Feel useless because I’m so bloody fat

[fatandfrustrated]

GP has just prescribed me steroid cream for a rash under my belly, whilst pointing out that it’s because I’m overweight and suggesting I do more exercise .

I’m 20 stone 8, 5 ft 9 and massive . I’ve been much bigger (23 stone) but my self esteem is shot to bits .

I don’t exercise much, as I’m too scared. I’m dyspraxic, don’t know what works for me - have never exercised in a positive way . I was removed from PE at school as they just laughed at me .

I can swim a bit, and walk, but never done it seriously . I’m pretty flexible but not enough so that I’d feel confident doing yoga . I can’t dance, or mirror other people’s movements eg aerobics, so that stuff’s out.

I’m also under cardiology investigations (genetics) so been told it’s gentle exercise only - nothing high impact, endurance or competitive .

I don’t feel at all good about myself, and I find when people try to help me I feel resentful and like I want to eat and lie in bed to spite them almost. Like speaking to Dr just now I just felt more annoyed than anything else and almost offended . Went and walked 20 minutes in the pouring rain out of anger , and I’m not sure who at exactly .

I’m not sure how I change my mindset . I CAN lose weight when I try - I lost 4 stone at sixteen, and I did it again at 21, and then 26, but each time I regained even more .

I’m an emotional eater too, I love food, I love planning my meals, and I have a weird anxiety about food too - I hoard it almost - so it’s difficult . I absolutely adore mayo - my big weakness, so it’s not good ...

Can you afford a treadmill, rower or crosstrainer?

Get a heart rate monitor, work out what HR is in the fat burning/aerobic zone, and just plug away for an hour every day.

I hate the treadmill, i can’t run and you have to walk for bloody hours to burn any calories, but if you have time and can walk and use your phone to pay bills, write emails while you’re at it the time goes quickly.

My machine of choice atm is the rower. Low resistance, netflix or a film on my phone, and just row. I play around with distance, sometimes i’ll do 10 mins hard, or 40 mins easy, or intervals.

Best bit of the rower is I don’t need to think about getting changed, sports bra’s, decent trainers etc. Psychologically it was always the “getting ready” to exercise for me, i’d put off getting changed as long as I could. Now i can just hop on in a lunch break, do 10mins, eat, and get back to work.

When I want to lose weight I keep a food diary. I can easily see where I've eaten too much of the wrong stuff, but equally, if I have had a good week and lost weight easily, I can repeat it. Keeps me from getting obsessed with food. But you do have to be honest😜

And walking. It's a national past time these days. Everyone's doing it. Stick some headphones on, pick your beat, and off you go. 👍 I feel much better mentally after a walk.

I gained over 3 stone over lockdown from march last year so I have been trying to make changes to lose it, I cut out all alcohol I try not to snack now or have carrot sticks and a small dip or rice cakes, have veg with every lunch and dinner and lots of it and a protein ie chicken, eggs etc. reduced carbs drastically by replacing them with alternatives ie rice with cauliflower rice. Only thing I'm stuggling with is the exercise side I have dumbells at home I've been doing 20 mins with every day and every other day I try to walk briskly for about an hour but I'd rather swim or run but running in my area is a nightmare at the minute, so hopefully gyms will open soon. I have lost a stone over about three/4 weeks so will see how I fair

I'm a bit like that too OP that if I feel like other people are telling me what to do, encouraging me, being all Ra Ra Ra etc I want to do the opposite.

When we had the bear home from primary school and looked through all the (not all of them), showy off things (daddy took the bear up in his plane!). My immediate urge was to take him to our local weatherspoons and take a pic surrounded by empty pint glasses and an overflowing ashtray 'i went to the pub'.

So I get that.

Do it for you. You have impetus. And control. Walking is good. And easy. Don't tell anyone you're trying to lose weight either or they will go on at you. Don't have shit snacks in the house or in bulk. Do things like. Mmmm snack. If I want it I need to walk to the shop and I'm buying a packet of wotsits and nothing else and I'm going to sit in front of the telly and savour them. Work for your snacks in a doable way. Find a person on YouTube who doesn't piss you off. Or just do. The classic. Put on some music you love and dance like a loon. Jump up and down. Swing your arms. Pretend you're doing knees up mother brown :D it's all so serious these days.

Do what works for you. Fuck what everyone else does. Don't keep snacks in the house. Hopefully you have a corner shop? Walk there if you want a snack and buy one. And in your position. Essentials shopping only nah. Supporting a local business at 7pm when it's empty is great.

Good luck!

