Please talk me down off the sodding ledge :( :(

[FragglerockAmpersand]

ARRRRGH

I just need a shoulder-thump/slap/cuddle

About 5 months ago I began a health campaign, with the help of a therapist. I eat the most insanely healthy diet, took up running, and swim miles a week.

One of the problems I had to tackle was to stop weighing myself. I would weigh myself, lose 1lb and chortle then eat a pie , or gain 0.5lb and go into absolute meltdown. I mean, serious meltdown. Which would then make me eat pies.

The therapist has helped me so much. I don't weigh or measure myself but focus on fitness goals and clothes.

Here's what's happening (in 5 months)

I can run 5k a couple of times a week
Friends say "Dear God you're looking skinny'
My Mum worries I'm looking gaunt
I bought my first pair of jeans (size 20!) 6 weeks ago. I can now get them off without undoing them.
Dresses that haven't fit in 5 years are starting to look loose.

On a whim, I took out the tape measure. Surely, right, SURELY TO FUCKERY I WOULD BE SMALLER

No. I have the SAME FUCKING HIP MEASUREMENT AS 4 MONTHS AGO

I have just completely freaked out and feel like I am back at square one, mentally. I want to lie face-down in some lard, burn my running shoes and give the fuck up.

So either everyone is suffering some kind of mass hallucination, and I'm just the same as I always was, or it's possible to loose a significant amount of weight/bulk and still have the same hip measurement.

What the fuck. I apologise for the sweary rant. It's just after working so carefully on twenty years of weight issues I really thought I was getting somewhere, mentally and physically

(And yes you did read that right - the falling-off jeans are a size 20. As you can see, I am not 'skinny' and I still have a VERY long way to go.)

Did you take any other measurements? Have they changed?

Respect for what you have achieved so far. I am a size 18 and couldn't run from here to the couch.

Your hip measurement has stayed the same. So what at this stage. Everything is looser because you are losing the weight from your stomach, which is where its most dangerous to store fat. Be proud of what you have achieved.

Accept a slap from me.

I can run 5k a couple of times a week
Friends say "Dear God you're looking skinny'
My Mum worries I'm looking gaunt hmm
I bought my first pair of jeans (size 20!) 6 weeks ago. I can now get them off without undoing them.
Dresses that haven't fit in 5 years are starting to look loose.

I think you are getting somewhere.

Focus on the clothes, they don't lie.

You have probably loss inches elsewhere.

You have done so well. 5 months of being more healthy is so much more important than a number on a tape measure.

Write a list of all the good things you have achieved over the last 5 months?

Focus on the positive.

Thanks peaches! I am pretty amazed with my fitness progress I must admit...

I didn't take any other measurements because I absolutely freaked out. I think DH might have hidden the tape-measure. He knows that when I get like this it's a pretty awful downward spiral into over-eating and self-hate etc. etc.

You're doing extremely well - the beginning is a really hard step to make (I should know, I've been building up to it all year)

I don't know about the measurements thing. Maybe you should start taking photos of yourself instead because that might be easier to see where the weight loss is coming from. And there's no obsession then (well, almost none...)

I'm feeling inspired, I'll just finish this peanut butter on toast...

Oh gosh, thanks everyone.

And you're so right about the health aspect Margot. I'm seeing the GP about my asthma later today and will be able to report with a flourish that it's all but vanished, and I managed to run my bad knee better, if there is uch a thing.

I guess I'm scared that I've kind of persuaded myself that I'm thinner by the power of my imagination or something but the clothes don't lie, as you say.

You must be doing well if other people are remarking on it. I think that because you're doing so much exercise your muscles are becoming toned and bet you don't have anywhere near as much flab as you did before.

I know it's hard, but keep going, don't weigh yourself and play pulling your jeans on and off without unbuttoning them. that will make you feel better.

You are fab, just fab. LOVE the lying down in lard, that made me laugh.

You sound so in tune with your own issues both body & mind I think that you know that the only way to go is onwards.

Please don't turn to the biscuit tin OP. I used to comfort eat terribly (and reward eat, and eat when I was tired, or happy or...)

Then I watched some terrible diet programme and the presenter turned to the subject and said 'you're going to have to start feeling your feelings instead of trying to eat them' I don't know why, but a light went on.

You're allowed to feel totally pissed off and frustrated at the hip measurement if ypu need to OP (although your progress sounds amazing), but I think you've got to try feeling it instead of covering it up by eating crap. Rant & rave on here if you like, and write how bloody unfair it is in your diary.
And when you're done & out the other side, you'll feel 100 times better that you got through it without sabotaging yourself

Good luck.

Thanks jim

Thanks everyone. Honestly, I really needed to blow off steam somewhere, and it was either here on in the biscuit barrel and I don't even HAVE a biscuit barrel anymore so I would have had to make some and that would have ended really badly, ie, with cake mix all over my face. I wish that was a joke, but it's not.

