Planning for failure?

CM_73
CM_73 Posts: 554 Member
in Motivation and Support
Hi all, just hoping to get some experiences really.

I've been at this weightloss journey an embarrassing number of years now. I've got diaries, charts, spreadsheets etc going back to 2014 and, yet again, I'm pretty much back to square one.

I know how to lose weight, I don't even need a silly small calorie intake to do it but the longest I've stuck it is just shy of a year, then I get fed up, then I give up, then I come back to it a few months later and start all over again.
If I just maintained during those times I'd be so much better off! But, I don't, I throw food down constantly until my weight has rocketed again.

Anyway, back yet again, all going well as usual, but I haven't changed anything so I don't realistically expect this to last. I know that time does the work for me, I'm happy with a small but steady loss.

I don't even know what I'm asking really, but has anyone been in that situation and cracked it? I really want to try and have a plan in place for when things aren't going well and how to stay, even roughly, on track.

Replies

  • CM_73
    CM_73 Posts: 554 Member
    ccrdragon wrote: »
    My best suggestion for this is to find your 'WHY' - why are you losing the weight and why do you want to keep it off? Just because it is the right/healthy thing to do is seldom a motivator for most people.

    It doesn't have to be some grandiose thing like 'save the world' and there is nothing wrong with doing it for vanity, but it has to be important to YOU - so important that you WILL NOT allow yourself to quit.

    This is (as you have found) a very tough journey, so you need something (anything) that drives you toward the goal and then helps you stay reasonably close to goal once you achieve it. If there is nothing out there that drives you, the weight loss simply becomes something that would be nice to have but is not very important.

    Thank you for that, I think you could well be on to something.
    One of the (many) things I tried was to write down the reasons for losing weight to give me some focus. And, I didn't really come up with much.
    The usual reasons were being fitter and vanity etc but I couldn't come up with very much. Could be linked to a low self esteem I guess.
    I shall give that some serious thought!
  • elisa123gal
    elisa123gal Posts: 4,324 Member
    A few things; first you seem fed up with yourself. That's a good place to be when you're on the brink of making a real change in your life. So, you got the weightloss thing down..so concentrate now on how you want to master keeping it off. Come up with strategies and ideas. I suggest reading the "maintenance" forum each day. Those are the folks that live in that world and they have great and different ways that they keep it off. You have to find what you think will work for you. It is just that last piece of your puzzle that you have to find. I also wonder if you weight yourself each day after you reach your goal?
    I hate weighing myself during my loss... but doing it after will keep you on track before you gain it all back.
  • MumTum1719
    MumTum1719 Posts: 1 Member
    edited June 2020
    Listen to the Half Size Me podcast. Heather is incredible and I find listening to people's stories inspiring and insightful.
  • CM_73
    CM_73 Posts: 554 Member
    Thank you both, much appreciated. Just to be clear, I've never hit goal, I don't even know what it really is, I'm sure I was born fat. But, I do have numbers both short and long term that I'm working towards.
    I do weigh every day (tracked on libra) and log it once a week. That is one area I could probably improve on - if I have a couple of bad days I tend not to weigh and I think that's where the missed days become weeks etc...
    I will have a good read of the maintenance forums, although I'm nowhere near there yet it could well help with the day-to-day lifelong mentality that I need to adopt.
  • quiksylver296
    quiksylver296 Posts: 28,439 Member
    sarahosmannl wrote: »
    Listen to the Half Size Me podcast. Heather is incredible and I find listening to people's stories inspiring and insightful.

    Agreed! She talks about how to handle maintenance a lot.
  • skinnyjingbb
    skinnyjingbb Posts: 127 Member
    I am same with you, I know how to loss weight, but not how to maintain.
    I am at 157lbs now, about the weight I quite in the past. I think this is a weight that my body feel comfortable, so I lose motivation and relapse to old habits. Oddly, the pandemic kinda helped me this time, I go straight home after work, eliminated me buying loads of take out or fast food in my after-work binge. So hopefully this time is different.
  • Duck_Puddle
    Duck_Puddle Posts: 3,237 Member
    A couple of things to consider:

    1. While you made a list of “why” to lose weight, also consider the idea of writing out why you don’t want to lose weight. This isn’t to provide inspiration, but rather to help pinpoint some thought processes that may be guiding your behaviors (even subconsciously). And that can help give you some ideas of things to look at for why you may struggle.


