Falling off the wagon ... hard

I have few priorities in life. The are my wife, my kids and my health. They are all intertwined. In order for me to carry on a healthy and active lifestyle with my family, I need to be healthy myself. It's what motivates me to change my lifestyle.

Also, the first few weeks of any regimine are always the hardest. I started my journey by juicing a few weeks back. Day 4 was HORRIBLE with headaches and all around irritability. But day 5 was a new awakening and everything just started to "feel better". I run a lot now. The first few weeks of running are HARD and you just don't want to do it, ever. Now, it's like an addiction and if I don't run for a few days, I feel "fat and lazy" and that's just not OK with me any more.

Moral is, something is hard if you don't do it as part of your lifestyle. I engrain this into my kids as much as I engrain it into myself. Do the hard things FIRST, because they will only get easier. Eating healthy, working out, tracking your diet... It's all hard at first.

One of my pals posted this and I just read this when I am about to give up. Hope it helps.


Losing weight is HARD.
Maintaining weight is HARD.
Being fat is HARD.

CHOOSE your HARD.

Its a hard thing, but first I would get rid of the "all or nothing" thing you have in your head. I can say I struggle with that daily. Then I remember this journey of weight loss is going to take me a very.... long...... time. When it takes a long time, you start to lose your drive. I know I do. But do know that you are not alone, there a lot of us emotional/stress/bored/happy/celebratory eaters. As long as you keep doing what you've done in the past, the right things, you will continue to have results. If you fall of the wagon, just get back on. Thats all you can do. Sorry if this is no help, but I'm going off my own experience. Cheers Melsy

One thing that really helps me is to not think of it as you are restricting yourself from certain foods, but instead look at new and fun recipes that you get to try. Focus on what you CAN have. Finding new foods and combinations is always fun. Also, I have taken some things I love, like chocolate cake, and made healthy versions of them (using...black beans. Sounds weird, but it is good, I swear!). Trying new, healthy food choices helps you build a new lifestyle.

One problem I do have is just plain chocolate. I'm addicted, I crave it, I love it. When people say "oh, if you crave something sweet, just eat some fruit!"....I laugh. Maybe a chocolate covered apple might do the trick. In no way, will fruit ever substitute sweets for me. I find that I crave it less on days I work out, probably because the endorphins are satisfying me in the same way that the rush from eating chocolate does. Also, the less I eat it, the less I crave it.

Weight loss is hard. I lost 110lbs over the course of a year and when I started I had no plans on doing such; but when I weigh myself the first time I had lost 4 lbs and something clicked in my mind that I was not going to give those pounds back. Get over the fact that you are on a diet and aim your efforts to create a new lifestyle. Of course you have bad days, but question yourself on what your doing. Don't use the excuse of being an emotional eater. It's too easy.

Find ways to improve your lifestyle. Fight for what you achieved. If you felt better 50lbs heavier than go for it.

Be kind to yourself. Forgive yourself for the past. Try to make good decisions and remember the only correct decision you can make is the NEXT ONE!

I wish you the best of luck, I know you can do it.

My highest weight was 355lbs about 10 weeks ago.

I have since dropped about 40lbs due to drastically changing my lifestyle: food and exercise.

I drink loads of water. I -hate- water. Nothing about water makes me happy, I'd rather drink juice or soda, or coffee. But I choose not to, and drink water instead.

I eat salad at least 2 meals a day. I am sure I will get burned out on it, and need to find a new way to sneak in those almonds and walnuts I really don't like into my diet. I love salad, but I hate making my own. Heh!

I don't enjoy committing an hour of my day to walking, though I will admit I do enjoy step aerobics (I use the Wii Fit Plus step workout, as well as a Step Aerobic DvD w/step platform) enormously. But I told myself at the start of this I would invest 60 minutes per day, 5 days a week to walking. I choose to continue doing so, even though I probably could get away with doing it 4 times a week instead.

I don't enjoy being overweight. Obese. Morbidly obese. However, I chose to let myself get in this predicament, and now I am making the choice to ignore what I - want- in order to gain what I REALLY want. Satisfying my long term goals instead of the short term gratification. Of course it is hard, how could it not be hard, lifestyle and food consumption are habitual, thus hard to correct and it takes a lot of discipline to do it.

How do I manage? I walk the grocery store every time I go shopping. I don't just go and get what's on my list. I take time to ogle the donuts, pastries, fried chicken, instant brownie mixes.. And I never tell myself "Forbidden!" 'cause truthfully it isn't. If I really wanted to I could have a brownie, or an oreo, and I will definitely be having a brownie ice cream sundae this summer. Nothing is off limits. I just say "how badly do I want it?" If I eat something that is definitely empty calories like a brownie, I need to balance it out with exercise and different food choice for the preceding and proceeding meals. It's a choice I make.

So you can choose to not exercise and eat poorly, or you can choose to make better choices in food and exercise. Keeping your eyes on the long term goals are what's important. And even more so, remember that 'falling off the wagon' makes you human, and doesn't mean you are forbidden from getting back up on it.

