To be a fat bastard and do nothing about it.

[Lizmay12]

So I've put on 3 stone since I had my children. I'm constantly down about it always moaning. Feel absolutely shit about myself. God forbid DP tries to be nice and surprise me with organising a childcare and taking me out. I spoil it whinging about my fat belly and having no clothes to fit me. All this and I do absolutely fuck all to change my lifestyle.
I eat to much shit and moan about being fat.

Yes I am being VFUCKINGU!!!!!! Why can't I change my ways !!!!!

I was a size 20-22, never been that large before. I was finding that nice clothes didn't go any larger than an 18. My husband started running a couple of years ago, and rather than joining him, It made me more determined that I didn't want to get fit myself. It was because I couldn't face up to the big lump I had become, so I put up a barrier I guess. Anyway, i finally got some oomph and I lost some weight for my friend's birthday party, and it had the knock on effect of making me think perhaps I could try running, if I could manage to lose weight. I started off badly, out of breath in a few yards. But I persevered and found my own pace, and started to get a bit further over the weeks. I did a sponsored fun 5k run in London earlier on this year, and can now run 8.75k without stopping. I'm entered into the Brighton 10k next year. I can only really run on the flat at the moment, but I'll hopefully be able to get used to gradients at some point. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make, is that I was very unfit and had no motivation, and now I can't believe I was that person. The health benefits are great. I don't get backache, I've lost weight, I feel fresh. I'm overweight still, and could do with losing a lot round my middle, but hopefully that will go. I'm 51 and so it's never too late.

I use the scanner on MFP - you scan in the bar codes of any food and it automatically uploads the nutritional information. Some of my friends don't use it but I think it's brilliant.

MFP and the scanner is all well and good if you eat a lot of packaged food but it is a lot off faff if most of your meals are cooked from fresh ingredients and for every meal you have to enter all the raw ingredients and work out what fraction of the whole recipe you actually ate.

Fanofjapan,
That's amazing. Well done on the weight loss and fitness. Thanks for posting it really does help me take this seriously for the first time.

I cook nearly all my meals from scratch and still use the scanner for most of it as I tend to get my ingredients from supermarkets. It wasn't a faff. It wouldn't be useful if you were growing your own or if you buy from markets though.

I also put in my favourite recipes and it work out how many calories per portion for you plus other nutritional info.

Well done to you for starting to be more healthy!!

My tips would be...

Do not buy any crap in the supermarket, so it's not in the house.

Find a time which suits you for a bit of exercise and stick to it.

MFP is brilliant for giving you an idea of what you're actually eating. Some of it is pretty shocking! But it educates you.

lose weight slowly, it's the healthiest way and you'll keep it off.

If you have "bad days" don't worry, you're only human. Just get back on to it the next day.

Good luck!

MFP and the scanner is all well and good if you eat a lot of packaged food but it is a lot off faff if most of your meals are cooked from fresh ingredients

Yes, it's faffy at first. As someone who always cooks fresh and eats nothing from a packet (ok, I eat butter, milk, dried pasta etc, but you get the idea) I had to do a lot of faffing around when I started MFP.

But you can save all your meals in "my foods" so if you eat the same thing again it's already there just to put in.

I had to make some lifestyle changes (quite big ones)...

Told myself I didn't want to me a shitty role model for my future children and that if I didn't sort myself out now I'd be not only leading myself to an early grave but them too.

Harsh but worked for me.

Www.eatingless.com

Not another diet, but a look at the links between eating and self esteem. When we treat ourselves well, including eating well, is when we start to feel better about ourselves, in a good spiral.

This worked for me, in combination with low carb eating ( lots of lower carb vegetables with enough fat and protein to make them palatable). The first few days of avoiding sugar and starchy carbs were horrible, i was honestly craving sugar. Showed me just how addicted i was to that sugar high. Now if i am tempted by a piece if birthday cake, say, i can honestly say the moments high is just not worth going through withdrawal again. Its good for the rest of the family too.

The low carb bootcamp on these boards (hattip BIWI and everyone over there) are a tremendous support and got me eating delicious things which really are good for me. Would love to to feel better too.

Thankyou Finally

Hi I was thinking about you earlier and I wanted to suggest online shopping. You can do a bit and come back to in, double check your shopping basket before you pay without feeling embarrassed, and it saves your favourite so you don't have to go back through the aisles every time with all the different temptations and advertisements.

