I need an intervention

[superbagpuss]

I seriously need help

Over the last few months I have put on 5kg in weight - this is a lot for me

I have developed a health issue that means exercise is no longer an option and I have had to go back on the pill for medical reasons. My life is restricted in that I go to work, come home, say hello to my children and am exhausted.

Recently I had a night out and in all the photos I had a fat face, my clothes are too tight and I feel like a big fat blob

But becuase I am sad, I can't stop eating rubbish. I try so hard but can't stop eating that biscuit or having pudding.

I am getting so desperate I mentioned pills on here but was told they are a waste of time.

I need a wake up call. I need to stop eating rubbish at work and at home (DH cooks in the main but we have started having more takeaways as the children now eat at school)

I need a five point plan I can stick too.

I weigh 68kg.
I want to weigh 62kg and have a much smaller belly.

Please help.

Firstly, when you say excercise, does that include walking? Could you maybe walk for 20 mins a day, and gradually increase that? Or swimming?

I'd advise you to sign up to My Fitness Pal - it relies on you being honnest, but you can set yourself a daily calorie goal and track everything you eat. It makes it much easier to see the effect of everything, and how cutting something out makes such a difference.

and for full effect here is my food list from yesterday

Breakfast:
Two slices tiger bread, nothing on them
OJ

Lunch
Bowl of green salad and cold roasted veg
bag of crisps (felt really guilty afterwards)

biscuits as a mid afternoon snack (felt bad afterwards)

Dinner
Mixed veg
2 potato croquettes
vegetarian kiev thing

thanks middle aged

I try and walk up the stairs at work but can only manage one flight before feeling rough, like I will collapse

I have taken on dog walking through a charity so hope to build a 20 min walk into my week.

I did try myfitnessapp but it depressed me too much - 4 months ago I ran a 5km run in 35 mins so this inability to do anything has hit me hard.

^Two slices tiger bread, nothing on them
OJ^
OJ is pretty high in calories - you'd be better off having a cup of tea, or a glass of squash. I'd also suggest you find somethign more nutritious and fewer calories a than plain bread for breakfast. If it's tiger bread, and your bread cutting skills are like mine, I'd be willing to bet the slices are door steps!

^Bowl of green salad and cold roasted veg
bag of crisps (felt really guilty afterwards)^
what was the veg? Go for green veg, rather than root vegetables.
There are lots of nice lower calorie crisp type snacks on the market.

biscuits as a mid afternoon snack (felt bad afterwards)
You felt bad - so you know what to do!

^Mixed veg
2 potato croquettes
vegetarian kiev thing^
Croquettes and kiev will both be full of fat if you've bought them and not made them. You could have had the kiev with green veg, or boiled/mashed/jacket potato would have been better than kievs.

I'm on a diet atm. Trying to lose 1st by Christmas. Today I have had
Breakfast: fruit and fibre cereal with koko milk (fewer cals than semi skimmed)
Lunch: bowl of soup
Snack: snack a jack caramel rice cake

That adds up to about 600 cals.

For dinner I will have home made chicken fajita, with chicken breast, loads of peppers and onions, and wraps. I've got fruit salad for pud.

Should come in at 1300-1500 cals.

I plan to have a little bounce on my trampette in front of the tele later, which will use up approx 100 cals.

Poor super, I feel for you. You're absolutely right to do something now, too many of us haven't and have watched 6kg turn into 16. I'm a terrible comfort eater, I first put on weight after a car accident, I had a month off work and sat on my bottom and ate.

If you can't exercise you're going to have to do this purely with food. Have you heard of Barenaked Noodles? They're a weird frankenfood you can get in Holland and Barratt. I quite like them and they'll replace spaghetti or noodles and they're practically calorie-free. They sell a "rice" as well but I've not tried it yet. I've given up fruit juice, it's not worth the calories.

Have you lost weight before? If so what methods have you found to work?

