From a Christmas Pudding to a Christmas Cracker - Weight Loss Motivation

DvB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121646378#Comment_121646378

Ah brilliant, great to know all is sorted and didn't cost a small fortune.

SnowyMuckish

Last time I managed to get the weight off I did it by upping protein and enjoying my food, 3 healthy whole foods meals a day and nothing was off limits but in moderation. Got my walk done every day. Happy life and things happened naturally and slowly. Maintained most off for a long time, never reached goal though and crept up a bit after Christmas which is normal.

This time same process is not working whatsoever! High protein intake (naturally through whole foods) but still feeling hungry between meals 😩. I really don’t know why this is happening! Possibly middle age 😫

I’m beginning to think that I need to track calories to stay in a deficit. I’m not one believes in tracking every morsel of food I eat, I’ve been to weight watchers and slimming world, and tried fad diets when I was younger before I had sense. I found that all the measuring created such a negative relationship with food and never worked long term.

But I do need to do something short term to kick start myself again. How do you track your calories when you’re cooking everything from scratch it seems like an impossible task! Any good app or website recommendations to give a ballpark figure of what I’m eating?

Loughc

I find MyFitnessPal is a great app to track calories. Most food is in their database already all you have to do is to add the quantity then.

DvB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121647680#Comment_121647680

Concur. Used it myself and found it brilliant.

taxAHcruel

Always avoided the calorie counting thing myself.

Firstly because it gets too complicated if you are making whole meals yourself. Something always gets by. I have made salads where the little dressing I put on it had more calories than the entire rest of the dish. And a lot of people forget the dressing when working out a salad. Or the Ketchup on the side of a Carb Free Burger.

Or or or. There is always something that gets by.

And that's not including the sheer frustration of finding your exact ingredients in the app - or worse you find your ingredient but some users have put in different calorie counts for them and you do not know what to choose or it's in a measurement you do not recognize.

Secondly though I have very little faith in calorie counting myself. I simply do not think it works. The entire Calorie in - Calorie out mindset for me simply never worked and I have never seen it work personally. And I think it leads to a lot of weight "yo yoing" and also situations similar to Snowy above where it seemed to work in the past but now suddenly doing almost exactly the same thing again seem to either not work at all or ends up in weight GAIN inexplicably.

So it has always seemed a high investment of time and effort and frustration for little, or even negative, benefits. YMMV of course which is the most frustrating thing with all dieting and weight loss! Everyone is different. But for myself and those I have observed directly I have entirely lost faith in it.

The most dramatic example in my life where I finally lost faith in it entirely was a friend who simply could not lose weight no matter what diets he switched to. In the end I moved him back to what he was originally eating when he started and simply changed WHEN in the day he ate each thing(s). He was eating essentially the same stuff as before - only eating them at different times of the day than he was before - and the weight started to fall off him.

Jude13

Im a big fan of cal in cal out and works for me.

I had an awful week food wise, have my folks over so eating out and going to events.

I went to the gym this morning and then to my daughters school sports day, her first one! She made me do the dad's race and it was a terrible idea, I had a suit trousers on with dress shoes. 3/4 of the way through the race my groin went so I limped to the finish.

Loughc

Yeah cal in versus cal out works for me as well.

DvB

Firm believer in cals in v cals out myself too. Every decent coach I ever had was the same. But I appreciate that it may not suit everyone. Regular exercise is a huge factor with it though.

Aisling(",)

First weigh in on plan and I'm down 4lb.

I have goal set to lose 12.5lb(this includes the 4 just gone) but I secretly would love to push it 19.5lb or even 26lb.

I'm not sure how practical is is but I'm focusing on my first goal anyway. Once the scales is going in the right direction even if it's by an ounce I'll take it!

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121673108#Comment_121673108

Well done 4lbs is a huge amount!

I'm massively yo-yoing at the moment.

tscul32

I've stopped increasing. For the moment that's my win. February is bring it back down month.

SnowyMuckish

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121647680#Comment_121647680

Thanks very much for that app recommendation! I’ve been playing with it all weekend and it’s amazing!! The barcode scanning feature blew my mind.