    2. Sometimes the idea of working towards a specific weight-particularly when it’s a long way from our current weight-can be daunting and almost an unknown concept (especially if we’ve never even been that weight. Like-What does that even mean to weigh that little?). I’ve had success staying the course (even with detours) by making my goals to stick to my calories and workout plan. Essentially, my goal is to do the work. In doing that, the results will happen (eventually). But my goal is my behaviors-things I can control-rather than the ever finicky number on a scale or a fitness goal that I’m reaching as quickly as I think I should be (my goals are typically running related).

    Best of luck to you.
  • CM_73
    CM_73 Posts: 554 Member
    Duck_Puddle wrote: »
    A couple of things to consider:

    1. While you made a list of “why” to lose weight, also consider the idea of writing out why you don’t want to lose weight. This isn’t to provide inspiration, but rather to help pinpoint some thought processes that may be guiding your behaviors (even subconsciously). And that can help give you some ideas of things to look at for why you may struggle.


    2. Sometimes the idea of working towards a specific weight-particularly when it’s a long way from our current weight-can be daunting and almost an unknown concept (especially if we’ve never even been that weight. Like-What does that even mean to weigh that little?). I’ve had success staying the course (even with detours) by making my goals to stick to my calories and workout plan. Essentially, my goal is to do the work. In doing that, the results will happen (eventually). But my goal is my behaviors-things I can control-rather than the ever finicky number on a scale or a fitness goal that I’m reaching as quickly as I think I should be (my goals are typically running related).

    Best of luck to you.

    Thanks very much for that, I will certainly give those a lot of thought.
    I particularly like the idea of the goals themselves being the goals in a way. I've been working towards mini targets for a long time now, but breaking them down even more into the specifics sounds a very nice idea.
    Although I don't want to change anything purely for the sake of change, statistically, I don't stand a great chance of long term success if I don't change something this time around!
  • CM_73
    CM_73 Posts: 554 Member
    Geneveremfp wrote: »
    I wonder if there's a bit of self esteem coming in here. You wrote that in quite a self deprecating way. You don't think truly that you're worth the effort and that you're going to succeed at it.

    I know I couldn't lose weight and tried all sorts of things and just kept yo-yoing whilst gradually getting fatter overall. Then I did some therapy and spent some time improving my self esteem and my anxiety. I suddenly managed to have a lot more willpower etc. I lost 60lbs and maintained until I became pregnant. Even then I didn't put on as much as I lost.

    I'd spent years thinking that being thinner would make me happier but actually I needed to be a bit happier to invest in myself enough to be thinner

    Thanks for that, I'm sure that is part of it. I do need to put a lot of thought into this and try to ascertain what's holding me back.
  • ivetgali
    ivetgali Posts: 79 Member
    I am in the same boat! You're not alone my friend!
  • CM_73
    CM_73 Posts: 554 Member
    ivetgali wrote: »
    I am in the same boat! You're not alone my friend!

    Thank you for that, good to know.
    It can feel like a very long, dark road at times with cheese and bread monsters lurking in the shadows!
  • avtlove
    avtlove Posts: 82 Member
    MumTum1719 wrote: »
    Listen to the Half Size Me podcast. Heather is incredible and I find listening to people's stories inspiring and insightful.