I'm doing slimming world and have lost 2st12 since May. In that time I've turned 40, had both my parents had 70th parties and I've been away on two holidays. ironically, I'm eating more than i ever have.

The main elements of the diet are very low fat - less than 5%, eating to satisfy your appetite with 1/3 of each plateful being veg and controlling but not stopping sin foods like bread, crisps, chocolates, alcohol.

The food list you gave would be a very high sin day due to lots of bread and breaded products. The bread, crisps, a couple of plain biscuits and two breaded processed products would equate within the slimming world plan to equivalent to several glasses of wine and bars of chocolate.

It may well be that for you two thick bits of bread is infinitely preferable to for example a bar of chocolate and glass of wine but slimming world has taught me to make these decisions for my own tastes and as a result I'm loosing weight and eating more.

A typical day for me now starts with a cooked breakfast typically bacon medallions, egg in some form, a low fat sausage, mushrooms and tomatos. I tend to have a big mug of milky coffee to get me going too.

For lunch i might have a jacket potato loaded with cottage cheese and smoked salmon and a salad, or an omelette, a mixed bean soup, a pasta and sauce dish.

Snack with the DC of fruit and ice-lollies (mini milk are very low sin and homemade even better)

This evening we're having wild garlic rice and curry (big portions). We eat lots of pasta dishes and things like steak and actifry chips.

Before bed I'll have a small bar of chocolate with another milky decaf coffee.

This past week eating this way I dropped 3 lb. 1.5lb the week before (but we'd had a day out and eaten out) and 2lb the week before to.

Before starting the plan I thought I knew all the right things to eat, quite a bit about healthy eating etc but when I tried to loose weight I always seamed to be starving myself or heavily restricting myself. Now I can confidently eat out, find things that are preferable to eat at a buffet and i know which drinks to opt for to minimise weight gain. But the biggest thing is I'm not scarred of food. If DH and I go out for a curry, I eat everything I want then just go back onto plan the next day.

I'm walking and swimming lots because I enjoy it. My sister is at a very similar weight loss and is a self confessed couch potato. She just hates exercise in all forms and has done since childhood. So its the eating regime thats making the difference.

Making a decision to do something is the first big step. Good luck which ever way you go.

thanks

normal breakfast is cereal for me with semi skimmed milk and no sugar

I have stopped having sandwiches every day to cut down my bread eating and I eat crisps maybe twice a week

I don't eat meat and mostly to tired to cook so dh does convenience food for me but I don't want to complain as if he didn't cook for me I wouldn't eat

before when I lost weight I was a gym bunny, three times a week plus classes

also I had no cake/ choc and soup every lunchtime

my office now has no kitchen/fridge/microwave facilities so of I want a salad I have to buy it from the canteen and its not particularly healthy

not being able to exercise has negatively affected my physical and mental wellbeing and at present the doctors can't give me as reason for it

had a talk with dh that I need to eat better and to stop buying me takeaway

Have you ever had any hayfever type allergies?

I get very mild asthma. Its so mild i'll go a decade without an issue. At present I'm suffering a bit with what I think is pollen related (something that doesn't happen normally at this time of year) and it leaves me feeling like I've got permanent post cold run down feeling.

I was moaning to my sister a couple of weeks ago about not being able to shake this tail of cold post school holidays and she suggested I get some anti allergies. Within 24hrs I was 70% better within three days 100%. My dad has had similar and the anti allergies also helped.

It is lousy not feeling like yourself.

On the food front...could you turn things around and have your cereals at lunch time and have your lunch at breakfast where you I assume have the cooking facilities etc?

Misformum - thank you - my problem is my heart, its very sudden onset and is making me quite ill, but thanks for the thought

I like your idea but I don't have long in the morning for breakfast, so no time to cook anything. I wake at 6:30 and am out of the door by 7 and I really don't want to wake up any earlier :-)

Today I didn't have breakfast until I got to work and I am having porridge.

Those instant porridge pots are good aren't they. Why don't you take a salad from home to work. I do and it's fine come lunchtime. Ask your DH to cook just meat/ fish and veg/salad. Take fruit and nuts to work to eat when you need energy.

