To hate being overweight but not do a diet I know will work?

[ChristmasPudding83]

I am 40, 2 children, size 16 (or 16-18 if I’m really honest), 13 to 13 1/2 stone, BMI on the borderline between overweight and obese. I hate the idea I’m obese, I hate the way my body looks, hate photos of myself, hate my clothes feeling tight, hate the added strain on my joints, hate the added weight on my face. But I don’t know how reasonable this is….i know lots of other people this size or bigger that I think look great and my OH claims he finds me attractive at any size. I believe in body positivity and that size doesn’t determine worth….and yet!!!

My weight has fluctuated throughout my adult life, but mostly I’ve been size 12-14 and around 11 stone and I definitely felt better and healthier at that size. I’ve found it harder to shift weight after having the children though and have been sitting around this heavier weight for about a year and a half. I do eat healthily on the whole and cook from scratch most evenings but snack too much/ stress eat/ get takeaways sometimes too and with young kids and a busy and sometimes pressured job I find it hard to eat perfectly.

Previously I’ve managed my weight on many occasions with Weight Watchers - it does ‘work’ for me - on my best run I lost 3 stone (13 stone to 10 stone) but I’ve lost a stone doing it on many, many occasions over the past 15 plus years. I eat quite healthily on it and don’t find it that hard to stick to for a while, but I hate paying money to a company which I feel is fundamentally exploitative. Also I find the level of control needed to stick to it becomes oppressive after a while and it often starts to trigger disordered eating patterns from the past (excessive control, binge eating and binge-purge) though I am usually able to spot the signs and stop in time.

I have always liked exercise and being active - this month I’ve run 25-30 mins every day and I usually run a few times a week, did the London marathon last year, cycle most days, have an active job etc. however while this helps me mental health and fitness it does not lead to weight loss.

What I can’t figure out is what to do next. I really don’t like being this size and as I know WeightWatchers will probably work (at least for a month or two), I suspect it is unreasonable not to just do it for a few months and lose some weight at least.

However the other side of me thinks I should be trying to get out of this toxic dieting cycle and finding another way either to accept my body or lose weight in a way that doesn’t involve such strict food monitoring (but I have never found one that worked)

YABU - suck it up and go on the diet
YANBU - dieting isn’t the answer here (but if so, what is????)

Help! I feel so stuck with this situation and negative feelings and have 4 year old daughter who I really want to be a better role model for :-(

But Weight Watchers doesn’t work…it’s very very easy to lose weight for a short period of time. That doesn’t constitute a diet working. It’s only works if you keep the weight off. The only way to keep the weight off is to do something that is sustainable for you and WW clearly isn’t (& isn’t for most people/anyone).

Eat 1g of protein per lb you “should” weigh. Use the Schofield Equation to work out how many calories you actually burn in a day. I burn 2200 so I eat at 2000 to lose weight. You might be surprised by how much you can eat and lose weight, all be it slowly and surely.

Please, please don’t eat 1,200 to 1,600 calories a day. Those are toddler calories and you won’t maintain them for any length of time. Most people can eat just under 2,000 or even over 2,000 and lose weight. It’s a lie that people put on weight by eating just over 2,000 calories. You regularly have to be eating much more than that to put on weight.

Give the maintenance phase podcast a listen too if podcasts are your thing. They have an episode of WW and the “2,000 calories a day” myth.

I've tried my fitness pal on and off for years and actually found it really difficult and could never stick to it, I could see I was eating too many calories but found it hard to know where to make the changes and eventually would give up with little loss.

I reluctantly started slimming world in July as my area offers a free 12 week program and I've lost just over 2 stone. I've never managed that before.

I know people slate slimming world for 'syns' etc, but I was/am fat and I've not got here from eating healthily.

Find something that's sustainable, that you can do forever. You need a lifestyle change not a short diet and then return to previous eating habits.

This really is the answer. I've tried numerous diets and ways of eating, the only way I've managed to lose sensibly and keep it off is to change my relationship with food. I now mainly eat three meals a day, sensible portion sizes and I don't snack mindlessly unless I'm hungry; if i am, I'll have something fairly healthy or if it isn't healthy, around 250kcal.

I try and have around 3-400 kcals for breakfast, 500 ish for lunch and 500 ish for dinner. It works. I also make sure I do 10k steps a day. It doesn't need to be 10k, if you're already doing more than that then keep up what you're doing. But for those of us who are inactive, 10k steps a day gets me an extra hour of walking in per day.

