No motivation left.

What's your goal weight / dress size? I'm v similar weight and its the most I've ever been. Weighed myself for first time in ages and had gone up to 14 stone 2 lb (I'm 5 ft 5) Carrying so much weight on my belly and have taken some photos so I have to look honestly about my current size. Plan to look at them when I'm tempted to eat outside of my diet. Also ordered a size 18 swimming costume and not pretending to myself I'm a 16 when probably a 18-20. Embarrassed to have got that big but using that to motivate myself.

I started at where you currently are. For me... it was mostly a head thing. I had to get out of my head of I tried and failed so whats the point. To... finally getting fed up with being unhealthy. (overweight and unfit).
Breathing heavy at the top of one flight of stairs finally gave me the motivation I needed.

This time around I am not letting my "head" derail me. I have set my deficit at 1 pound a week, am not setting a goal that I must lose x weight by x time. I dont have any foods labeled bad and restrictive (except bread because it is a trigger food for me).
I have increased my exercise, because I want to. I am eating enough to fuel my body, to lose weight, and not to be hungry all the time.

I am reading posts on the board for motivation and support, looking at success stories knowing that this could be me in the near future.

I am staying positive and not getting down or being hard on myself for the days I go over the calories set. (Even when going over a lot). Log everything and start a new day with positive attitude.

I go this and so can you!

I do things without motivation all the time. It's not like I have to hype myself up to brush my teeth or shower (outside of severe depression, which is a different issue). I view healthy eating and exercise the same way - daily habits to maintain my health. Maybe reframing it this way would help?

If I waited until I was motivated I'd rarely exercise

When I was working I got into a really good routine of exercising at lunch time. It got so I'd get antsy without it.

As others have said, use discipline to create habits. This takes time - a common timeframe I've heard is six weeks.

Here's more:

http://www.wisdomination.com/screw-motivation-what-you-need-is-discipline/

Motivation is fickle, and fleeting.

Willpower is limited, and temporary.

Discipline is . . . well, not my strongest suit, personally.

Habits are habitual.

I like using the limited willpower, when that tank is semi-full, to find and groove in some new habits: Better habits, reasonably easy habits, habits that can continue almost on autopilot, once the motivation flies, the willpower is depleted.

I was overweight to obese for 30+ years. I've been at a healthy weight now for 6+. It can work.

P.S. Self definition is important. "Lazy, unmotivated fool" is a thing you wouldn't call your best friend, I'll bet - and it doesn't leave much room for change. Maybe try on a self-definition like "haven't found the right plan yet"? Then, keep looking for it, when you have the time and energy. In between, give yourself grace. Life is complicated enough without beating ourselves up for being human, y'know?

You say something really profound about your walking. "Not huge distance, maybe 3 miles". That's 5 km!!!! That's HUGE!

First of all, don't get on the scale. A healthier measure for you is how much faster or further you can walk with less pain. As you enjoy walking, get a sheet of graph paper, the kind with little boxes. A box of colored pencil crayons.

WALK WITH NO AGENDA. YOUR ONLY GOAL IS TO DO 100 WALKS.

By that I mean, step outside and walk as you feel. Slow, fast. To the end of the driveway. To the driveway 3 houses down. The end of the street. Around the block. Whatever. Come home and colour in a square. That's it!!! Exercise done for the day!! The GOAL is to colour in 100 squares.

DONE IS BETTER THAN PERFECT 🥰. Every day you will look forward to your goal of colouring in a square. Eventually the walks will get longer, faster. REMEMBER THAT A WALK TO THE END OF THE DRIVEWAY OR TWO HOUSES DOWN COUNTS. ITS THE CONSISTENCY THAT WORKS. You will feel so good when you have completed a beautiful colorful page of squares! I'd be shocked if you didn't see results. The better you feel the easier the eating changes will come. Ideally you will walk for 100 days straight. Easy to do with no prearranged expectations.