A 1 mile run burns approx 100 calories.

Think about this before you eat any naughties.

Lizmay

A few thoughts.

• you've got small kids and are sleep deprived. You're in the trenches. My youngest has just started school and it is so much easier to be healthy and keep fit once you are not in 24/7 survival mode, as you currently are! Your body and mind are under a lot of challenge at the mo - this will lessen as your kids grow.

• just eat three times a day - decent brek, decent lunch, decent supper. Don't cut out carbs but don't have loads. Eg If you're having curry have a fist of rice and lots of curry sauce. If you get really starving, wait for a bit, and then if you really really are hungry, then have a handful of nuts and a piece of fruit. It can help to fix a time. I've started having lunch at the same time everyday - am usually hungry 45 mins before but I just hang on and say "lunch soon" (like when I was a kid!)

• just eat loads of really good food - meat, veg, fruit, make your own wholemeal bread, eat lots of eggs and natural yoghurt. Don't try to eat "low fat" but try to be "low sugar" instead. Brown rice, and wholemeal pasta (latter might be an ask too far but brown rice is lovely!)

• Just drink water and one coffee and a couple of cups of tea a day. No rubbishy fruit juice or fizz. You just don't need it.

• Exercising. Doesn't have to be a mega run or gym session. Walking with a buggy counts and if you walked 45 mins a day you would be getting fit, esp if there are some hills and you can keep the pace up. Fitbits are brilliant for tracking and if you hit 10k steps a day you feel great (and its not hard to do running around after kids all day). Just cos you haven't been to the gym doesn't mean you haven't been active.

• If you e.g. go for a run, you need to feed and water your body afterwards, or you'll feel dizzy and starving and running next time will be harder as you'll be more sore and stiff. I usually have plenty of water and some oatcakes with peanut butter. Make sure you warm down too and do at least 10 mins stretching, so that you won't be injured for the next time .

• don't go mad with the exercise. Leave at least one free day between each run and try to just walk on your free day. Otherwise you'll get tired sore and starving. Once you have got a basic level of fitness you can up the ante.

• Winters coming - think about investing in an exercise DVD - half an hour a day in your own house. Then running next spring when the weather gets better - eg C25k or 10k trainer?

• fitness is something that you build slowly over a long time. I started C25k when my kids were about the age of yours. I then trained for the Great North Run (nearly killed me!). Then I had a another few months of running and then did an exercise DVD last winter. Started running again this spring and my fitness is way better than it was two or three years ago, just through slow and steady keeping at at (with several weeks of falling off the programme!)

• if you aren't already aware, read about sugar and the fact that it is a poison. Robert Lustig is the main author and You Tube video person who explains it all. Eating sugar (in biochemistry terms) is really just like drinking alcohol - in terms of how the body is able (or rather unable!) to metabolise it in a useful non-damaging way .

Good luck!

you could be a fat bastard who's miserable to a fat bastard who wants to do stuff.

Is there anything fun and physical you want to do? Might be worth focusing on fitness and strength first if you want to do something as a goal rather than on just weight. You might still be overweight but be someone who's buff and kicks ass instead!

Liz And that's what you need to keep doing. Every other day or every day. Get your arse out of bed and MOVE. Be it a run or fast walk or a jog. Whatever. Aim to get to 5K. Don't sweat about time or distance for now. The most important thing is to keep moving. And everything else will slowly fall in line. You'll come back. Feel good. You'll think about eating a bit more healthier. I do the halves trick. Yes I want that cupcake with the buttercream icing. But I'll cut in half and put rest in fridge for tomorrow. I won't deny myself. I've worked hard this morning so I deserve it. What you don't want to do - is go overboard. Moderate your intake and MOVE - all the time, every day if you can. Good luck!!

Final thought - losing weight is about diet (note I say "diet" rather than "a diet"), but feeling mentally well enough and energetic enough to both manage young children and enjoy a healthy diet without needing loads of sugary "treats" (not treats really as they make you feel shit in the long run) is about exercise.

If historically you haven't exercised regularly and now start to, then your brain will be learning neurologically to adjust to a new hormonal situation - once you start to exercise regularly I think the brain starts to set up a positive reward feedback loop, the brain starts to look forward to the post-exercise high and it becomes much less hard to drag yourself to doing something active. Of course the fitter you get the more enjoyable eg running is, too.