Finally beginning to get an actual understanding of what calories I’m really eating and it’s an eye opener. My ‘healthy’ normal breakfast of porridge, fruit and seed mixes added up to over 700+ calories 😱. No wonder I’m getting nowhere fast!

I linked the app to my smart scale which is synced to my watch which I’m delighted with. I’m good to go, I’ve no excuse now, the next few weeks are going to be interesting!

Jude13

Ive stepped back from my attempt to become a cracker. I just have too much going on I need to focus on and dont want to beat myself up for it at the moment.

DvB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121687984#Comment_121687984

Mental health is just as important Jude, look after yourself.

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121687984#Comment_121687984

Same, I can't manage it on top of 4 hour sleeps and now the return to work, I need to just breeze through the next few months as stress free as I can.

For myself it's easy to remind myself the newborn stage will be over by Summer then I can really push hard on losing weight. Good news is I'm still the same weight I was in Nov-23 so I haven't gained but I'm not happy where I am at either.

Jude13

Cheers lads. I need a holiday and to change a few things.

Aisling(",)

Week 2 weigh in: 2lb down, total loss of 6lb

I didn't think I'd get the 2lb had a bit of a messy weekend, Friday takeaway, pizza and cake at a kids party on the Saturday. I knew I'd been on plan outside of that so thought I'd get a half a pound or maybe a pound.

Aiming for 2lb next week but if I get the one pound to be at half a stone I'll be over the moon!

CheerLouth

Had my second InBody scan at the gym yesterday - a month since the first one & I'm quite pleased with the numbers. Overall weight down 2.7kg, body fat down by 3.7kg, muscle mass up by 0.6kg. Quite happy with that as slow and steady wins the race & I'm feeling very good with more energy now that I'm actually eating three proper meals.

Aisling(",)

Week 3 weigh in: 1.5lb down, total loss of 7.5lb

Half a stone gone🥳

Wasn't eating as much fruit and veg as I should have been but apart from a pizza downfall I stayed mainly on plan. Happy out.

Have two meals out in the week ahead and I don't know how sensible I can be with food in either place so I'll just try my best to keep the other meals in the week decent.

5lb left to get to my current goal.i think there might even be a chance I get to it by the end of February!

tscul32

Well done you!

Aisling(",)

Week 4 weigh in: maintained, total loss of 7.5lb

I'm lucky not to have had a gain. 3 meals out, pancakes and a few cocktails.

Going to try push through my bad habits which are creeping back in.

DvB

Weighed myself this morning for the first time in a while and have gone up into the next stone bracket and am disgusted with myself.

I know its ultimately down to a severe change in lifestyle with my work/life balance shifted heavily & huge hours being spent sat at a PC, so need to find a way to address that soon or i'll be in need of an intervention like the one I had 8 years ago that lost me 3.5 stones... i'm pretty sure I haven't the knees and energy to do that again so it'll have to be diet taking the heavy lifting this time and see if I can reverse this slide.

Aisling(",)

That's the hard part to resign yourself to. It (for 99% of people) all boils down to diet once you hit a certain age. I used to be able to eat and drink everything I wanted once I got a few jogs in during a week. Now I'm keeping an eye on my food and even though my movement is less than usual due to work and its working to drop a few pounds.

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121774657#Comment_121774657

I could have written that myself. Except not only have I gone into the next stone bracket I horsed through it. I’m almost in the next next bracket.

I don’t have the time to exercise at the moment but thankfully being back in the office ended the endless snacking so that’s a start. Down a 1lb and only thing I did is return to the office.

taxAHcruel

Not having time for excercise is something I have actual nightmares about. Thankfully it does not happen so often. Generally when it does however I try to excercise anyway.

By that I mean if I would normally put the gear on and do some kind of work out or run or something else for an hour or two - I would put the gear on and do that workout and run for as long as I literally have time for. Even if thats only 3 minutes.

Sounds a bit ridiculous really. And in most ways it is. But the main reason I do it is that even when I have no time for the excercise in question - it still remains part of my habits and routines. Which sounds like a small thing but actually over time it can be very powerful. And since this is specifically a "motivation" thread I thought it might be worth mentioning.

