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I am about 30-50 lbs overweight. If I lose 30 lbs I will look very good,but to bring me back to my pre-children weight, I would have to lose 50 lbs. I know that I look rather large and unattractive. I know that it is hard to find clothes that fit. And yet, I still eat. I have tried weight watchers and all it entails-the counting, the meetings…and nothing. I even tried that new drug-Alli-and nothing. Okay-alot of side effects-I will spare them from you.
I have no self control. I mean,I can for a while-a day,a week, even a month. But eventually,I crash. I love to eat. I wish I was as picky as my kids. I know I am looking for a quick fix and this is something that takes time. What have you readers done to motivate you to lose weight and eat properly?
You can start by not bringing junk food into your house.
Start dating.
can you do any exercise during the day, or at night?
that’s more important than what you eat.
You have to decide that there are no quick fixes and you must have a change of lifestyle. Having a friend who also needs to lose weight can be a help as you can support each other and give a phone call when you are feeling as if you might cheat. Plan ahead a decide that one day every 2 weeks will be your treat day – then it is easier do without the rest of the time. Buy yourself something really nice to wear in a size that is one size less than you now wear. When you have your fist significant loss and are down that first size, you will feel like a million bucks in your new clothing.
one year i took a jar and every time i lost a pound i put a dollar in the jar. if i gained a pound i took out two. a friend of mine got involved and we put a quarter for every hour we would excersise and also a quarter for every time we made a good decision regarding food choices…but bad decisions lost a quarter. we had a goal of loosing lets say 10 pounds and at the end we went out together. we had a great time, lost the pounds and had fun doing it.
another friend did it to give the money to a specific tzedakah but when I tried that there wasnt enough mitivation….
you should try this method. tell me how it works for you
Start by thonking of losing JUST 10 LBS. When you think of the need to lose 30-50, it is a daunting task. 10 lbs. are much less, and much less intimidating. And MG is right. when you lose that first dress size, it will spur you on. Start by making small changes in your diet, fewer simple starches and more complex carbs. If you like a potato, try substituting either a sweet potato, or better yet, CAULIFLOWER (which when mashed and mixed with some garlic salt and onion powder can be a great substitute for mashed potatoes). If you normally eat fries, eat a potato baked. Bake your chicken. Eat fish twice a week (baked or broiled, no sauces). Think about the hidden extra calories you are taking in, that we pay no attention to most of the time (like salada dressing). By making smart choices and filling up on vegetables when you need to crunch and nosh, you will make a difference without half trying. Bonus – your general health will benefit from all these changes, not just in weight loss. Go for a walk with a friend on a regular basis. It costs absolutely nothing. Hatzlacha rabba.
The best motivation is looking at what happens if one doesn’t lose the weight. Higher rates of hypertension and diabetes. Pretend your doctor told you that you have just entered the illustrious club of members diagnosed with those illnesses.
Reduce sodium intake
Follow a strict daily 200 carbohydrate diet by eating 3 meals and 2-3 snacks ALL containing carbohydrates
Don’t binge on vegetables because you are not a rabbit and you will be starved and eat twice as much at the end of the day. Carbohydrates fill your stomach.
Eat chicken instead of eggs and meat during mealtime to ensure a balanced meal.
If you need help speak with a NUTRITIONIST. Don’t listen to day spa quackers! They are there to sell products and the longer you stay fat, the more money they make. Only YOU can help yourself, but a NUTRITIONIST can help you develop a food plan that you can stick to and is healthy for you.
1st stop should be the thread above, which had loads of advice.
2nd – Poppa is right; think of yourself as being in the shidduch market, and see how fast your husband notices the new you.
3rd – sort of like Minyan Gal’s idea, but instead, pick an activity you cannot do now (like walk 6 flights of steps without stopping) and try to meet that goal within 6 months.
Winter is coming, so outdoor excercise is going to be a challenge. Stairs in a hospital is an ideal place, as its safe, well lit and warm / dry. (forget the gym, its too condusive to chit-chat).
Start with a small goal, don’t race your way to the floor you set as a goal, and above all esle, portion control. Denying youeself the foods you love will not work. Eat, but eat with a cheshbon.
Join Overeaters Anonymous. There are meetings in msot large communities that are well attended by frum people. And many are very successful in losing the weight and keeping it off.
Maybe do it with your husband, make it into a project.
If you admit that you have a problem – I think you are halfway there. I second the situation to do it with a partner (someone sympathetic to your situation and also wants to lose weight, husband or friend).
I recently read the book “The Life-Transforming Diet” (Rambam’s take on health and pyscological principles, with sources) of which, the biggest takeaway – at least for me – is, to give yourself enough time to “change your habits”. Sheer willpower will never be enough to combat desire. So little by little, you change your habits… (it does give specifics, and it seems very doable… though kind of complicated at this point for me.)