Brown rice for lunch it is, then.

I do have to remind myself that I whined that I 'only ran two miles' today, and that does count for something, whatever the stupid bloody tape measure says.

Thanks so much Last. And I saw that very programme and I remembered that quote too!!! It was so spot on. I should maybe try and re-motivate myself by watching some of those programmes - I know it's a bit 'trash telly' but they can be so inspiring.

Only two miles????

You'll be sending all of us crying to the biscuit tin with envy!!

I can run 5k a couple of times a week
Friends say "Dear God you're looking skinny'
My Mum worries I'm looking gaunt hmm
I bought my first pair of jeans (size 20!) 6 weeks ago. I can now get them off without undoing them.
Dresses that haven't fit in 5 years are starting to look loose.

Read all that through again - who cares what some arbitrary number on a tape measure (or scales for that matter) says? Think about why you started this 5 months ago - did you imagine you'd be saying those things so soon? You are obviously fitter, healthier and smaller than you were, and presumably this is your way of life now, its not about quick fixes but sustainable healthy eating and exercise (ie the only way that really works, as opposed to 'diets'). Its all good - stick at it!

Glad you are managing to not go off the rails OP. Honestly you sound like you are doing amazingly well, an inspiration to us all!

Are you replacing the scales with the tape measure? I ask as that is the sort of 'self-sabotage' stuff I do.

You have worked hard on moving away from the scales, so a negative part of you is seeking the high/lows of measuring something so have found the tape measure etc? amateur psychologist me

When can you go shopping for size 18 years....???

Err....make that size 18 jeans!

I honestly can't thank you all enough for giving me the necessary slap-hug

Margo I'm actually skipping the 18s and going into the 16s! I'm going to run like blazes and eat piles of brown rice and bowls of mango through until the new year (well, with one very obvious hiatus ), then my aim is to get some 16 jeans and cut off my appalling hair as a sort of 'new year, new me' thing!

And you're right with the replacing of scales with the tape measure. Each is as unhelpful as the other. Be damned to them I say!

You've done remarkably well.. and it must be working if people are noticing :o

I'll tell you about my experience. Six years ago I was seriously fat. Like something out of one of those fat documentaries. I was heading towards being housebound or dead. 29 stone. So I finally did something about it. It took seven stones before anyone noticed any difference or my clothes got looser. That made it very hard to carry on as it was so disheartening but I persevered and now I'm 10 and a half stones.

Keep going, your body will thank you for it and it sounds as if you're looking amazing too :)

Blimey Crispy you absolute hero. Wishing you long life, health, happiness, and a killer wardrobe

Well done Fraggle!! You go girl!! Size 16 jeans - wow!!

Running 2 miles/5k or whatever is brilliant! There is a saying on the wall in my gym that no matter how far you run, how much weight you lift etc you are there doing something where others are sitting at home wishing.

I too am working out/training and dieting and the comment you make about not seeing the difference on the tape measure could have been written by me! But listen to what those around you are saying - you look skinny. Know that you are improving your health - asthma gone! And give yourself a big pat on the back for doing so well!

Your weight didn't go on overnight and it won't go overnight - the healthy way is to do what you are doing!

Well done!

I lost loads of weight (5 stone). Put some back on (1/2 stone). Still exercising but struggling with my diet at the moment. But when I think of how much better I am than how I was at 17 stone I know I can't give up.
FWIW tape measures can be awkward when you are larger/voluptuous! I remember trying to measure my waist and getting results about 3 inches less or more! (But then I couldn't find my waist!)

Not sure about tape measures, they are odd. Or maybe it is the trousers that lie. For instance, I would wear 34in waist trousers, right? Never went beyond, depite some overhang (I'm a bloke btw). Anyway, got measured round the stomach with tape measure, round belly button and wtf? 38-9 in waist. Trouser measurements lie to flatter you. I lost weight and got into a 30in trouser from Primark (classy I know) but I bet if I measured with a tape round my waist I would be 34.

One final thing, the weight tends to come off the least helpful areas first such as arms, legs torso but not stomach, that's the last to catch up. Drink lots of green tea and do The Plank and Side Plank, a very easy 'exercise' that takes 2 mins max a day.

Personally I don't advise too much running to lose weight, imo it's all in the sugar and inefficient fat cells that makes us overweight, but if it works for you, fine. Me, it just makes me eat more.

OP, you need to read the paper towel theory nerdrebel.com/the-paper-towel-analogy

I agree focus on the clothes. I started low carb and then moved to paleo a few months ago and started boxing at the gym and have gained weight!! But clothes all looser and I can see my body shape changing and my love handles and miffin top shrinking. I don't bother with the scales now. I just go with how healthy I feel. Sounds like you're doing great with what you're doing though!!