I BELIEVE YOU CAN DO IT. I AM GOING TO BE CHECKING IN TO SEE IF YOU WENT FOR YOUR "driveway walk". Now go find a sheet of boxed graph paper and pencil crayons! Write your start date and weight at the top and again after the 100 days!! There is a literal rainbow waiting for you at the end of your journey!!! 😘

You can’t give up! Putting one foot in front of the other! Days are going to suck and they are going to be hard. Some days you’ll eat like crazy and feel bad but sometimes you need those days. Maybe setting little goals. Like I’ll walk X amount today( I know your legs hurt) or I’ll bike X amount of time. I’d be miserable if I was on a diet most my adult life. I don’t know what your weaknesses are but there are option out there that are more nutritious or lower in calorie. There’s always option in everything.
I’ll admit sometimes I wanna give up and sometimes I eat like a total slob. Sometimes I feel guilty sometimes I don’t. But I workout when I don’t want to. I get uncomfortable and it feels like it’s all for nothing. But somehow a month later I’ll lose a pound or two or the measurements around my waist and arms get smaller . Before I know it my clothes are feeling different.
It takes time, lots of time and I mean lots of time. Not everyone is in shape because it is work. It’s hard work. You can do it. I believe you can make small goals and work towards them. I’ll add you as a friend and we can chat and vent.
You can do this!

I match @kshama2001 ’s thoughts…I would never exercise if I waited to be motivated! Although I like exercising now…really? Or is it just that I know I need to do this to lose/maintain weight? Or that it feels sooo good emotionally, knowing I did it another day? Or because I’m starting to see the results? I guess I like exercising to be done for the day more than exercising itself. It’s all good. Keeping active physically and socially and doing the occasional intellectually stimulating activity will help (hopefully!) lessen the probability of cognitive impairment in later life. That is a huge driver for me. That annoying Nike slogan of Just Do It has a lot of validity.

I am 38 and 212 pounds. I was close to 220 at my highest. I was starting to think I'd never get motivated again and I would live the rest of my life in the obese category. Last Friday I got bad lab results back and I feel like a switch has been flipped on for my motivation. I am certain it will stick now. I need to loose weight and within 6 months if possible. You have to find that reason...the one that compels you forward. I simply can't get motivated until I high rock bottom it seems. Last time I tried losing weight and made progress, I had just got so fed up with my weight that I couldn't take it anymore....oddly enough I was only 194 pounds then...that was years ago (like 15 years ago!). Anyway, I believe finding that reason is key!

I complained for years about being stuck. I thought I was doing all the “right” things but I didn’t pay attention to the things I didn’t want to change. That was where I needed to change (to much snacking, wine, lack of rest). Once I finally changed those things one at a time, I lost the weight and found my true self. I don’t diet now. I eat what I want when I want but it is not mindless and I do not drink alcohol. For me that was key.

I started all of this years ago...my kids were 2 and a newborn...they are now 12 and going on 10. I was in a pretty bad place health wise. 220ish Lbs @ 5'10" with high blood pressure, immeasurable cholesterol due to my triglycerides being over 500, pre-diabetic and so on and so forth. My Dr. at the time basically told me if I didn't get it together I'd probably be lucky to see my 70s and likely pretty sick by 60s if not sooner...I was 38 at the time. I did not ignore this. I was heading down the same path as my dad who a little over a year after I got my ball rolling died of a widow maker at 61 because he never got his ball rolling.

My kids were a big part of my reason why. I wanted to be in good health and be able to play with them and watch them grow and participate in many fun adventures together over the coming years. The idea that I was in this condition at 38 was also just not acceptable to me...for the majority of my life I had been lean and fit and healthy...competitive multi-sport athlete from school age through high school...military...and a very active college student who did a lot of hiking, biking, and walking. I wanted that back too. I wanted to be able to take my boys camping and hike mountains again, not just sit their drunk and fat in my hammock working on my 2nd pack of Pal-Malls.