There -are- healthy choices out there that make eating well fun/interesting/etc and exercise (imo) isn't ever going to be fun if you approach it like a chore. I started off walking my dog. My dad started off seeing how many steps he could take in 40 minutes, and trying to increase from there. We all have different motivations. Find out what drives you.

You can do it if it's something you want. Good luck to you!

I love that XOchocolate!

Hey I had an over 40 lb fall of the wagon. Emotional eating was one of my biggest down falls and still is today. After losing over 70 lbs I added on 40 and boy did I have excuses. Well last summer, after moving across country I decided I needed to stop the gaining. I managed to lose a few lbs but found it hard to be committed and then the holidays hit and I gave in to the constant bombardment of food.

January 1st that all changed. Not a resolution but a decision I was done!!! No more. I sat down and completely revamped my food, exercise, and daily habits. I looked for things that I knew were triggers and sent them packing. I started planning everything from the meals I would prepare at home to how I would work around being invited to parties where there would be so much junk. I plan my meals out so I know exactly what to prepare at home and am not doing the whole "what is there to cook" debate. That debate usually ended up in us ordering in. I have recipe books that have healthy dishes that are also easy to cook and I use them to plan out my meals two weeks at a time. Taste of Home has a couple of great recipe books that are very similar to meals I would pig out on but just healthier versions. "Taste of Home Comfort Food Diet Cookbook: Lose Weight with 433 Foods You Crave!" is an excellent book. The recipes are very good, even my kids love most of the recipes. I mean love, my 11 year old often asks for 3rds.

I exercise 5 to 6 days a week even if it is just a walk or a bike ride. I have a set time of the day that I do that exercise and yes sometimes that means dragging my butt out of bed extra early on some mornings. I have also taken a close look at my own habits that lead to binge eating or mindless snacking. I am working hard to change some of those habits such as dinner at the dinning room table as a family instead of in front of the TV. We also eat our biggest meal at lunch (I know not everyone can do this, it's the firsts time in years my husband schedule has worked for this). Our evening meal is usually left overs or something light that doesn't make us feel over stuffed when we go to bed. All in all I found ways that works for me and my family and made it happen.

The most important thing I had to do was change my mind set!!! I had to stop feeling sorry for myself, stop beating myself up for falling in the first place, stop predicting failure for myself before I even got started, and start doing for me and my family what needed to be done. I had to decide that i wanted to lose the weight more than I wanted to be miserable. Other people can offer encouragement or suggestions but I had to be the one who would decide what I wanted my body to look like and then take action to put it in place. I also had to decide that "WHEN" I slip up or fall a down that I won't let it destroy all of my progress that I will just pick myself up by the boot straps, put the past behind me, and start over no mater how many times I start over. It also meant committing to stop saying I don't have time to plan meals, I'm to tired to get up early, I don't have time to exercise, it is to hard to eat something else at parties, and I don't like healthy foods. I had to decide I would make time, and do it any way! I have been working on losing weight for a few years. In that time I have met many others doing the same thing. The ones I find the most successful are the ones that turn excuses not to eat right or exercise into excuses to get healthy. They are determined even when it's hard and they don't quit when life sends them a hick-up. For me, I am going to be positive thinker. I am 30.8 lbs away from my goal weight, I will get there and I am making life time choices to make it happen.

I completely cut out "junk food" for a few months, then I was able to do single servings for a while and now I'm ok just taking the portion I've tracked (since I do that before I eat it). I'm also not focused solely on appearance goals; I now have fitness goals. I want to be able to do more pullups, bench my bodyweight, squat 1.5x my bodyweight, and deadlift 2x my bodyweight. I have to stay focused to achieve those goals. I also have to make sure my diet is in check so I can hit my macros.

I know you hear it a lot, but find what you love to do. That's what makes it sustainable. I love lifting but hate cardio. Others love cardio and hate lifting. Focus on your love.

I do still binge but it's maybe once/month and nowhere near the number of calories I was putting away before.

Hey there. First of all I would highly encourage you to both go to therapy. There are even therapists that deal with eating disorders...which INCLUDES overeating/binging etc. Figuring out WHY you go to food emotionally will be the only thing to truly help change it...and to find an alternative.

Secondly, find an exercise that you LIKE. There are many, many out there. You just have to shop around. I found spinning. It literally changed my life. I hate ellipticals and treadmills. They bore me to tears. But spinning, or a dance class or Body Pump I look forward to...and now teach!

It isn't all or nothing. It's EVERYTHING. In moderation. If you totally cut things out you are bound to fail...BUT set yourself up for success. I don't have brownies in my house..because I'll eat them if they are there! If it ain't there I can't eat it.

Last....only you can be in that mental space where YOU want to change. Until you're ready, you're not ready. And BOTH of you will have to be ready.

Don't give up. You can't live the rest of your life like this. There is a better life, and a better you just WAITING for you. It's not easy. If it was, then everyone would do it. In the words of President Obama, "Yes we can."