on verge of quitting

ONE meal at a time! Dont stress about the week or the day. ONE MEAL AT A TIME!

Someone suggested getting some help with the festival. I agree. There must be some people near you who would be willing to lend you a hand in planning and executing some of the tasks.

It really is easy for everyone to say don't quit (and they're right) but you need to decide for yourself what's most important. Sounds like you could use some help in other areas too, as well, as the festival plans.

Can you lean on any family members or friends for support (moral or otherwise)? May be there are alternatives to help you pay for the mortgage, too?

I would first, sit down with a pad of paper and write down everything that is stressing you out, then brainstorm ideas on how to make each situation (one at a time) better. Sometimes seeing it on paper makes it easier to categorize and come up with a plan. Also, can you take maybe half a day and do something for you to re-energize yourself - maybe just enough inspiration to push yourself to get this stuff done, in the most efficient way, with a clear mind?

I know you'll be supported here, if/when you decide to stick with the weight loss program. Look at all the concerned people already. :flowerforyou:

~katie

Don't worry about changing everything at once.
You've got a lot going on in your life... take a moment to breathe

And remember you don't have to be perfect, you just have to be better.

When you completely change your whole life at once, you revert to the familiar in times of stress.
And who doesn't have stress? Having tools to cope with stress is what's important.

For me that was small incremental changes, baby steps
A couple of small changes at a time, then a few weeks later when they've become habit another couple of changes and so on and so on.


Here's how I started:

1) tracking for a couple of weeks before I worried about losing.
(although seeing what I was eating I couldn't help but rein back a bit)

2) seeing where I could make small changes on things that weren't that important to me.
(Don't even think of taking chocolate out of my diet!!!)
--Reducing quantities where I won't notice it so much
--Swapping out things instead of eliminating them.

3) Look at my diary and started adding foods that had positive healthy effects specifically for the health issue in my family.
I found most of the things I "should" add were really yummy too! salmon, avocado, oatmeal, mango, red grapes....
(Sort of think of food as medicine to deal with family history of various health issue oatmeal is good for heart health, mango and red grapes lower cholesterol, tumeric and cinnamon good for arthritis)

4) every couple of weeks I see where I can make another couple of small changes.
If you completely revamp your diet, it's way easy to revert to old ways in times of stress.
If you make a series of small changes, food still offers you some sense of comfort.
sort of a comfort continuum, and after a while the first small changes will seem comforting in themselves.

5) also rather than being uberstrict with the target MFP set for me I did the math to find out the calories needed to maintain my goal weight and my current weight and...
I gave myself a range:
ROCK BOTTOM: 1200 cal,
TARGET: lose 1 lb/wk as my target (once that went down to 1200 cal I switched to lose 1/2 lb a week
HIGH END: maintain my goal weight

As long as I keep within in this range I'll lose. I tend to naturally zig zag my calories 3-4 at very close to my target and then a higher calorie day closer to the top of my range.

SAFETY VALVE: As long as I stayed under maintain my current weight calories I won't gain. So no need to throw in the towel, just pick-up where I left off.

REMEMBER YOU ONLY HAVE 1 POUND TO LOSE, THE NEXT 1!
Once I found ways to lessen the stress, I found it way easier to focus on the process and let the results follow. (It's what worked for me some people need the stress to get them motivated. Me I get scared and overwhelmed and don't see the big goal as achievable.)

Food is not the enemy.
Oddly enough on my journey here I've reduced guilt over food.
I have the occasional treat and I fully enjoy it with no guilt involved.
The thing is since I'm not eating crap all the time the occasional treat is just that a TREAT it's special and I enjoy it so much more than when I was unconsciously shovel junk food into my face.

I figure if I've got a good plan that I can actually maintain I can keep this off for a long time to come, without feeling deprived.

Good Luck

also stop calling this journey a diet...diets are destined to fail. call this a new lifestyle of eating right and good clean foods only.

I am feeling really down at the mo. Stressed with work and home and on top of that I am organising a festival and I feel completely lost. I really need time out but because I am paying the mortgage on my own and I'm self employed , I literally can't afford it. It feels like everyone wants a piece of me, but that no one really cares about me.
On top of that I'm failing and flailing with my diet! I've been trying really hard but the weight is barely shifting. I literally have no energy when I get home from work, so exercise seems like a mountain. So it all feels pointless. Plus I have to try and look after the house too.
So i have nothing left in me to keep trying with the diet, even though I feel so utterly disgustingly fat.
I don't know what to do

went through a time like this and gave in and gained 30lbs, DON'T SLIP you will regret it. I know you are miserable, but did you know that there are foods that improve your mood. Dr Oz has awesome tips about that I am so sorry that you are going through a rough time. I hope it calms down soon. I developed an ulcer bc of my stressful times. Trust me I wish I could go back in time when I was 30 lbs lighter and lose the weight then instead of letting myself go and adding 30 lbs to my already 40lb goal, now I have to lose 70! It happened fast. And it did not help my stress. At the time I felt like everything was out of my hands, I had no hold on my life and I felt deprived so I used food to comfort myself but it only made things worse. Please don't give up. People do care, I care and I don't even know you. The one thing you have control over is your mind. You can take a bad situation and decide not to let it take you down. You can do it honey, just tell yourself you can. Don't give up, those stresses will pass.