Millie - it was fresch porridge from work restuarant, it is good but I can only have it on Friday as the rest of the week its next to bacon and I hate the smell of meat.

I have tried to get salad to bring into work, and have done when I've been organised enough to go shopping :-)

Superbagpuss it sounds as if you're buying a lot of your food ready prepared. Eg you say you can't have salad for lunch because the canteen salad isn't healthy, and you buy your porridge ready made.
Ready made food contains a lot of hidden calories.

You can take your own salad to work - make it the night before and keep it in the fridge. Homemade porridge is great, but do you know what's actually in the porridge you bought?

My suggestion would be to take control of what you're eating, even if you aren't actually cooking it yourself. Ask DH to sit down with you and plan a menu for the week, around his ability to cook.

If you can't get organised to go shopping, can you do some internet shopping? It's easier to avoid impulse buying when you're not wandering up and down the aisles.

TBH, you've come up with a reason why you can't almost everything everyone has suggested.

I hate to be harsh, but losing weight is HARD. I know, I'm doing it myself. You will need to change the way you do things, and what you eat, and it's not easy. But if you don't change your ways, your weight won't change.

You can't exercise, so you are going to have to be hyper vigilant about what you eat. I'm not saying you can't have treats, but you'll need to make sure they are treats, not routine.

If you don't want to use MFP because it depreses you, then try just writing everything you eat down on a piece of paper, and the next day, try to eat one thing less (within reason obvously).

I've found that visual stimulants work for me - I have a graph in the kitchen and plot my weight every day. When I can see that my good diet one day has a knock on effect on my weight the next day (and vice versa), it's a great incentive to carry on.

When you say you have no kitchen facilities foes that include no kettle? If not the porridge pots sound great and there are lots of other rehydratable pots in the lunch aisle you could investigate and will keep forever in your desk drawer.

Have you tried the Jamie Oliver long life pouches? I kind they're great as they don't need refrigeration or heating and they're filling and low in calories. I'll try to put on a photo, this one is 161 calories per half pouch

Ok so get the porridge pots. Make a salad the night before and a homemade coleslaw say made from red cabbage, apple, celery, spring onions, grated carrot and grated parsnip, chopped walnuts and fresh parsley or coriander. You can add some mayonnaise if you like. Take fruit, nuts etc. If you are a vegetarian then your diet is severely lacking in quality nutrition going off your menu. There is so much you can eat that is quick and doesn't take a lot of pre preparation just needs to be more organised. The food you eat is medicine and the better you eat the healthier your body will be. Nothing wrong with crisps or biscuits sometimes but your diet needs to be good 80% of the time.

thank you for the comments - I do need some tough talk as I have become far too lazy and it is havign a negative effect.

So - no treats/cakes/snacks at all from the treat table

Yes to bringing in my own slad, got to be cheaper and healther.

Yes to eating a proper healthy breakfast in the morning

We have no kettle, just a water machine that does hot and cold - I used to do instant soup but either needed to buy disposable cups or take my mug home every day to wash (again, I guess I just got lazy)

Can you not have a word with the Management. I would have thought that in a work environment that a kettle was normal. Or you could buy a small one and then you would have one?
Its not easy. Small changes are the way to go.

I don't agree personally with no treats. I have a drawer full of chocolate and lovely biscuits that I love but because I allow myself to have them I tend to not bother unless I am really hungry for one. I do mindful eating and I exclude no food from my kitchen. I eat when I am really hungry (tastes amazing when you are genuinely properly hungry) and stop as soon as I am satisfied. Diets do not work for me and I don't do them at all. I stopped them many many years ago when I had a young daughter and did not want her growing up with any diet mentality or believing that dieting is the only way to go. Its nonsense really. You don't need an outside force (that you pay money too most of the time in one way or another) telling you what when and how to eat. Be kind to yourself and start to tune into your own hunger and stop beating yourself up.