I think sporty people find it easy to remain sporty because of this, their brain chemistry helps them along.

I'm doing training for an event at the mo and I have been exercising a lot. I'm in a permanent state of zinginess (even on the days I'm not training). Its so different to March-June this year when I just couldn't be arsed to do anything and was grumpy and tired most of the time.

Lizmay - some online shops can be delivered for as little as £1 round my way (south east - sainsbo) or do click and collect if charges too much.

Eggs. Eggs eggs eggs are KEY to weightloss. Don't worry about the "cholesterol" - eating high cholesterol food doesn't give you high cholesterol. Anyway, hard boil eggs and keep them in the fridge. These were amazing when I was losing weight. I still like to mush them up in a cup with a little bit of salted butter (really) and eat as a snack mid morning. Spanish Omelettes for dinner, scrambled for breakfast. I get through 3-4 eggs a day.

I'd absolutely recommend that you Read "pure white and deadly" - it's a book from the 70s about sugar and it changed the way I look at food.

Anyway, here's a standard day of food, as an example:

Breakfast: 2 scrambled eggs, 2 slices ham, 1 slice toast (Vogel bread)

Snack: 1 mushed up egg, celery sticks, low fat Philly

Lunch: handful of chicken pieces, 10 baby tomatoes, slices of cucumber ,1 babybel, 3 oatcakes max (Nairns cheese ones are great - VERY low sugar). humous.

Snack: 1 apple, sliced, with nut butter on slices (if you like it!)

Dinner: Tuna pasta bake, but ratio of Tuna:pasta is 1:1 (for you; the kids can have less tuna more pasta)

You'll want something sweet after dinner. I can only say resist the urge by drinking hot drinks. Vanilla rooibis tea is excellent (I like it with a splash of milk, OH is horrified).

The thing is you can eat most things but the proportions need to be right, and usually when one has put on a load, the portions & proportions have all gone to shit!

Godspeed!

Remember, the best workouts are the ones you actually do.

Definitely agree with reading Pure White and Deadly.

Stop eating before you're full - initially I got into the habit of woking out how many calories were in everything, so I could make sure I had appropriate portions. Usually thes portions felt tiny and I wasn't full afterwards, but if I waited 20 minutes then they sort of 'sunk in' and I wasn't hungry after all. Easy way to reduce the food you eat due to boredom/because it's there!

I think it's about changing your mentality about food rather than going on a diet. Forget diets that force you to obsess over every meal, how many cals etc.....very few people can keep that up.

You need to look at your diet as a long term change. Focus on changing your foods...make your meals veg based, lots of lentils, cut processed meats entirely, limit or cut dairy, replace white bread/pittas/wraps with brown, don't add fattening sauces to your food. No pizza, ready meals or takeaway....

Have dark chocolate instead of milk chocolate (if you need chocolate!!).... Little things to start with. Snack on bananas or nuts.

Once you've changed your foods then you can slowly reduce portion size and the amount of times you eat in the day.

Walk as much as possible. Move as much as you can. Join a gym or buy some Kettlebells or weights and do an exercise video from YouTube....

Focus on healthy. Looking better because your skin is bright....feeling better because you have more energy and feel healthy...You'll be more likely to stick with it and the weight will fall off without having to obsess over it.

Thanks for all the great advice.
I really do think I'm addicted to sugar or carbs I don't know which. Day one and I'm getting a headache and I've had plenty of water.
Online shop sounds like a really good idea.
Discussed my new plan with colleague at work over lunch. She commented at me having a healthy lunch and was all ooooo that's not like you is it

She told me she she really understood my struggle because she felt so fat this weekend when she went out.
I'm not kidding she is 7 stone wet through.

Fellow fat bastard here, just spoke to GP about it who was v kind and said weight loss is approx 80% down to diet and 20% exercise.
I'm making small changes, wine & cheese is where I can make significant changes and I know it. Also learning to enjoy snacking on raw veg & almonds + drinking masses of water. No real change yet but I feel a lot better in myself.
Best of luck!

P.S: I'm also re-descovering soup; so autumnal and lovely and filling.

Wow I didn't realise 80% of it was the food part. Thanks for that I suppose that's why I got into this mess in the first place coz I have no idea about all this.