I am absolutely fucking sick of being on a 'diet'.

[ThatsGoneAndDo]

My husband is 150lbs soaking wet and eats whatever he wants, when ever he wants and never gains. He's never even been a slightly bit tubby.

I've been on a mission to lose a few stone and worked really fucking hard.

In the last week I've not felt well, kids been off so I've been lax. Absolutely nothing crazy or glutinous at all. Normal routine but...
A piece of cake one day. Couple of slices of pizza for tea. Just normal things.

I've gained 7lbs. 7 fucking lbs from just going back to eating 'normally' without stringent calorie counting at 1200

I'm so sick of it. I just want to live a normal life and not gain weight.

I've always been this way. I gain so easily.

Figure out how many calories you need to intake for your ideal weight. Your body needs to adjust to that ideal calorie count. Use KG for weight not stone ie its easier to measure caloric need. I need 30 calories per kg daily. You may need more I don't walk dogs.

It absolutely sucks doesn’t it. My DP is 39, can still wear the same clothes he had at 15 yrs old. Very occasionally, he’ll get a little pooch to his tummy and says ‘I need to lose this’ and promptly does in what feels like a day. I serve him up a bigger portion of meals and he’ll empty the snack jar of Rocky bars weekly. He works a physical job but does no other exercise.

I do a HIIT class 3 times a week, follow the same diet minus all the extra chocolate/biscuits and yet I’m up a few / down a few lbs all the fricking time. We recently came home from a week away in a villa, same diet, same exercise and whilst I’d gained a chunk he stayed exactly the same. Sometimes life just isn’t fair.

OP, if you’ve been low carbing recently and have eaten pizza and other carby stuff this week then most of that 7lbs will just be water weight which will disappear quickly as soon as you low carb again. You haven’t gained 7lbs of fat - possibly 1 or 2 at most.

Heavy weights - best to get a trainer to start you off and get your technique right but yes you can absolutely use the free weights section 💪

OP - if you were on keto you'll have run down the glycogen (carb) stores in your muscles. When you topped them off again with the pizza and cake, you'll have dragged a whole lot of water in there as well. Which is fine, but it's why the scales have shot up, I bet it's not fat at all.

🤣🤣

Body pump is a good intro to weight training. I love it

At 60 I've changed my life and weight by educating myself about UPF . If you're interested look for Chris Van Tulleken podcasts or his book Ultra Processed People . Calories / low fat / Rosemary Conelly stuff has been sold to us for years and we're only getting fatter . TBH I'm just sad that I took till now to find this out , and angry of course about fantastically wealthy companies knowing the facts and deceiving us

Is your DH a lot taller than you OP?

It's massively frustrating but the reality is that men are generally taller and have more muscle than women so need a lot more calories every day to maintain weight

There are loads of online videos for dumbells. I actually found it easier to have dumbells at home as I can just pick them up when I have time. Start with basics
Lateral raise 3 sets of 8
Bicep curl 3 sets of 8
Hammer curl 3 sets of 8
Shoulder press 3 sets of 8
Overhead tricep dip 3 sets of 8
Goblet squat 3 sets of 8
Bentover rows 3 sets of 8
RDL 3 sets of 8

Use the heaviest weight that you can to complete the 3 sets. If you can complete any of the above at a certain weight without feeling like it's a struggle move up to a slightly heavier weight for that exercise. Every time you can consistently do 8-12 reps x 3 and it doesn't feel like you are working hard move up to the next weight. The last couple of reps should really feel like you can't go any further. The above is called progressive overload
You can add in other exercises there is loads of stuff online.

Do some cardio as well, walk fast, jg, run, do a few sessions on a stationary bike, whatever you prefer.

Make sure that you are feeding your body well in order to help build and retain muscle. Lean protein from fish, chicken, some red meat, pulses etc.
Dairy such as natural or Greek yogurt, cheese and milk.
Good fats from avocado, olive oil nuts and seeds, oily fish such as salmon trout and mackerel.
Plenty of veg and some fruit. Veg should outweigh the fruit though. Aim for 30 different plant based items a week from veg, fruit, seeds, nuts, pulses etc.
Good nutrition is important to building muscle.