On the note of snacks and stuff getting in the way I just acquired a Ninja Creami. A little pricey though I believe there are cheaper market equivilants. I have been making a guilt free ice cream (essentially almond milk, protein powder, vanilla extract, and low or non sugar sweetner optional like Monk Fruit) in it that serves up pretty much like softscoop icecream that A) doesnt land on the hips and B) doesn't come with the lethargic sugar crash that sometimes follows a feed of ice cream.

Anyway not sure if any of that helps anyone. But it's a motivation thread specifically so thought I would mention it all the same lest it motivate someone even a little :)

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121778988#Comment_121778988

For me it’s not a lack of motivation for exercise it’s a 60 hour work week coupled with a newborn and toddler at home I can’t exactly waltz in the door and head off for a run or the gym for a hour.

but it won’t be forever. Once the newborn hits a Rhythm and a routine I’ll be back out pounding pavements.

taxAHcruel

Yeah new borns change everything. A lesson I learned 4 times now :) Thankfully we are done now and won't be producing any more of those!

I did invest in a backpack cradle, a front loading sling, and a running buggy though which I am so glad I did because it carried over to the three new borns after that.

But it meant that instead of losing all my excercise time trying to get baby to sleep and then using what time I had left to excercise - I actually made taking newborn away from mammy (to give her down time) part of my excercise routine. Doing squats with baby on my front - walking or hillhiking with baby on my back - running with running buggy in front of me (I did not like the ones you attach to you back even though I often run with a tyre or sledattached to me - the weight just did not feel right for me).

That's not for everyone of course. Thankfully it worked for me. And the mammys were awfully glad of the no baby time. Especially since all of mine seem to have been constant rather than periodic feeders. So they were drained (figuratively and literally) a lot of the early months.

I was teaching my toddlers to fight pretty much since they could walk too. So in general I have worked hard (and yes it is hard work) to make my children included in my entire physical routine rather than a hinderence to it. But it's no easy thing to do and it's certainly not over night. A lot of trial and error, effort, consistency and comfort with failure.

DvB

Similar to loughc I have a 60 hour work week, coach 2 gaa teams and also have to help at home doing the day to day stuff, trust me when I say time for exercise and proper meals at proper times is not an easy fix.

Alit easier when single or before kids, or before running your own business... Trust me on that.

taxAHcruel

Indeed. No one says it is easy. Which is why I never give "advice" or tell people how they could be doing things better. Generally it's just good to hear how other people dealt with simmilar issues because sometimes you get lucky and hear something that makes you go "Hadn't thought to try that - let's see if it works".

Generally I avoid ever giving advice or critique unless someone openly asks me to. Which does happen a lot and always feels a little uncomfortable. I prefer just to represent what I have done for me - and hope someone somewhere gets something positive out of that.

Only thing I know is that for me personally NOT excercising does not save time. Because for me it leads to worse sleep and worse concentration. So then I end up needing 10 more hours to do my work week than I otherwise might and at the weekend I end up looking to "catch up" on sleep and so forth.

Not to mention that I have long buried depression and self loathing and there are things I very much need - excercise being on top of that list - to keep regular or those demons start to grow and surface again. A constant war that I will lose some day - but I intend to win every battle in the interim :)

It's a very delicate balance for me therefore. And while it is always tempting to "save time" by skipping X to achieve Y and Z - in the end it just leaves Y and Z taking longer.

But I have the privilege of not working a 60 hour week too. Mainly because I have been so deeply obsessed with work/life balance that I have turned down quite a few raises and job promotions and more if I had any suspicion it would skew that balance.

DvB

Did a midweek weigh in just to see if my perception that my changes in diet were working and was astounded to see i'm down 6 lbs since the shocker of a weigh in about a week ago.... I appreciate that there's probably a chunk of that which was water loss (despite drinking litres & litres of the stuff) etc but good to see the scales backing up my feeling of already seeing change in my clothes fitting etc.

Nice to see an early win to keep me motivated anyway.