Obviously the calorie thing differs for everyone, some may need more, some less.

OP I lost weight about 15 years ago with weight watchers and have kept most of it bar about 10lb, and that comes and goes. At the moment I’m very close to my original goal.

However I rejoined recently after I had a baby and while it did work for a while, the plan changed and went from being very sustainable for me to being what I felt was too restrictive. If you don’t want to eat chicken or eggs I found there wasn’t a lot left to make a diverse range of meals out of, especially not if you are trying to feed a family too. I also observed the ‘last supper’ mentality creeping in and lots of unhealthy behaviours about the number on the scales and a strong binge urge whenever I wasn’t ’on plan’. I thought about food every waking moment, what points things were, what I could and couldn’t have.

So I cancelled my membership and upped my activity. Now I must say I’m not actively trying to lose much, just a few pounds to be closer to goal. I have found I’ve been able to reduce binge urges and definitely do not spend as much time thinking about food which I think will be healthier in the long term.

I found the feelgooddietician on Instagram really helpful for unpacking the diet mindset and neutralising your relationship with food.

I think it’s telling that weight watchers is pivoting slowly towards normalising weight loss medication rather than simply repeating that it’s all a matter of following the science in the plan. Oprah is an example of this, all her resources, chefs etc and financial investment in weight watchers and she is using weight loss medication.

I personally find calorie counting to be as triggering and it feels as restrictive as weight watchers as it means I constantly think about food and what I can and can’t have.

Can you tell I have a lot of thoughts about this topic? 😄

Highly recommend the book intuitive eating. Take a week to nail each principle. Massive game changer.

I'm sure I'll get shouted down for this but I did the 1:1 diet. I lost 3 stone pretty quickly and have kept it off. It's the plan used by researchers to reverse type 2 diabetes (which I did not have btw but I liked the idea that it was tried and tested).
I tried WW, SW, intermittent fasting etc but I found what motivated me was quick weight loss, no faffing about. This will be different for others of course. It was the opposite of what I thought would work for me as I'm a good cook and love food. But I found that ultimately what motivated me was seeing the weight loss, fast - rather than fannying around with -1lb a week!

Same with intermittent fasting I lost two stone oct - feb. Very motivating as it was really noticeable. Bmi from 27 to 21.

Remember seeing a friend I didn’t see much who just said “your bottom! It’s….gone!”

This may or may not apply to you, but I've found it helpful:

One way that can help change eating patterns, although it will take time to build the habit, is to spend time on being really aware of your body and how it's feeling, and your internal emotional landscape.

Mostly, when we over-eat, it's for psychological/emotional reasons, rather than actual physical hunger, or simply because of lack of awareness and focus on our body's cues.

So: step 1: I ask myself "Am I really hungry right now, or am I wanting to eat / eating because I'm tired, stressed, bored, feeling empty, from habit etc?" Can I learn to question my feelings and notice the difference between these? If I discover there is actually another issue, how can I address it other than by comforting or numbing myself with food? Is there something else I could do to comfort or distract myself, or to resolve the feelings I'm having?

Also whether you drink enough fluids - having a (low calorie, healthy) drink and waiting 20 mins to see if you're still feeling hungry can often be useful.

Step 2: if I discover I really am hungry, I'm going to eat, whatever I like, within reason, and I'm going to give it my full attention.

There are plenty of studies that show that eating mindfully causes a 20% decrease in calories eaten, simply through the enhanced awareness given to eating, and with no sensation of lack or loss.

I don't like the word mindful very much, think it's much overused as a panacea, but all it means is that when you eat, you slow right down & focus on nothing but eating: how does it taste, what is the texture, what is the temperature, how does it change as you chew it etc?

So: I think about what I want to eat. I prepare that, and I put it on a plate or similar. So I have a reasonable portion size. I don't eat on the go or from the packet, because then it's easy to just keep eating until the pack is empty.

I sit down at a table if at all possible, and I take my time with eating. I focus on each bite I take, fully appreciating the flavours and textures. I don't take the next bite until I've fully appreciated this one. I don't watch TV or scroll on my phone or do anything else while I'm eating, because then I will be distracted and I won't be as aware of my body's cues about hunger and fullness. I just concentrate on the experience of eating. I eat until I feel about 80% full, and then I stop, because I know my body is still processing what I've just eaten, and the signals about fullness take a while to catch up.

If I feel genuinely hungry again later, I'll let myself eat after at least 30 mins have gone by, and I'll just repeat step 2.

