Morbidly obese and Chronic illness - how to start?

[Valerrie]

Hi, I'm looking for some advice please.

I'm morbidly obese with a BMI of about 46. I'm 5ft1 and I weigh 17.5 stone. I struggle with my weight due to eating crap, comfort eating, convenience eating due to disabilities and no exercise.

I have fibromyalgia and a spinal injury, osteoarthritis all over, cervical spondylosis, Peri-menopausal, celiac and ibs. I'm 35

I know I need to change my diet. Due to the fact that I'm in bed most of the time, I find it too hard to go downstairs, stand and make food. This means I'm eating sugary cereal for breakfast, a sandwich my husband leaves me with crisps and chocolate, a couple of pieces of food and then a takeaway or something that can be oven cooked quickly for tea like gf nuggets and chips, steak and mash, ready meals etc. My husband is ill himself and works full time so can't spend much time cooking.

I'm now finding it difficult to just move the minimal amount. If I go downstairs and walk back up I'm incredibly breathless and my heart races and pounds. Even walking to the bathroom leaves me breathless.

I really want to tackle my problems but I don't know how. I have severe health anxiety so can't see a GP because I can't leave the house. My blood pressure is fine. If I start moving around and I feel my pulse elevate I have panic attacks. I'm limited to what I can do because of neck and spine pain and knee pain.

I'm so, so miserable and scared. I can't seem to get a grip and make healthy food choices but then we never have healthy food here. My husband does the shopping and he's underweight so buys junk. DD eats healthily but is starting to notice my poor choices.

What can I do? I've spent the morning in a state of extreme panic because I walked up the stairs and I thought my heart was coming out of my chest.

Sorry that took such a long time to write I didn't see you were already in touch with your GP op! I would still try and pressure them for a bit more help though as you sound overwhelmed with it all and CBT (not yet delivered) doesn't sound sufficient. Good luck op!

It sounds as though you need to be tested urgently for diabetes. If you can't leave the house, could you order an online test?

I had six sessions of CBT through work, but the man doing it was used to work stress CBT and as mine is severe panic and health anxiety he couldn't do much. It wasn't successful.

I ordered a blood sugar monitor and the pee on a stick things which were all normal. I am concerned I'm maybe pre-diabetes though because of the crashes. It doesn't happen all the time but I've noticed if I eat sugary cereal for breakfast it's more likely to happen at lunchtime. Or if I go more than about 3 hours without anything to eat.

OK, I have no idea how I'm going to do this all on my own but I'm going to throw the chocolate and crisps on top of the wardrobe so I can't reach it.

DD is 9.

If your GP receptionists are unhelpful could you access help from a mental health charity or local charity who could access some help on your behalf?

I've tried with Mind but I'm rural Wales and they don't offer those services in my area :(

I didn't realise how poor mental health support was until it was me needing it. It's very sad and although I'm housebound with it, I'm not suicidal so I'm low risk.

OP, as others have said, you are addicted to sugar and carbs generally. You can break this addiction but it requires a lot of willpower. I would suggest looking into the Paleo diet or Whole 30. Right now your body is craving sugar/simple carb fixes for energy and you will have to re-train it to use other kinds of nutrients instead like good fats and proteins. This can take a couple of months or more of cutting carbs right down to achieve. Take a look at a forum called Mark's Daily Apple. There are plenty of people on there, who used to be obese, who have lost a lot of weight. But it is far from an easy solution.

First things first, the junk cannot come into the house. Secondly, if you have issues with willpower, it would be worth visiting a counsellor to get to the root of your particular food addiction issues. My MIL is morbidly obese and in her 70's and we have seen the effects of this, as she has aged. I really would implore you to do something about this now as it gets much harder later on.

Sounds like you're really in trouble with your sugar yo-yoing. I've been there. You need to really focus on low GI foods, plenty of protein and fibre, as little sugar as possible. Believe me, it will be worth it and you'll feel much better.
But, your husband is enabling you, for whatever reason, and that really needs to stop!

Thank you, just been looking at low GI foods. I've just had some pre-cooked chicken breasts and pistachio nuts for lunch and a banana.

I need to do this. I just messaged DH to ask him to pick up fruit and nuts and popcorn. I'm going to spend the afternoon trying to think of easy cook meals and lunches.

I asked DH not to buy me chocolate any more and he said I make his life a misery if he doesn't and it's not worth the stress. I am a brat sometimes and have cried because there's been no chocolate in the house.

I'm a dick. I can't believe I've let myself get this bad. Part of me wants to give up already because I have no willpower whatsoever. This is going to be so hard.

Choose your hard varlerie

Being obese is hard.....losing weight is hard

You can do this!! Small changes.... make some easy to reach goals

If you are ceoliac are you eating GF cereals and bread?

You're husband sounds like he's a big part of the problem.

Have a look at BIWIs low carb threads for ideas of what to eat, it would suit a ceoliac diet and stabilise blood sugar.

I genuinely empathise a lot with you. The morbid obesity, osteoarthritis and anxiety are all me too.

Please stop making excuses though - if you can afford take always you can afford to do an online shop.

For me, in the last few months I've totally changed what and how I eat. I've given op caffeine, chocolate, sweets, crisps and takeaways completely. Trying to be sensible with them just doesn't work for me. I plan on cutting out biscuits next - I don't have them often but I do eat one out the drawer without thinking sometimes and that's not good.

Also do you think getting up and going downstairs during the day might help? Might it be good for your dd too?

Anxiety is shit and I haven't mastered it completely but I have learnt that avoiding things that make me anxious don't help. It just makes them grown bigger and bigger and cause more problems.

if you are ceoliac are you eating GF cereals and bread

Yes, everything I eat is gluten free and mostly dairy free too apart from chocolate.

if you can afford take always you can afford to do an online shop

Very true.

