So, what's the best diet?

[TwoTeaTessie]

I have name changed for this. Little bit of background.

Within the last month I have hit the 19 stone mark, I am going to hit 30 in July and have a DS of 8 and a DD of 1. Have spoken to my Doctor about losing weight, initially she prescribed pills for me, but I didn't take them as they made me feel rubbish.
She can't/won't refer me for surgery as I have no underlaying long term health problems that are caused by my layers upon layers of fat.

So I need to be doing this on my own but don't know where to start, I'm not sure where to get my perseverance and courage from.

Over the last couple of months I have read a couple of success story diet books (both American) which set me up as I was reading them, but as soon as I finished the book so too went my resolve.

How do people stay on track? What happens when I fall off?

I've been toying with the idea of Diet Chef (or something similar) as it provides everything you eat and I wouldn't want to waste that much money by cheating.

Any thoughts, tips, slaps round the face to get me started would be good!

How are you limiting wheat on SW if you're allowed unlimited pasta??! Mmmm, give me more of those processed carbohydrates and watch the weight fall off - not.

My mistake. Bread is limited along with cereals and oats.
It does work.

No, it's not wheat you limit on SW, it's bread. Bread and cheese are my downfall, so SW limiting them is good for me.

The whole point of SW is that nothing is completely off limits, you just have to be aware of what and how much you're eating.

I tried WW once but found the points system to easy to, urm, shall we say manipulate. It didn't necessarily mean I had a... well, what you'd call a balanced diet. With SW, you have to have something from all the different food groups every day.

A lot of people say they're surprised by how much you're allowed to eat!

x-posts!

Twotea you sound similar to me although I have less weight to lose than you. I like the idea of losing weight but I just struggle to give up the treats (and I mean a family sized bag of crisps, or 2 large bars of chocolate, rather than normal size treats!) so I try to stick to it and end up binging.

I had most success with slimming world, until I moved house and couldn't get to a meeting any more. I followed the extra easy plan which is basically 1/3 of everything you eat has to be fruit or veg, then the rest can be meat/carbs/most things except treats. You get a syn allowance which can be used daily or saved for weekly treats. I always saved my Syns and had a bit of a blow-out once a week - I could resist the rest of the time because I knew I could have my Friday night treats but still see good weight loss when I went to group!

Re motivation - I am the sort of person who gets bored and gives things up very quickly! I found I lost weight so quickly at first with SW that I felt motivated - it was a challenge to lose each week. I also bought a gorgeous dress a size too small, and gave myself a target for when I wanted to get into it (a month) and tried it on each week until I achieved it.

Any diet that allows 'unlimited' sounds dangerous to me

TwoTeaTessie - have you considered low carbing? One of the great advantages of it, apart from the fact that you can eat yummy food, is that because you are controlling your blood sugar levels, you won't be hungry. Which makes it so much easier to stick to.

Have a look at the last thread - look at the rules on the spreadsheet, bottom tab

I've never known anyone "do" WW, SW, LL, Cambridge diet or any other thing you buy into just once.

The " diets" I see working longest term for ppl are centred around portion control (use a tea plate rather than a dinner plate for example) and avoiding/ reducing crap (refined carbs mainly).

I've seen quite a few ppl lose their carb cravings by following a low carb diet.
As someone else said, all diets will work. It's sticking to the buggers that's the problem

Have you considered hypnosis?

I would like to give hypnosis, but I'm a great big scaredy cat about going and doing these things and what if I spend the money and it doesn't work

Another low carber here. Of course, no one diet suits all, but the thing I love about low carbing is that I find it EASY, and have absolutely no sense of deprivation on it. The first 2 weeks can be tough, but after that it's pretty simple. I get to eat the foods I love (roasts, steaks, prawns, mayonnaise, cheese, eggs, cream etc.), and I very very rarely feel at all hungry. I also get to have a few drinks from time to time :D

I'm a hopeless dieter - I hate restricting my eating, bloody loathe it. I've tried every diet under the sun since 1976, and still ended up at 16+ stone last year. I've lost over 5 stone of that since August, and am feeling great and really, I mean REALLY enjoying my food. That's why low carbing works for me - because I know I can carry on eating this way forever. That's what makes a diet 'best' or not - whether it suits your tastes, satisfies you, and is something you can see yourself sticking with, rather than enduring.

Best of luck finding the way of eating that suits you - and if it turns out to be low carb, hope to see you over on the next Bootcamp thread :D

I would suggest:

1. Working out how you gained the weight i.e. are you overeating because you are bored, depressed, stressed, sexually frustrated, whatever. Like myself you have somehow acquired an unhealthy attitude towards food - how did this happen and how can you develop a healthy attitude? Books like Fat is a Feminist Issue may help.

