'm treating myself with a trip to the Bahamas", because deep down that doesn't feel attainable yet. But 199lbs does...and that brings me to the last thing I have learned over my years of yo-yo dieting.
4. When it comes to weight loss, I need extrinsic motivation. In literally, every other aspect of my life, just meeting the goal IS the reward, but weight loss is different for me. I haven't figured out why, but it is. So, I reward meeting my goals with something extrinsic. When I worked out 5x's a week and recorded my food everyday for a month, I bought some new workout clothes. When I hit 199lbs, I'm replacing my cheapo fitness tracker with a Fitbit Charge 2. And WHEN I hit my goal weight, I'm going to the Bahamas.

All that say. Maybe it's time to do some internal reflection. It sounds like you've already identified some hurdles in your weight loss journey, but now instead of trying to plow through them, figure out what's the best way to get you over them.

I want to lose the weight and not regain it, so everything I do now is for that purpose. It kind of becomes more about the process than the numbers because building habits now, however long it takes, sucks less than losing 150 pounds then regaining them, in fact, it makes things easier in the long run.

I measure my success by new habits I'm able to form, or new strategies that I discover, and weight is just a byproduct. If I keep weight as my main focus I may be tempted to eat too little, over-exercise, and do things that I know are not sustainable. I don't like gyms, I don't see myself sticking to going to gym a month from now, let alone 10 years from now, so I don't go to the gym. I found other forms of activity that I'm more likely to keep up. I don't eat a salad unless I want a salad. If I want something warm there are plenty of lower calorie warm things. If I want something particular that's higher in calories, I have it, I just have to decide how much and how often it's worth it.

I think keeping your eyes on the very long term and your focus on the very short term is a good way to handle weight loss because medium term goals can feel daunting, while short term goals feel attainable, and because very long term goals are lifelong and contain many parts they don't have that same sense of rushing that can make a person impatient and they're easy to compartmentalize.