Thank you - I can do SW for about a month and then I just give up, binge and go back to normal. I don't know what's wrong with me but I've never had willpower. I don't drink anything other than water, don't touch alcohol, no caffeine. It's just food.

I do try and go downstairs when I can, the only thing is, my bathroom is upstairs so on the days when I'm in the wheelchair I can't go down in case I need the toilet. We're waiting for an adapted bungalow to become available so hopefully that will help one day.

When I can though, I do go downstairs. I used to be terrified of leaving my bedroom in case I collapsed, but I seem to be past that now and downstairs is doable.

Can I recommend My Fitness Pal the website? You can do it at the same time as SW. you have to tell it everything that you eat, and just by doing that you become a bit more responsible with your diet.

You also pick up friends on the site who help to keep you on track (after the month when you say you normally give up).

There's a bunch of MNetters on there giving support as well!

Could you take up knitting or crochet to distract you from thinking about food?
Look at doing meal planning and easy recipes for DH - do you have a slow cooker (use cheaper cuts of meat or look up vegetarian meals) so that he could put it on in the morning with a stew and just cook vegetables / jacket potatoes when he gets home?
Fill up on vegetables like cabbage, cauliflower and broccoli, swede and sweet potatoes are great (you can bake sweet potatoes), or baketrays of peppers/tomatoes/courgette/onion/carrots 😋
If you get hungry between meals drink a pint of water and wait 30 minutes, if still hungry have an apple.

What do you do all day, if you're almost bed-bound? How are you spending your time? You must be bored witless.

I do have a slow cooker, I need to try using it more. I like all fruit and veg so roasting etc is an idea, thanks.

I already crochet! I love it and it keeps me busy, only thing is it really sets off my neck and shoulder so I can't do it every day.

I am bored witless. On very bad pain days I mainly cry, feel sorry for myself and endlessly rotate between three social media apps.

On better days I crochet, paint, watch TV, read. I try and do as much housework as I can depending on how much pain I'm in. I can sometimes manage dusting, folding laundry, pairing socks. It's a miserable existence.

How use slow cooker if OP can barely get downstairs.

Do you ever go outside - has anyone checked your vitamin D levels or do you take a Vit. D supplement?

Hi OP check out rebelfit on Facebook. There are lots of us who are big but the chap who runs it really understands. There are daily workouts but they can all be done at home and they start v gradual.

He educates about nutrition too.

Also, have you tried mindfulness? The headspace app is very good.

My DH could put quick things in the slow cooker like a chicken or a ham.

I have not been outside for about two months. No, I don't take vitamin D - I'll have to get some.

Thanks I'll have a look at that group on Facebook! I did the free trial of Headspace and enjoyed it, but I can't afford to buy it at the moment unfortunately. Perhaps in the new year when I don't have to worry about Christmas presents :)

That sounds like a tough place to be in Please pop over to the lose 100lbs thread when you have a minute and have a read. We're all at various stages now as the threads have been going for nearly a year now, you're very welcome to join us. We all understand that horrible feeling of looking at the scales and thinking how on earth am I ever going to lose all that.

It's not going to be easy but as someone said, chose your hard. Peri menopause is a steaming pile of shit but improving your diet will hopefully ease up some of the symptoms in time. Lower GI food will help and the one about a smaller plate and eating slowly does help. Don't try to change everything all at once and accept there will be moments when things don't go to plan. That's ok, the important thing is to keep at it, just take it one day at a time for now. If you have a tape measure take your measurements, good to look back at and helpful for the times the scales don't move but you lose inches.

Don't worry about exercise for the moment. Do what you feel able, for now food is the main issue and you can make a big difference through this. Success breeds success with this . Get one day under your belt then move onto the next, they add up - just like losing 'only' 1lb a week is about 4 stone a year . The great thing about the Internet is you don't need to do this on your own there are people to help you through it and you can do it. You said that you were scared of leaving your room but you have over come that which shows you can make a difference and do things.

Can you get a foot cycling thing? They are fairly cheap. Can do it when sitting down.

Baby steps.

Good luck op, you can do it. You are already taking first steps by posting here.

Stop beating yourself up, you are carrying so much guilt and low self esteem. You can't change the past, you can't change the fact that you got to this point. You can change this moment right now. Concentrate on that. Don't worry about the big plans. What small action can you do now to help yourself?

Good luck, don't be so hard on yourself. You can do this

From what you've said about crashes if you've not eaten, I'd get your blood checked for diabetes. It's highly likely given your lifestyle/weight and believe me, medication will make a huge difference if it is diabetes. I've lost nearly 4 stone since being on Metformin to stimulate my pancreas and I don't get the crazy never ending food binges where you are never full. It's changed my life OP, but whatever you do, stop eating sugar. It's killing you.

Thank you so much everyone. I can't get blood tests. I need hormone ones, thyroid ones and sugar ones but I can't leave my house, let alone go to a hospital. Anything medical I have a severe phobia of. The GP knows this and said I need to have some CBT before I even think about trying to have blood tests, although the waiting lists are so long.

I've checked my own blood sugar first thing in the morning and it was fine. I haven't got any test strips left now.

I need to try and give up sugar but won't that cause me to be ill?

Yesterday I had plain chicken, low fat air fried chips and spinach for tea, yogurt for a snack instead of chocolate and I've had gluten free oats and a banana this morning.

Well done on making those choices with your food yesterday! Thats a great start It's all about small steps and keeping them going.

If you've checked your blood sugar, its really unlikely there is a problem with it, and that it may be anxiety related so you can apply mindfulness to that feeling like the feeling when you move and your heart rate raises.

How do you feel about watching some mindfulness videos today?