Hi, dear one! You don't know me, but I could be you! I have a very stressful job working about 9 hours per day supervisory, but not allowed overtime, so I try to keep it down by clocking out on time and staying a few minutes longer. I have daily work, supervision, reports, monthly tasks, etc. No time for exercise...I eat out the wrong foods a lot of the week. When I hit the door at home, I just crash and so much is piling up and not getting done. This is when you really need to hang in there and force yourself to do the exericse. If it means getting up 15 min earlier - DO IT! It will decrease your stress level, help you think more clearly on the things you need to be mentally alert for and decision making. I am new to this program, but not to exercise and being overweight, and stress, stress, STRESS. If i exercise for even 10 minutes either in the morning or the evening, I end up sitting less and doing more around the house, or being more organized at work and on an even keel throughout the day. I know this works! I just can't explain how. It changes the endorphins or something! I am pullling for you. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE don't stop. You do not have to spend extra money on this site, just keep your diary, chart your food and exercise. Don't worry so much about losing weight, think about it as staying healthy and in shape, becoming fitter. The pounds will eventually take care of themselves. Give your self a break by not feeling guilty if you eat the wrong thing at one meal or another, but just keep doing the exercise for your own well-being and confidence. I may not lose any weight, as I am in the last third of my life and metabolism is slower, but I will continue to improve my health and confidence - and SO WILL YOU!

You've had a lot of good comments and insights from others, and like many of them, and you, I've had similar periods of extremely high stress in my life. At my ripe old age of 55, I handle it better now than I used to, but that doesn't mean it isn't hard to stay positive, keep motivated, and stay with a healthy diet when life seems to suck all the energy from you.

It sounds as if you haven't gained even with all the stress/challenges you're facing at the moment, so try thinking about that as a success, rather than slow/no weight loss as a failure. I've been stuck at the same weight for more than 2 months--frustrating, but at least I'm not gaining, so I know that my logging everything that goes in my mouth and trying to figure out what I'm stuck is part of what I'll experience the rest of my life.

Also, if you haven't been to a physician you may want to consider that. I had a couple of years of tiredness, low energy, slow but steady weight gain, etc., and just thought it was "life"--lot of stress during that time. During an annual physical my MD decided to test my TSH levels and found that I had hypothyroidism. Within a couple of months I could feel my energy slowly come back and I realized then little energy I had had for quite a long time. Now I can often tell when my TSH levels are off and my meds need adjusting because I inexplicably have no energy for anything other than dragging through my day.

Hang in there!

You say that no one cares about you (which is probably the negativity talking), but remember that the most important person that needs to care about you is YOU! Show yourself you care and don't give up.

I agree with everyone's advice. DON'T GIVE UP!

I too have struggled. It has taken me a year to lose 28lbs!! Stress is a huge factor in not loosing weight for one. I go through it. Last year was horrible for me. The biggest thing for me was making small changes. As soon as I got used to one small change I would make another. I still do that to this day. I tried to do it all at once and crashed every time.

You need to focus on you. Taking time for yourself will also help your motivation. Even if you just sit and read a book for a few hours. It turns into other things eventually. Again small changes.

As for the housework. This is my advice. Tackle one room a night or morning. I had to learn how to do this when I was going to school full time, working full time and taking care of my family. Believe me my life sucked for awhile. But I lived through it.

Small changes may not get every thing done right now and you may not see immediate results but you WILL get results. So... NO QUITTING!! Just take it SLOW! And remember we are all here for you!

I'm so sorry you are struggling! I totally feel your pain! I've been at it for almost 8 weeks and have actually GAINED weight. It hurts to work so hard and not get any measurable (i.e. weight loss) validation for it. My friends stress that I must focus on how I FEEL and use that for motivation.

They may be on to something for us here! Keep on with the healthy changes and lifestyle, but don't track the weight just yet. I'm on an 8-week weight-loss program at my job and the weekly weigh-ins have seemed to only validate that I'm some sort of weight-gaining freak. Ah yes, the scale is inaccruate. Brilliant! I've wanted to throw that 40year old 5-ft tall analog doctors' scale through the window many times (...can I write that down as "strength training"????) My last weigh in is this Friday and after that, I'll continue logging food on MFP and keeping up my exercise and training programs, but I'm not weighing myself for a very long time.

When I get frustrated like this, a part of me even fears that my body is incapable of loosing weight (age, damaged metabolism, bad genes, falling out of favor with the "Skinny Chick" Goddesses, etc. ) and I may need to resort to bariatric surgery, but I'm going to give myself a year of hard work trying to loose the weight "naturally" like other "normal" people before I make that decision.

I hope that in a year...or even months from now...you and I can have a different story to tell and can share our motivation of finally being rewarded for our hard work! For that to happen you CAN'T QUIT! We aren't finished writing our stories yet!