Hate exercise

[Babysharkdoodoodood]

Just reading a thread on exercise addiction. Just how? I abhor exercise. I go to the gym 3 times a week now do hit classes and just finished week 3 of C25K and I've managed to increase rowing to 1000m. I can't do the Nordic thing or the bike. Working up to tackle them. Some of the other classes look fun but the timings are always wrong for my shifts.

I only started going in July but I'm making sure I go. My bmi is 35!! I'm also eating LCHF and I've lost a couple of kilos.
There's a job I want to go for in a few years and my bmi has to be under 30.

I just hate it so much. I try to make it enjoyable by listening to music. The weights are fine, it's just the cardio. It hurts and it's dull. Hit is ok because it's varied and we use an Omnia multifunction thing. I then go to the spa after to steam out the kinks and aches, which helps.

It's also so time consuming. I'm spending nearly 3 hours when I go. I don't have dependents and DH is supportive as he wants the slimmer me back again.

One positive is that DH walked past me in the street the other day as he didn't recognise my shape from behind.

But I want to enjoy it. Does it eventually happen or will I hate it forever!

"addiction" means they have a mental illness.

How does someone eat themselves into being super morbidly obese.
If you're never truly hungry then you can't ever actually enjoy food.
If you binge then you can't even taste it.

What a waste of food.
Yet mega over-eating is probably a lot more common than exercise addiction.

You sound super disciplined, OP. Don't knock yourself.

The exercise is great to help keep you out of an early grave, so please don't stop. But to really lose weight you probably have to look at the food intake side (sorry). I think there might be lots of support for eating less on MN.

Yeah. I am eating LCHF now. Have T2 diabetes so haven't eaten carbs(many) for a while and have got my blood sugar down to normal range.

It's my flipping tummy though. My exercise app says I am burning fat, but it's sloooooow! DH says I'm looking a bit like an M&M with toned legs and a round body. I guess I'll burn it off faster as I get more muscle mass. I don't even care about the weight that much. I just want to get rid of the fat and build more muscle.

Just wish it was more painless.

I should add that I had breast cancer a few years ago and that's when it all went on. Nothing to do with over-eating, but I did have a few pounds loss when they cut off the left booby. . I'm still on a steroid treatment so it's like pushing water uphill. Every drug I'm on (a lot) has the side effect of weight gain. Grrrr.

I find exercise really, really boring but I did find a hobby that happens to be a great exercise and I am definitely some form of addicted to it. I have lived through marriage to an alcoholic/drug addict, so in truth I'd never badly hurt myself or my loved ones for my hobby. I'm more than capable of realising that I need to skip a session if my knee hurts or prioritise taking my DS on holiday/to another activity even if it means a few weeks off. I have a virus now and have gone days without it because I accept my body needs rest. So I'm not a destructive kind of addict.

However, I long to do my hobby, I've arrange things in my life around getting to do it at least 5 days a week. I want to do it for several hours every day. There is a little part of my brain engaged in it at nearly all times. It makes me feel an utter high on every mental and physical level. I love it, I love what it's done to my body. I feel right and satisfied in a way that I don't think I ever have done. And as someone who went from marriage to an actual addict to single parenthood, I guess it's a very new sensation for me to have something for me. That is a priority for me and me alone and that has made me say, fuck putting everyone else before me all the time. This is mine and I'm doing it. (I actually also share my hobby with DS but that's more his good fortune and a bonus to me, not my reason for doing it.)

I had lost weight and reached a healthy weight but was very unfit when I discovered my hobby. I knew that for the health benefits of fitness, to tone up and to maintain weightloss I needed to find an exercise I could do regularly but wasn't optimistic because exercise is too boring to me to be committed to, especially as a single parent. Then I took DS to the roller rink, he got into it so we went a few more times over the next couple of months. I remembered I loved skating. Went without DS with an adult friend and I was 100% hooked. Now I'm a skater, it's a part of who I am. I dance/artistic skate (like figure skating but on wheels) at the rink, I skate ramps and pump halfpipes at the park. I skate long distance on trails, and am working toward a 2 hour marathon (because skating marathons are a thing!) and I've started freestyle slalom. The aerobic and anaerobic benefits are absolutely enormous it's arguably the absolute best exercise method there is. But it doesn't feel even a little bit like exercise, just having great fun and superpowers.

If you don't like cardio, don't do it. Well, OK, that's a bit glib, and rowing will do you the world of good. But concentrate on what you enjoy, rather than what you don't. I do very little steady state cardio and have lost a significant amount of weight. In fact I spent 12 years going to the gym doing steady state power walking on the treadmill. Lost no weight. Fondly imagined I was at least fit, but when I tested my VO2 max it was rubbish. The cardio I do is things like kettlebell swings, boxing and HIIT. My fitness has gone through the roof.

You need to find something you like doing.

Exercise shouldn't be a punishment you grin and bear.

Try some different things... if you like weights, try Liift4 by Beachbody (home workout, 30-40 mins, 4 times a week - I highly recommend this. I'm on my 2nd round of it)
Or try a sport that you might like... local badminton group to get your cardio up? How about touch rugby?

Experiment with stuff until you find something you actually like.