Oh, @charlaj666

My heart breaks for you reading this!!!

I will say this, and it might help...

Weight loss is in the kitchen, fitness is in the gym...

I lost the first good clip of my weight nearly a decade ago - by changing what I was eating. My daughter and I started cooking together, and I focused on getting more fruits and vegetables and just eating less fast food, convenience foods, and anything that came in a package.

I felt like (and still feel like) I'm not a "real" fat person. I feel like I'm not really "pre-diabetic," even though the numbers still show that if I don't change, I will be fully diabetic...

I lost from 319 (medical chart highest weight, even though I know it was higher before i started losing) down to 250, then back to 275 them down to 239, and back up. I'm around 275-280 these days. 319 was in 2009. So even though I haven't maintained all of my lost weight, I have maintained nearly 40 pounds of it for several years.


I STILL HATE EXERCISE.


Sadly, I used to love it, back in my 20's before my metabolism when into panic mode...

Regardless, I will say that the only thing that finally gave me some hope out of binging out my misery was -

1) getting divorced (was so hard at first, but eventually, I felt better)
2) just being around people here on MFP who've made changes are were willing to help others, too!
3) finally finding a doctor willing to get me on thyroid meds and diagnose some other related issues...
4) finding out that going low carb, even temporarily, helped me understand my broken brain wiring
5) figuring out how to love myself as I was, at my worst (the divorce and recovery helped this the most!)


I promise you, it's possible. I lost weight without any exercise. Basic movement, like walking, does help. But it isn't always possible. Even now, my average days are only 4000-6000 steps, but I feel a ton healthier than I used to. I got plantar fasciitis (micro tears in the heel tendons - which is like shin splints in the heel), and if I pushed too hard, I'd end up with shin splints, too...


So, for me, the best things I did were - logged in here daily, for support, even if I didn't log my food.

Started drinking more water. Just a little at a time.

Started tracking my food - just tracking it, not reducing it yet. Getting a true, clear picture of what I was eating.

Found friends on the same struggle. Yes, I'm still morbidly obese. I believe I have to get down to 220 or something to get out of the MO classification. So I stopped letting the label mean anything.

Banished the guilt - food is just fuel. Did I give myself the best fuel today? Probably not. Will my body still operate? Yes. In a week, will my bad choices today matter? In a month? A year? 5 years? 10 years? Will I even remember??? That perspective was something I had to achieve and remind myself all the time, because guilt makes the restrict/binge/punish/etc. cycle stronger and longer... I had to take the power away from guilt. Sometimes I still feel a little bad about less than perfect decisions, but I can't change them, and I wouldn't punish a friend for the same choice, I'd encourage her...so I have to encourage myself.

It's still super hard, but I refuse to give up. Please try not to give up on yourself either!


Any small change adds up. Do not feel like it won't help...

Make a small change and try to stick with it. Then after a week or 2, when the first change has become easier, make another small change...and just keep them up!!! All the hugs and luck. If you ever need support, and I'm not on this group, feel free to send me a private message.

(HUGS)

Another thing I work to remember is that WILLPOWER will fail you.

YOU DO NOT FAIL WILLPOWER.

Willpower is finite. It has limits. It must be renewed. It is a good tool, but it can't be the ONLY thing we depend on...

Motivation is also all well and good, but it strengthens and fades over time.

Dig deep and find the things that make you want to fight back...


Here are some of the harder walls/realizations I hit on my journey so far.

https://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/KnitOrMiss/view/shrapnel-of-an-epiphany-warning-raw-intense-adult-content-674031

This one right here is my favorite writing:

https://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/KnitOrMiss/view/motivation-versus-determination-699445


That one reminds me that I need to get back to writing!

Just some thoughts on paper/screen...

I hated exercise too, when I was morbidly obese. Fundamentally, being obese makes exercise really unpleasant. It’s all much harder work, especially for your muscles and skeleton, so you get out of breath fast, get really sweaty and get injured. That in turn means you can’t get or stay fit, which makes all of those things even worse; ugh.

I lost my first four stone doing no exercise at all. That was all on just eating less. Then I started playing Pokemon Go and started taking a five-minute walk to the nearest PokeStop every lunchtime. Another few months down the line I’d lost some more weight and was taking fifteen-minute walks twice a day and swimming on a Sunday.

You can see the way this is going

Basically, as I lost weight everything kept becoming that little bit easier and I kept finding I could do just a little bit more without the sweating and heart-pounding and joint pain.

Fast forward to today, and incrementally, without noticing, I’ve somehow become someone who enjoys HIIT gym classes and five mile hikes. But only because I’m fit enough now that it doesn’t suck to do it.

So... you can do a huge amount just by cutting calories, without any exercise at all. But if you add in some exercise in very small amounts, and then ramp it up slowly, you might gradually find that you stop hating it so much. You might even find something you actively enjoy. Eventually

Hey, charlaj666, I hope you are continuing to do better. It's all baby steps. I have been working on this all year. I had a similar experience to KnitOrMiss -- I had to work on eating first. After I figured out a diet that worked for me and my life and got results, weight started coming off, and moving got a bit easier. Hang in there!