Right now, I combine that with the principles of the “full plate diet” – simple: eat fiber foods before others (always eat fiber foods! working up to a total of 40gms a day), stop when you’re feeling full, and drink 6-8 cups of water…
I also started a private blog on posterous (easy!), a diary of sorts, which is a great motivator!
1. You want to be a healthy mother? You have to lose weight. Think about it when you eat.
2. Don’t keep extra food in your house. Seriously. Not a single snack. ONLY normal healthy foods.if your kids eat nosh, buy every day only what they need for that day.
3. Report to someone every little thing you eat. This will make you think twice before you eat.
Take it from me. I also have no self control. But I find that these 3 are the only things that can keep me in control.
Hatzlacha!
Join Overeaters Anonymous. It works. There are frum groups everywhere, but you can join a goyish one.
It’s not christian, it’s haskafahicly sound, it’s merely dealing with each person’s individual God – for us, Hashem.
You can ask any Rov who’s in the velt. It’s muttar – and it gets the job done. “Came for the vanity; stayed for the sanity”.
I am a big believer in the 12 step when dealing with any addiction, and food is none the less an addiction to cocaine to many. “More motivation” Richard Simmons style ain’t gonna help.
It’s seems like your addicted “it’s not what you’re eating, but what’s eating you”. And it seems like you’re ready to give up.
Which is great, because it means you can go to OA. You can only join if you are hopeless. OA is for hopeless people, who somehow found hope – and success.
But leave your husband out of it (sorry sacri, I say this as a husband) – join OA – and tell hubby to go learn :).
Really you can’t lose weight for anyone else but yourself and you can’t do it for any other reason than you really want to do it and you are really READY to do it. If you do it for a quick fix you will gain it back just as quickly. So YOU have to decide that you want to make a life change, eat healthy and be healthy. Just because you love to eat doesn’t mean you can’t learn to love to eat healthy foods. And just because you love to eat doesn’t mean you have to eat fattening and unhealthy choices.
Maybe the best thing for you is to seek out a good nutritionist and go for a medical checkup. Found out where you are holding medically and know what you have to do to bring any medicalissues under control. Discuss your weight loss issues with your doctor and then take that information to your nutritionist. She will help you learn to read labels, learn to make substitutions in your favorite recipes and meal plans and understand portion control. You can eat a lot of food on a good diet plan and never be hungry as long as you are eating the right foods for your particular body type and medical issues.
When you make those changes in YOUR diet and meal plans those changes carry over to your family meals which will automatically help the rest of your family learn to eat better and make healthier choices. As these choices start to have a better effect on your body you might have a little more energy to take on the exercise you have been avoiding.
Judging from your question, you are not looking for technicalities of how to go about loosing weight. Your question is about motivation.
The questions you might consider asking yourself:
1) Is your husband happy with the way you look? There is a mitzvah to try your best to look good for your husband. If you are strict with other mitzvahs, why not with this one?
Take one of those pictures that made you freak and say that CANNOT BE ME and keep it handy so you can look at it
Make sure to eat a protein item before or at each meal – like salmon at 10-11 AM (just microwave with lemon pepper seasoning, or add soy sauce for more of a treat and chicken cutlet at 3-4:00 (just bake with barbecue spices/hot spices for 5-8 mins – ) THIS WILL KEEP YOU FULLER so that you don’t eat a lot at meals – just some salad or hot vegetables.
NO SNACKS/ICE CREAM/CAKE IN THE HOUSE – if you have to do kids, then make the snacks the type that you can resist – they have all kinds of snacks that cater to the kids and don’t really tempt adults. If you are the major balabusta that always has a freezer full of devil dogs, rugelach and yummy stuff, wrap it like it was going to siberia, and put it on the back of the remotest shelf in your freezer in the basement (by your neighbor) – make it as inaccessible as possible.
Exercise – make it an absolute ‘chok v’lo yaavor’ – we don’t not put on tefillin/ we don’t eat without bentsching, and we don’t go to the shower until we exercise – have your workout clothes/music/area absolutely handy so that you have no excuse, no stopping for coffee, no phone call,no ck email until done.
Water – try to prefill up your water bottles for the day so that you have an easy marker for whether you consumed your water.
Remember – even 5 pounds looks good, so you will have mirror motivation all along. It’s all psych out – so find your own tricks – do it for yourself, do it for your husband, do it for the mitzvah of ‘ushmartem es nafshoseichem’ – do it so your kids are not mortified when you come to their plays – do it so that you aren’t afraid to go to the next simcha…. whatever works.
Good Luck!!!!
I am with you. I don’t have to lose as much, but about 20 pounds would do me good. What I find is that I tend to do things in spurts: Either I eat sensibly and walk almost-daily and go for checkups, dental appt.s, pedicures, etc… ie, really focus on MY well being. Or I do none of the above. And they happen in cycles of several months. Or more accurately – several months off, and several weeks on!