2. Ensuring that whatever diet/food plan you go for will not give you spikes in your blood sugar. Sugar addiction is real and it will sabotage any attempt at weight loss.

I've always been fat, as a child, as a teen and now as an adult. I come from a fat family and then married into one.

My son who is 8 is now also going the same way and I must change things now before it starts to effect my DD who is 1.

Today I have planned what I am going to eat an so far I am going well. Who knows this might the start of something good :)

Here's some encouragement - today for lunch, instead of the usual SW full roast (with potatoes roasted using Fry Light and lots of seasoning), I had roast chicken, chips and salad (chips made fresh using, you guessed it, Fry Light). My plate was full to the brim and the only thing I had to count was the little bit of Caesar dressing I put on the side of my plate to dip my spring onions in.

So stuffed I didn't want pudding...

Ahh Mrs I appreciate the help, but I've just sat down after cleaning the kitchen to keep my hands busy and away from food and now I want nothing more than chicken and chips

I have downloaded the book to my kindle and will start on it as soon as I have finished my current novel (about a fat woman turned thin)

I know what you mean about ww. I have never done it, but my mum joined about a year ago now, after her Dr had prescribed it for her (she got the first 3 months free) and she has done really well (and I am really proud of her) She has lost 4 stones and due to this he diabetes meds have been reduced by half, but al we ever seem to talk about now is how many points there are in something, or who's new at her group.

I think planning and keeping tabs on what I eat is a good first step for me, I don't expect it to fall off though if anyone finds a way please let me know but slow and steady.

I would like to exercise more and my sister has agreed to tag along for moral support, any suggestions on that front?

Both doctors I know personally eat low carb diets. It's very popular in the medical profession. I have about 3 stone I would like to shift and know I could manage low carb but I seem to have some issues with ignoring the little voice in my head.
Tried hypnosis, lovely but didn't work for me. I need to address the cause but haven't figured out what it is yet.
Were you poor as a child? I was outraged when I saw that newspaper article about children who went without going on to be bigger but maybe there is some truth to it. Might start a thread to see ....

I can highly recommend C25K. I'm just about to start the last week, week 9, where I will be running for 30 minutes, which is pretty much 5K. I never thought I would be able to do this, but the programme really helps you to get there!

However. Don't rely on exercise alone to help you lose weight.

I've been to WW before and found that really useful! At the moment there isn't a local meeting at a good time so I've been doing my fitness pal which I'm finding really good! Just keeping a track of the food your eating is such an eye opener! Really didn't realise how much I ate in a day! And it definitely makes you think twice about reaching into the fridge for a snack

I undertand how tempting something like Diet Chef can be: lose weight, someone else does all the hard work. WELL IT"S ALL BULLCRAP!!!! I implore anyone out there to not let their desperation take the better of them and join DietChef. Now as a foodie, I can tell you the food is less than satisfactory. It's practically overrated microwave meals. I made the grave mistake of applying for the 12 week plan. Of course as any sane person (who isn't completely absolved in the hope that they will one day find they've lost a pathetic amount of weight through this extremely costly venture), would tell you that after you realise how useless the first month was and how bad the food was, you should cancel. So I came to cancel after only one month and I was told that I'd have to pay a ridiculous £155 to cancel. This was because they had already taken out next month's payment without my knowledge. When I spoke to the lady and expalined to her my situation, she didn't really seem to care and just kept saying I had to pay- barely heard me out! They claim it's all in their terms and conditions - I guess that's why you read the fine print. Just to add to the injury, they made me pay for the return and the box itself is extremely heavy. COSTLY RETURN + CANCELLATION FOR A PRODUCT THAT WAS TERRIBLE AND DIDN'T DO WHAT IT CLAIMED IT DID. So why all the happy reviews; I can only imagine people just feel good that they are actually doing a diet for the first time, but if they simply wake up and smell the coffee they'll realise that they haven't lost that much weight, and if they have, it is more than likely it is due to exercise and not the pathetic badly tasting microwave meals they send you. Also, make sure you have a lot of storage space because they send you the whole month supply at once. Terrible. I don't even write reviews online or anywhere but I felt a moral obligation to let everyone know what this company is up to.

Hi op, another vote here for Slimming world. It works well with a family as you can all eat the same and you can still have small treats

It's maintainable too, doesn't feel too much like a diet, it's just healthy eating. I've lost over 3 St, now have a bmi of 22,and the weight is staying off.

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