Although this takes a little longer to do, it's super simple, doesn't require any calorie counting, helps me get in tune with my body, and doesn't have any "bad" or forbidden foods. I won't feel hungry, I won't feel restricted, but it has still helped me lose weight, and keep it off.

And if it's too much to do at every meal, try to do one per day, or several per week - it all contributes to building the new mental muscles and bodily habits, and once you've started a change, it's easier to take a second step down that path.

I also do intermittent fasting, but that has actually just been a side effect of the above, because I realised that I was truly hungry much less often than 3x day, so now I just eat when I'm truly hungry, and don't stick to set mealtimes, unless I'm being social, in which case I'll try to set up my day to accommodate the socialising!

Best of luck!

Do the diabetes Uk diet on their website I lost 10kg

Another recommendation for My Fitness Pal.
I'd add some resistance training for fat burning to complement your cardio

And drink 2 litres of water throughout the day. We often eat when we are actually dehydrated
I've just bought a 2 litre bottle to keep me on track

I honestly believe its not what you eat but how much. If you start cutting out food groups when you add them in you'll yo yo and gain the wait again.

1. Never eat between meals and let your body feel hungry for a while. Its crazy how much snacks including healthy snacks like nuts add to your calories intake.
2. Portion control. This is critical, you need to eat less than the amount of energy you burn to lose weight.
3. Exercise helps but not as important as portion control.
4. Reduce your sugar intake. Sugar spikes your glucose levels making you feel hungrier quicker. If you like sugar eat it with a main meal but don't have a desert at every meal, have it as a treat once or twice a week, say weekends only for example.
5. When it comes to main meals eat veg then starch then meat. The greens are healthier so fill up on these first. They also get your digestive system working ready for when you come to the meats which are harder to digest.

Good luck :)

That’s a worry surely 🤔

I’ve struggled with weight since my teens. Up and down. Tried everything. The only thing that worked for me is to remove flour and sugar from my diet and replace large portions of carbs with a smaller one, plus a portion of green veg and a big salad alongside healthy protein and oil. Basically keeping food really simple. It’s filling and consistent and loving. And it works.

inwent from 15.5 stone to 11 stone in a year. I have a couple more stone to go ( I am 5ft 2 and 45)

It doesn't work though, does it? You lose a stone or three - then put it back on, "many, many times" according to your OP. That isn't a program that works. If you're going to keep trying to lose it, it needs to be by doing something you can stick too. Otherwise you'll just be back here in a year or two. And there's just no point, given how miserable (and borderline dangerous) it sounds.

Please can I ask advice re MyFitnessPal? How do you log things if you make everything from scratch? Literally add every ingredient each day? Isn't it hugely time-consuming?
Thanks.

Diets don’t work long term if they rely on you using willpower to avoid what you “really” want to do because you only live once so you will do what you want to do eventually! You might be better pursuing something that reduces your appetite like ozempic

You can store your own recipes so if you make things the same way or batch cook you only have to enter the individual ingredients once

Saxenda (private) - took away any cravings for alcohol even in late 2022 popped to supermarket one night Christmas 22 for a bottle of wine came home with 2 pint of skimmed milk. Sadly good old Sax wasn’t to last

Inside 6 months Saxenda came off the menu for Ozempic which cost more money. . . Surprise surprise

I cannot say the same for Trulicity - burns a pound, puts half a pound on.

Went go my GP surgery who put me on capped diabetic brand of Saxenda who said said I should think about people on weight management up hospital left high and dry. (apparently unsure why I’m subjected to posts on ppl tier 3 who can get Saxenda)

attended hospital appt 30th November 2023 who proceed to ask why I couldn’t get injections so forgive me some one is lying.

Another vote for intermittent fasting. I've struggled with weight for years.
That and focusing on proper, high fat foods and I feel like my ability to properly manage my weight has just slipped into place. I'd recommend reading about it if you're unsure.

Try Slimpod, it gets you out of that whole diet food shame cycle.

Nutracheck is far better than MyFitnessPal.

OP you either need to accept you are one of those (many) people, like myself, who will need to keep an eye on calories for the rest of your life if you want to stay slim. Or, if you don’t want to do that, work on accepting yourself how you are. But you are being unreasonable if you do neither and just keep moaning/being miserable about your weight, IMHO. And FWIW you don’t even sound that big.

seems that nutracheck is subscription only? myfitnesspal is excellent and free.