@SnapdragonToadflax It’s a shame there aren’t any women using the weights room in your gym 😔 Weight training has become a lot more popular with women recently so in many gyms you will see women using the heavy weights as well as men.

I would check your local fitness facilities to see if any of them offer women-only weights sessions- lots do. But if not- yes, use the weights area anyway- don’t let the men hog it! If you’re not sure about technique, there are probably lots of YouTube tutorials showing some of the basic lifts. If you could afford a one-off session with a PT, that could be well worth the money as they can show you a range of exercises and how to do them safely. Deadlifts with a heavy bar will work multiple muscles, and will get your heart working hard.

I prefer using free weights to weight machines but the machines are good enough if that’s what you feel more comfortable with. I would aim for 3 sets of 8-12 reps on each exercise. And remember it needs to feel hard- so that by the time you get on to the final few reps, you have to push yourself very hard to complete the set. If it feels too easy, it won’t do much for you.

As a PP said, Bodypump is a good introduction to some different weights exercises. BP involves using light weights for lots of reps so as to build muscular endurance. If you also want to increase your muscle mass, you can then do the same exercises in the gym but with heavier weights and fewer reps.

People are even more miserable when they're overweight lethargic and can't fit into their clothes plus the poor health that comes with it all. It's blood tough.

Agree with food intake rather than excercise is key to weight loss.
A poster once here said "you get skinny in your kitchen and fit in the gym". It's now my mantra. And I train with a PT twice a week and on training days I eat more protein which means more calsbut it doesn't mean I eat what I want.

I do a mixture of both free weights and machines.
Get yourself a good pt who you feel comfortable with. I did a 10 week course with a women pt to start with. I didn't feel particularly comfortable with any of the pts at my gym so I went for one who had a home gym. I was very clear I didn't want to weigh myself, just focus on strength.
I know feel pretty confident to do most of the things in the free weight area. Once you do it a few times it's fine.
Feeling comfortable with the pt is really important, my pt was a mum and understood I couldn't be in the gym daily.

@SnapdragonToadflax I do mine at home using Caroline Girvan videos. It is easy to fit in a 30 minute session 5 days a week if you don't have to worry about travelling to a gym. I started with just 2 sets of dumbbells and a yoga mat and gradually built up over time.

Women need to build and maintain their muscle mass to keep their metabolism up, particularly as we have hormonal, lifestyle and cultural difficulties compared to men, so many women have poorer muscle mass in their youth (particularly generations affected by low calorie diets, a fear of "bulking up", a lack of protein and years of chasing very lean body images).

The natural trend is for muscle mass to decline from middle-age, but that can be stalled and maintained, or reversed.

More muscle means your body requires more calories to sustain itself and therefore easier to eat a "normal" and pleasurable amount of food. As a short woman, this means a lot to me, because my basic daily requirement looks like someone else's tedious low calorie diet plan.

And yes, it's bloody annoying living with a tall man. Mine comes back from tinkering in the gym boasting that he's done this and that and it's the equivilent of me running a half marathon.

The good news is that strength work is relatively easy to fit in in short sessions and also easy to upgrade with heavier weights as you progress. It doesn't have to be a big time suck.

Thyroid issues don't apply to me but the NHS threshold for medication is way out of synch with many other countries and so many women suffer for that with the wider impact on their general health.

Food is such a wonderful thing to experience and to cut out so many things is so difficult

It is! Don’t cut things out, add them. Add more protein, add more veg and fiber and fermented food, eat raw veg and vinegar before carbs to prevent blood sugar spikes. Add Greek yogurt and berries to your chocolate cake, fibre fat and protein keep you full and satisfied. Check out Zoe nutrition, the glucose goddess and Intuitive Eating.