How to stop thinking about failing

Okay so I don't have as much to lose as you, I'll admit it. But the feelings you have are exactly the same as mine!

I try to see things in other ways. Like how ill feel in a years time when I'm the same weight or god forbid even heavier and. I just did nothing about it. I'll look back and think what a year wasted.

I know I'm going to fail some days. But i try to strive for progress, rather than perfection.
If I have maybe 5 days of not meeting my goals, the next week I try beat that and only have 4 bad days. And if it goes worse and I have 5 bad days again, then I just try harder the next week.

I think accepting that some days are just not gonna go as planned really helps me stay on track a bit better, just by being more aware.

And when all else fails, I hop onto the "success stories" page, a lot of them are truly inspiration and motivation and shows no matter how big you are.. Someone else has done it, so why can't that be you!
And some of the changes in the before and afters are phenomenal.

And I can almost guarantee that a lot of them may have fell of the wagon plenty of times!

I've also learnt, that doing an action gives me motivation, rather than waiting for motivation to do the action.

You will also have to to learn to say "No." to your partner. Which in my opinion is that hardest thing. And I don't mean telling him he can't have things either, I mean "No, I can't have a takeaway, you can if you like"
You can't force him to eat like you, but if you don't indulge and stick with it, you might find he follows suit especially if he sees results.

And also, start small. I tried getting 8 cups of water in, from only previously drinking maybe two a day, if that.
So day 1 and I drank 8 cups, same for day 2.
I had to stop at day 3 because I could not stop going toilet. It was constant lol.
So I went back to two and I've slowly been increasing it so my bladder doesn't have a breakdown lmao.

I hope anything in this babble helps, I tend to go on a bit, so well done if you read it all haha

And most importantly, you got this.

I love all the advice here!!

It’s awful when your worst enemy is yourself!! But changing your mind set to “healthy” instead of “skinny” will make a world of difference. Starting off with simply making a healthier choice makes the process feel more natural and puts less pressure on the need to lose weight as quickly as possible. If you stick with it, your healthy choices will snowball. For example, I was at the gym at 5:15 this morning. Two months ago I laughed at people who woke up early to workout! I never thought that would be me!! But it felt so darn good I’m going to do it again tomorrow! You can do this!!!

Take heart. There is reason for hope. And the reason is that calorie counting works. It has to work. It’s how our bodies are designed. But it doesn’t work like most people would like it to. If we have a significant amount to lose the two things that are needed are a downward trend and time. It takes a lot of persistence to lose much weight and keep it gone. Just how it is.

If you don’t mind I’ll tell you part of my story of how I lost over 100 lbs (its been gone for years) and saved my life. You’ll likely think this is stupid but it started like this- as usual I was feeling bad. I weighed 285 lbs, had HBP, sleep apnea, debilitating back pain and a seemingly permanent cough. I actually tried to not think seriously about changing. Why? Because I could find temporary comfort in the fantasy of changing. If I really tried and failed, I might have to give that up. Better to keep the dream.

But on this day I was feeling really bad. I needed to do something. But what? What might actually work? Nothing could be off the table. I could pack up some food and and exercise bike and drive north. Drive north as far as I could. I’d get snowed in with my exercise bike and just enough food to last the winter if rationed properly. Best take along some books, movies and a DVD player. )This was long before anyone had heard of the Biggest Loser.) That was my brilliant idea.

I had a wife, kids and a job. I couldn’t do this. But this- would it work as a weight loss plan? Yes. But my wife would nix it. OK plan 2. I’d do the same plan but do it by confining myself to the second floor of the house. My wife could bring my meals upstairs. That would be the only food I would get. Would that work as a weight loss plan? Yes but it would be vetoed as well.

How to fix this? I was desperate. Here, in about 3 minutes I had thought up 2 plans that I was sure would result in my losing a significant amount of weight. But I could not actually implement either of them. How to fix this? Then came the lightbulb moment. What was the problem? I could see myself losing weight, the problem was living my life while I did it. Dumb as it sounds, that’s how I discovered hope. I could lose weight if I could figure out how to live with the process.

Question, you describe a week of doing everything right without losing “any weight.” Is that any as in zero? Not a half pound? Not even .2? It makes a difference because the arguments to refute the voice in your head have to stick to the facts. One of the reasons I think I made it to goal weight is because I figured out how to argue with myself and win. I didn’t win every argument. Some things I’ve been arguing for years without a resolution. Just how it is. But I’ve argued effectively enough to keep the voice in my head from getting me to quit. And that’s really the only way to fail at weight loss- quit. So never quit.

A thing about the voice- it can’t stop. Not even when we sleep. But not everything that goes on in our heads is thinking. Thinking is deliberative process. We can’t think all the time. It’s tiring. So because our brains can’t stop they resort to filler. Plus our brains love repetition. Our brains would be happy if today was just like yesterday. Consider the popularity of TV reruns. Why do you think that is? Add to that our brains are wired with pathways. Just like walking in the woods, the worn pathway is the easiest. So when tired or stressed our brains are looking for the easy way out. How about that rerun of when we spilled our milk in the second grade and everyone laughed at us? Sure you find it distressing but its an easy tape to play so we will go with that. Just like we have behaviors that are bad habits, we have thoughts that are bad habits.

So finally to the point- how to stop thinking about failing? You can’t really. But you don’t have to act on that old bad habit thought. And you don’t just have to take it. Push back. Let’s talk about your disappointing weigh in. If it wasn’t actually zero I would tell myself something like this- I lost weight this week. The week is a success. Even that .2 loss is success. It’s a fact that to get to goal weight I had to lose that .2 lbs. Now it’s gone I can cross it off my list. But I want to do better next week. I had best look over my plan and food diary for last week and see it there might be a way to do better.

If weigh in was in fact a zero loss try this- Well, disappointing but my body doesn’t know this is weigh in day. My body isn’t a machine. Let’s look over my work for the week. Did I have a plan? Did I keep my food diary? How well did I stick to my plan? If I did all those things I had a good week. If I keep having good weeks I will make it to goal. I can only control my process. I can’t control the scale or the march of time. Just how it is. Can this argument be won like this? Probably not. But I’m not just going to sit by and let negativity take over my head. Wait until next week. If I keep sticking with my plan it will eventually show up at the scale. Just how it is.

Weight loss is mostly about problem solving and persistence. Don’t let your brain wreck you. Keep you eyes open for negative thoughts and push back any way you can. Never quit.

One technique I've learned for anxious thoughts is to actually avoid trying to stop the thoughts, because it just makes me think about them more, if that makes sense. Instead, I allow myself to notice how I feel, accept it, and then move on. I don't judge myself for the things that flit across my mind, even if they're "negative." They're just there. I get to choose to let them affect my behavior or not.

I dont have a people scale, only a food scale I have not weighed in once. I will eventually weigh in but in the past the scale number was too much of a focus.
My hubby sounds like yours always on wanting the chips and candies ect. Finally my no's have been heard and he doesnt offer. He gets them for himself and keeps them away.
I picked one small goal to start. Food, and now have added walking.
I know my clothes fit looser. I can tell its easier to move my body..
My girls have noticed too. They mention how healty I eat compared to their Dad. Ive never used the word "diet" as for me that sets me up to not suceed.

You got this! Rock it!