I also find that as soon as people start complimenting me on how I look – I turn off. It sounds crazy, but I completely lose motivation to continue. However – fitting into smaller clothing DOES help. Also, focusing on how I FEEL (energized, less tired, less stressed [walking helps LOADS with the stress factor], not bloated, etc…) helps me more than numbers on the scale.
Someone suggested focusing on 10 pounds at a time, not 30 or 50. I say, focus on 1 pound at a time. THAT’S do-able! :o)
BTW, if you are looking for a stranger to be e-buddies with for this, I would be interested. I think I might to better with that than a local friend…
Esther,
If you want motivation, in addition to the other suggestions given, try this. Find a good internist who is not in Borough Park or any other frum community. (In other words, he or she won’t listen to someone saying fressing is a mitzvah.)
Go for a physical. Get your blood tested. See the doctor for the results. Ask him or her about your elevated cholesterol, glucose and hemoglobin A1C. Ask about your risks for diabetes (which you may find out you already have), heart disease, stroke, etc.
THEN see if you are motivated.
By the way, ask the doctor how much weight you are advised to lose. It could be less than you think.
I too was 50 pounds too heavy. But no more. Now my body mass index (BMI) is close to 23 which is well within the normal weight range.
There are many different approaches to weight loss but all come down to one simple truth: you have to burn more calories than you consume.
Good luck!
(don’t mean to hijack the thread but, SRpshyc: It’s funny that you say that… that’s exactly what happens to me too. As soon as I lose a little weight, feel and look a little better… I lose motivation… hmmm… gotta find me a way out of that one.)
seeallsides said to keep a picture of yourself at your heaviest and least attractive. Good idea, but depending on your personality, either do that or keep a picture of yourself at your thinnest, at your goal weight, and tape it to your fridge or nosh cabinet. The fat picture may keep you from eating because it grosses you out and/or reminds you that if you eat what you want to, you’ll just look worse, or the thin picture will keep you upbeat and give you incentive to avoid the food (“if I don’t eat it, I can look like that again!”). Also, maybe keep your weight (or weight log) posted somewhere in the kitchen to remind you of your goal.
Good luck!
never step on a scale
generally
the scale will show a lower number than you expected, giving you a false sense of success and causing you to lose motivation
or
will show a higher number than you expected causing you to become discouraged and lose motivation
Esthermalka
There’s a book called “The Life-Transforming Diet” I know people who went on this diet and lost weight. Its not difficult and works with stages so at no point do you become overwhelmed. Its based on the Rambams principles of health and diet. Check it out it might be what you are looking for.
The scale is not a good measure of what you are losing or how you are losing. There is a big difference in losing fat or losing muscle and water. If you want to lose weight the right way do it with a doctor who can watch you appropriately to make sure you are not losing muscle but building muscle. Sometimes you might get on the scale after eating appropriately all week and exercising appropriately all week and still not lose a pound, maybe even gain a pound. But with the right doctor and the right scale, he might be able to tell you that you gained 3 pounds of muscle and lost two pounds of fat so you actually did very well that week. However, if you got on the scale at home you would feel frustrated and dejected because you would feel like you gained weight not understanding that you actually lost bad weight and gained good muscle.
I need to loose weight too, I have been thinking about forming a weight loss “club” get a few of the guys here together and try to do something as a group. But I haven’t done it yet.
I don’t think you should give your kid junk to help her gain weight. Give her high calorie healthy food.
(posted to feel smart)
Wanna lose weight fast? Dont eat at night. U almost dont have to diet, if you dont eat past 7 thats a diet.
popa is right. Give your child ensure or pedia-sure to gain weight. Fried foods is never a good idea. She should still eat healthy. You can also offer her an extra large portion or a second helping. Another idea is to give her more meals but smaller portions. So give her snacks that are healthy but will help her so you can give her an extra sandwich for a snack. The bread alone, even whole wheat bread, or a small bagel or soft pretzel adds calories to her diet.
Speak to a good nutritionist who can help you add healthy snacks to her diet plan so she can gain needed pounds and have proper energy. But if she gains weight from unhealthy foods she will gain fat that might have a lasting result you are not looking for in the future.
Esther- giving your child junk won’t make her fat. It will make her SICK chas vsholom. That’s absolutely no excuse.
Feed her peanut butter, avocado, bread, fatty milk, proteins and SOME snacks etc.
Please follow your pediatrician’s guidance.
Maybe this will be motivating. Today, for the first time ever, I watched the Dr. Oz show. He said that losing just 10 pounds can add 10 years to your life.
minyan- makes sense, I was told by a nutritionist that losing 10 percent of your weight decreases your risk for disease by 50 percent! So its easier to set your goal, if you weigh lets say 200 lbs. and you get to 180 lbs. you lost 10 percent and if you continue going and lose 18 more lbs. thats another 10 percent. B’hatzlacha!
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