Keep it simple. Make a commitment to yourself and pick one movement and stick to it. Don't worry about food yet. That's the next step. For example walk up a particular hill or take the long route to a shop and do it every day. X

The infection under your stomach is a serious indicator that it’s time to refocus on your health and well-being. I had it when my youngest was a baby and it became primary and secondary infections with serious talk about needing a skin graft.
It sounds to me like low-carb (not no carb/keto) would work well for you, there is a MN Low Carb Bootcamp that is great for solidarity, support and information. I lost 100lbs low-carb. Excerise-wise you can’t beat walking, just a little every day would help you feel more positive.You CAN do this.
(Oh and my adult daughter has dyspraxia, you have my empathy...she loves kayaking, walking and tae kwondo. Dancing, she had a great teacher and loves Swing Dance...she tries lots of things to see if she can do them.)

I've lost 5.5 stone since July. It is both astonishingly easy and incredibly difficult, at the same time

By which I mean your head has to be in the right place - personally I stress eat amd emotional eat so I put on weight when overwhelmed with too much to do, difficult long running situations, when afraid I'm going to fail at something else etc. Food isn't actually the problem, more my drug of choice given I have children and its low immediate risk to be overeating compared to say getting really drunk... I think for most people who become very overweight this is the case, and the reason that just giving diet and exercise advice misses the point...

Get ypur head straight first - clear your mental load if you can. If you've got overwhelming commitments can any be shelved or cancelled? If they can't then can anyone help? If you can free yourself of any pressure it will help enormously. If you can't I'd say give yourself credit for what you're dealing with and decide to just start walking daily and not get on the scales until the other overwhelming pressure (whether its a non sleeping baby and homeschooling older kids, or workinglong hours and studying/ homeschooling, or whatever) eases.

Just walk fatandfrustrated you don't need to do any other exercise. Start by walking as far from your house as you can in 15 minutes, then walking back. Plan some circular walks a similar distance. Walk half an hour per day for two weeks, then decide whether you can walk for longer - up it to 45 minutes - or more briskly, or incorporate hills, or whether you'll stick to the 30 minutes as it is and maybe add two more challenging or longer walks per week...

Once you've done two weeks of walking (or even better use the two weeks as thinking time) decide what permanent change to your eating habits you could cope with sticking to. Dieting is pointless as you know - whatever you do is forever. Could you stick to eating during 8 hours out of 24 forever? Once you've been doing it a few months you can play around with which hours - eat between 12 noon and 8pm or 8am and 4pm or even 2pm and 10pm or whatever suits you, just always leave 16 hours between your last food one day and first the next... Could you do no S? No snacks, no sugar, no seconds except on special days and Saturday and Sunday?

For me keeping it simple is essential. I cannot stand counting and tracking or being told what to eat, or "inspirational" exercise videos with wet toothed trainers being peppy, those things give me the rage, so I don't engage with those approaches.

I walk between 2 and 10 miles per day depending on my schedule (shift work and homeschooling).

I do intermittent fasting 18:6

I mostly avoid bread and sugar, but not entirely - they're not things I only eat "socially" i.e as part of a shared meal or if one of the DCs or a colleague has baked and everyone is trying a bit, or DH offers me a piece of his chocolate, bit I don't eat sweets/chocolate/ biscuits/ cake or anything containing processed sugar alone anymore.

You can do it. Its easy if your head is in the right place and incredibly difficult if not, so address that first, and start walking while you do.

I agree with majesticallyawkward that its also good to look at other plus sized women who look great and seem happy for inspiration, and if you have nice clothes wear them or if you can afford to buy a few nice things which fit - because it is so much easier to make positive decisions about everything, including food and exercise, when your self esteem is good and you feel positive already.

If you hate yourself you get into self destruct mode (generic "you") and think nothing matters, it's all shit and impossible blah, blah, blah, and its a spiral. If you feel good, however, you can achieve even better things without it even seeming like an effort.

@UntilYourNextHairBrainedScheme can I ask you about IF, when you say you can't eat outside the 8hr window, can you still have milk in your tea/coffee outside the window ?

Also if you look under "Weightloss chat" on here you'll find supportive threads including ones for people with a lot of weight to lose. Talking to people who once lost/ need to lose 10 vanity lb isn't always very motivating if you've got a lot more to lose for health reasons.

Could you work out your TDEE and aim for it 3 days a week to start with? Emotionally train yourself that you have 4 days of eating as normal and 3 days sticking to it, then when that becomes easier do 4, then 5? You should lose plenty sticking to it 5 days out of 7. Then you aren't craving treats or cheat meals as you know your only a few days away from having it. This works for me because I love food, especially takeaways, so my Friday treat doesn't mean I've ruined my diet and make me give up.