The changes I made were primarily for my health and what I could do to just lead a healthier life. I really wasn't all that focused on losing weight or anything...just things I could do to help me improve my health. I started focusing on a healthier diet by really looking at what I could add to be healthier...more vegetables, fruits, whole grains, etc. I had a horrible soda problem that consisted of about 5 Mountain Dews per day...I slowly weened that down to none. Quit smoking...started exercising regularly, etc. I had not yet even heard of MFP and by simply making healthier lifestyle choices I dropped to around 200 Lbs.

By the time I found MFP I had already developed some pretty good healthy habits and along the way dropped 20 Lbs, basically without really focusing on that or trying...just doing the things that I know intuitively are good for me. I was feeling better...more energetic...less pain...sleeping better...less anxiety and stress, etc, etc. All of my blood work normalized and my blood pressure normalized as well, though I still required medication (hereditary)...but I hadn't seen 120/80 in ages, even with meds.

All in all I lost about 40 Lbs, which was great...but I put a lot of that credit into me simply making life changes where normalizing weight was almost just a natural bi-product. All that to say, I think many people put too much focus on weight loss and being some arbitrary number on the scale as the ultimate goal and it causes a lot of stress and anxiety with fluctuations and how much time it takes, and regain, etc...when just focusing on leading the kind of life you want to lead forever to be a healthier and happy person goes a long way to allowing everything else to just fall into place.

I never punished myself with some strict or super restrictive diet or super low calories or sufferfest workouts...I just learned to eat healthier and move around more and now I've long since been back to hiking mountains, biking mountains, cycling across my city and paddling the Rio Grande...God only knows where I'd be right now if I hadn't decided to just take a different path than the one I was on. Just remember whatever path, it's your path. It has to be doable...it has to be sustainable. If it's neither of those things you'll veer off that path pretty quickly because motivation and willpower are both fleeting things.

wilson10102018 wrote: »

33gail33 wrote: »

wilson10102018 wrote: »

ReenieHJ wrote: »

To the OP, have you had a complete blood workup? Have you talked with your doctor? Have you been diagnosed with a particular health issue? Constant joint pain doesn't sound like much fun. Could it be fibro?
@wilson10102018 You keep saying OP is 100# overweight or double what she's supposed to be, where do you get those figures? She didn't give enough stats to know that?

Does it matter? An obese person with un-diagnosed joint pain should see a doctor which is what I told her to do and not to worry about 3 mile walks until she gets her weight under control. She did not say she wasn't 100 pounds overweight and Ann who also quibbled, guessed it at 60 to 93 pounds and started talking about hyperthyroidism that afflicts only 1 out of a 100 people and only a small percentage of those experience joint pain. Whereas OA is causally linked to obesity and most obese patients have OA. Quibblers notwithstanding my advice was the most sound. Get to a doctor, lose some weight, delay strenuous exercise until things are under control.

I have OA, am about the OPs weight, and walk more than that every day. Obese people with OA need to move more, not less. Not sure where you are getting your info from. (And I'd hardly call walking 3 miles strenuous exercise ... )

The OP has undiagnosed joint pain. If you had severe degenerative synovial macrophages in your knee joints you would be walking your way into a wheelchair. Glad you don't. But, don't assume others are as lucky as you when egging on exercise in the face of serious disabling illness in another person.

She mentioned she has joint pain and is obese - and you have her in a wheelchair from a bit of daily walking? Good lord that is over the top. People get stiff joints when they are middle aged and heavy - not sure where you live but where I am that doesn't generally constitute a medical workup. It generally constitutes advice to exercise and lose weight.

Fwiw I have severe tri-compartmental osteoarthritis in my knee and no one has ever told me to stop exercising, quite the opposite. (Also she didn't mention anything about swelling or restriction of movement.) You're suggestion that she remain sedentary lest she end up in a wheelchair is frankly bizarre. She is walking not running a marathon.