    YES!! I second this. She's awesome!
  • mssue18
    mssue18 Posts: 117 Member
    Today I’m getting a little bored. I can see myself getting to my goal, but don’t know if I have the stamina to stay with the work this journey requires. This is hard! I haven’t truly come up with a why am I doing this yet. I’ve been working on getting to my goal for about my whole life, and I have made progress. If I lose track of what I’m doing I’ve been able to refocus before I gain everything I’ve lost back. And each time I add a healthier new food or habit. I still need a really strong why. This time I want to reach my goal and the process is hard and scary. I’ve been refocused to do this for about a month or two. I want to succeed. It’s the results of getting to my goal and the long term everyday work that I’ve never experienced though.
  • 88olds
    88olds Posts: 4,534 Member
    I’ve lost 100 lbs but I likely hold the record for the longest plateau at around 10 years. Part of the reason for the plateau at about the 2/3 mark was that life was pretty good. 215-220 lbs was a lot better than 285. There was no way I was going back. I guess a difference between us is I hated losing the same lbs twice. It happened. There’s no way to avoid it but a 2-3 lb gain that stuck around? That would get me working. I was not at all confident that if I gained any significant amount that I’d be able to lose it again.

    What’s your life like when you’re at the lower weight? Mine was a lot better. I had health issues that were history. I was a gym regular. I bought all new clothes even though I wasn’t at goal. But all the time I had that nagging voice telling me I wasn’t finished. Then one day my neighbor sat down on the couch and died. Gone. The next week I got back to losing weight. Keep trying. The past does not control the future.
  • annliz23
    annliz23 Posts: 3,752 Member
    Fir me it's an ongoing lesson about changing and adapting exercises and food to be healthy but it's always about tweeking
  • RunsWithBees
    RunsWithBees Posts: 1,508 Member
    I did not plan for failure because failure was not an option for me this time :# I had already failed many times in the past to lose weight for vanity reasons but when I was having my annual checkup the nurse weighed me and when the doctor saw the number he said “That must be a mistake, I’ll have the nurse weigh you again” I guess I carried my excess weight well and he didn’t believe that was what I weighed, I had to endure the awful embarrassment of telling him “It’s not a mistake, that’s what I actually weigh” and when I had my blood tests it showed my liver was in the beginning stages of NAFLD as well as my fasting blood glucose nearly at prediabetic levels (diabetes runs rampant in my family) so I made a promise to myself that I would lose the weight and keep it off in order to avoid the negative health consequences my obesity would eventually directly cause. I would not let myself weasel out of that promise no matter what it took, I would put in the hard work and just do it. I did it, I am no longer obese and I’ve reversed the liver damage and my fasting blood glucose is normal. I’ve maintained it for 6+ years. I allow myself a buffer zone of a few pounds but when I go over that I need to get my act together and get back to my goal weight, I remember that promise I made to myself all those years ago. I recently had 4 lbs from last summer I was carrying around and I “allowed” myself to gain 2 more lbs during lockdown but in mid April I said to myself it’s time to get back to it so I simply started counting calories and upping my activity slightly and now I’ve lost those excess 6 pounds and I’m back at my goal weight just in time for summer. When it was simply about “looking good” I wasn’t able to keep the weight off, it took having my health on the line for me to get serious and stick with it.
  • mssue18
    mssue18 Posts: 117 Member
    I still don’t know if I have the stamina to do the hard work of this journey. I need to learn more about myself in addition to counting calories and exercising. Either I was very hungry or sabotaging myself tonight. I ate over 600 calories over my goal. I don’t know what to do now. I don’t know what my problem is. I’m looking for a reason I sabotage myself and a strategy to stop doing it. I’m not willing to fail but I’m struggling to stay positive. I think I have to take the helplessness I feel in my work life and make sure I make a healthy lunch and take it to work. Maybe I can do this tomorrow to help my stamina for this hard work that is losing weight and getting healthy. This is my plan for tomorrow.
  • mssue18
    mssue18 Posts: 117 Member
    I just started a medicine that makes it hard to tell if I’m full so I have to be super disciplined to not eat too much. There are a lot of obstacles to losing weight. I need to turn them into opportunities to find new low calorie foods to fill up on. I hope I can make this work and not gain any weight. Tonight I had cucumbers after dinner because I just wanted to eat a little more. Now I am done for the night.

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