I'm dyspraxic and hypermobile so injure myself easily. Walking - on good, stable ground - I can do, though. Start slowly, if you're not used to it and make sure you have good footwear. Invest in a step counter - fitbit or mii band - and set yourself goals for movement.

frumpety you have to find what works for you. The intermittent fasting "gurus" usually say no, no milk or anything with calories outside your eating hours. What I've settled on is black coffee and green tea in the mornings, but milk in my tea in the afternoon (during the eating window) but also in the evening after my eating window.

This seems to work for me - I don't mind black coffee and have no problem fasting completely until lunch time, but really missed tea with milk in the evening. That was I'm totally 0 calorie fasting for for about 15-16 hours per day, and "dirty" fasting with two or three cups of tea for another three or so hours. Having tea with milk makes up for no snacking because its a comforting thing, for me.

In the end it's a lifestyle not a cult, so just do a bit of trial and error.

wellnessseeker.net/shauna/

This woman is brilliant. She helps you to find your "why". Lots of free stuff as well as zoom groups. She was doing this three years ago with me. She's in Ireland.

+1 to all the PP mentioning the importance of diet over exercise. I feel one of the greatest scans of the medical establishment and fitness industry is the stupid, unscientific focus on telling people to exercise to lose weight. Exercising doesn't burn many calories. One cupcake = an entire hour of running. Exercise also triggers hunger, especially for women. And the more you exercise, the fitter you get and the longer you have to exercise to burn the same amount of calories.

Dieting (healthily and sustainably!) is the only way. Sure, throw in exercise it if makes you feel good. Could you get an accountability partner through a weight loss group? And can you come up with new comfort habits in the short term to reward yourself when you need to feel good? Like watching t.v. you like or buying something small when you have the urge to eat something terrible?

And if you want to exercise, swimming is about the best you can do in terms of low impact and very high calorie burn. I'd up the swimming if it doesn't make you too hungry.

@UntilYourNextHairBrainedScheme Thanks for that info , I probably get through nearly a pint of milk ( not sure how much that is in calories for semi-skimmed ) in my coffees in a morning, usually have between 6 and 8. Will look at reducing the milk down and see if I can get to enjoy black coffee.
Like your walking suggestions too, sounds achievable.
And well done on your weight loss, that is so impressive, I bet you feel loads better ?

frumpety thanks. I do feel better in the sense that I no longer feel I have to worry about my heart or knees immediately, and vanity wise it's so lovely (but expensive) to be able to find clothes in my size in pretty much every shop - online or bricks and morter - but I was always fairly active, I didn't really feel terrible before - even when my BMI hit 40 I could out walk my healthy weight fairly heavy smoker colleagues 20 years younger than me when we had to do a city tour as part of a course we were sent on last year!

I think its important not to get into a spiral of self loathing as nobody achieves anything in that state! Prioritising your own health actually requires you to like yourself first, as nobody prioritises someone they despise over their children or work or relationship or elderly parents etc. etc. Even going for a walk alone cam feel selfish if you should be playing with your two year old or spending hours with your elderly mum or helping your 7 year old with phonics or marking essays or writing reports or studying for a test... There's always something...

Hi OP, can I recommend a kick bike (basically an adult scooter) look for minimum 16" wheels. Low impact cardio exercise that is really fun :)

medium.com/@jordancrowder/5-reasons-why-kickbike-is-the-best-low-impact-exercise-fdb90ee6f99d

OP, yoga won't really help much with weight loss, but it will in other ways! Flexibility is more an end point than a starting one (if you start off flexible you're actually more likely to injure yourself), but over time you'll build strength and stamina and be able to see what your body is capable of.

Weight loss is 80+% diet, so in your position I'd focus on that before trying to lose weight by exercise

This. You need to get to the bottom of that and sort it out.

Not really sure what to do about the mayo. Go lower calorie and just have the recommended tablespoon? Personally I'd ditch that completely until you've sorted the emotional eating out. I don't understand emotional eating but I know there's threads on here you could join for support. Always better when you buddy up with someone else.

@frumpety try Bob milk. It's essentially skimmed milk that tastes like semi skimmed. It tastes fine on its own so you definitely wouldn't notice a difference in tea

@SadderThanEeyore Thank you will look out for it :)

@WildfirePonie love the look of those big scooters , are they quite lightweight ?

Can you not consider weight loss surgery? Especially with the other suspected comorbidities. If you’ve been so overweight for so long, even if you lost the weight you’re likely to gain it back.

I am your height and was nearly 15 stone, I got WLS and the best thing I’ve ever done, although NHS waiting list is very long and you have to jump through their hoops so I paid privately and had it done within a week of making my decision to get it done.