My BMI is nearly 40

[Arrarker]

I was a fat child, fat teenager, fat adult.
I was going to be thin by 40, then 50. Those ships have sailed.
I've eaten myself to illness. My hip hurts, my knees can't do stairs. My blood pressure is high.
I have tried slimming groups, pills, meal replacements and hypnotherapy.
I hold down a professional, serious job. You would never know my daily mental struggles with food.
I had kids in the park call me names etc. I seem to be immune to feeling the self consciousness of obesity. I don't stress over it emotionally. But I can feel my body now telling me that I'm have hurt it. The aches and pains have erupted over the last year.

I bought an excise bike. My skinny husband is assembling it now.

So today's the day. I'm not going to snack. If I can get through the day and just have 3 small meals and no desserts I will be pleased.

My birthday is August 15th. I'm going to focus on that. Stick to a diet for 5 weeks.
I can't think about the bigger picture.

5 weeks.

Exercise IS crucial imo

Walking as much as possible is a great way to get in shape, and it lifts your mood too (even in bad weather)

I'm hanging on at the start of week 3. I cracked yesterday and ate too much so I have to pull back a bit more today.
It's 3 weeks until my birthday I was hoping I could be strict until then to loose a stone but it's asking a bit much.
I'm still grabbing with exercise and trying to work full time with long hours. I don't know how people do it.

Hi OP. Just wanted to say that you're not alone. I'm mid forties and my BMI is upper 30's. I haven't always been fat. But I've never been thin. I've basically yo-yo'd my way up the scales. I have also tried every diet in the book and had an eating disorder for 25 years which is always looming in the background. The only diet that ever worked for me was WW, but I can't be arsed with pointing these days.

So now I'm just doing myfitnesspal. I have a calorie allowance. I'm mindful that I should be trying to eat more veg, more protein and less carbs, but I'm not setting strict rules and I will have the chocolate if I want it. Its the restrictions that send me into binge mode after a few weeks which will trigger the eating disorder. I find it not too hard because everything can be barcode scanned these days rather than having to look it all up in a book or working out points or whatever. I'm strict about weighing stuff though. I've stopped with the copious amounts of alcohol I was downing. I'm also not sticking to a strict meal routine. Some days I will have a big breakfast. Other days I don't feel hungry in the morning so I have more calories for my other two meals. I try not to snack but if I want some cheese and crackers, I will have them. Just not the whole packet!

I have a loose goal to lose a stone by 8th September (I'm going to be on the telly. I took a big leap saying yes to that - knowing I'm still going to be fat as fuck - but I decided that lifes too short to turn down opportunities) I'm not going to beat myself up if I don't quite make it to that stone mark.

I'm down 8lbs so far which I'm happy about. Everyone strives for big losses but these days I am content with a pound a week as my body is not letting go of fat that easily like it did 20 years ago. When I reach my mini goal of 8th September, I will set a new one.

I struggle with exercise as I have osteoarthritis (one hip, both knees, lower back, and possibly other places I haven't had scanned yet) and I'm not allowed to do any impact exercises like jogging. I do go for a walk every day though and my daily step goal is 8000 which isn't huge but its a goal. Although losing weight will not grow back my missing cartilage, it should take some of the pressure off my lower body.

I fully support you. I know how hard it is. Keep going!

Well done OP! Remember not to restrict yourself too much or aim too high at the beginning. A stone in 5 weeks is quite a lot and while some diets may promise that, those are usually the ones where the dieters pile all the weight back on. I agree with others about exercise. It’s really important but not at the expense of you waking up before 6 to fit it in because you won’t do it - you might do a few days and then give up and give up the diet too. The key is sustainability. How about getting a Fitbit and trying to do more steps at work instead or trying to get 1000 in if you have a spare ten minutes. It will add up and will be much better than some punishing regime that you will start to dread.

It’s really hard. I had a small slip-up a few days ago where I polished off the remainder of a tub of ice cream. In the past that would have triggered me to think fuck it and I would have got a pizza and some sweets to go with it and probably binged the next day too. I didn’t. I got on with my healthy habits the next day and am not dwelling on it. Being perfect is impossible. There will always be temptations. If the only way you can lose the weight is through eating in a very restrictive way then as soon as you stop the temptations will be there again and you will go back to where you started. You need a way of eating that you can literally do forever (albeit slightly lower in calories until you reach your goal, but not much lower).

Best of luck.

I'd also add that exercise is great for the soul and for making you feel better, but it doesn't necessarily aid weight loss (it can stave off the weight gain though!) I spent 9 months at a local gym doing 3 HIIT sessions a week. I mean they were hard! This was a few years back before the pain in my hip started. I lost no weight. It dropped off other folk but not me because my bloody body is just like 'noop, I like this fat'. So I stopped torturing myself and went to dance classes instead which I loved. But I sadly had to stop that too due to the impact on my joints :(

I was 20s3 on may the 18th. I'm now 17s7. I never would've believed that was actually possible, I have no will power!
What worked for me was a complete overhaul of my life. I cut out alcohol completely, I've had to go gluten free for other reasons and I stick to 1200 calories a day, plus I've done c25k.
I've finally realised after years of misery that it is very achievable, and actually I'm never even really hungry. You just need to be determined and you'll do it.

sugarbum I can recommend the Brain Over Binge podcasts on Apple podcasts. I started listening to them today and a lot of what they say make sense. Their theory is that binge eating is largely caused by restrictive dieting so it’s important not to restrict too much. But more interestingly is that they reject the idea that binge eating is a symptom of depression, low self esteem etc and that you need to cure the underlying problem to cure the binge eating. Well, not so much reject it as say that it’s not that important. You may be bingeing because you have low self-esteem but to tackle the binge eating you need to stop bingeing and that’s it. They point out that the only reason you Binge is because your brain tells you to binge. If it didn’t, you wouldn’t, regardless of how low your self esteem is or how depressed you are. I’m only a few episodes in but it’s really resonating with me. I have struggled with binge eating for many years and the bit about restriction makes sense because it was initially triggered by me starving myself as a teen and then bingeing when my body finally couldn’t cope. It was then further triggered after a few months of me doing the 5:2 diet which involves extreme restriction (albeit only two days a week but try telling my poor brain that). Both periods caused uncontrollable urges to eat as much as I could and then continued so I totally buy what they say about restriction. I also think that’s why people who do things like Lighter Life are more or less doomed to fail because their brains are likely to trigger a binge response once they stop the diet.

@allShedtheload thank you. That's why I'm sticking to my calorie count and not restricting what I eat, because I know that its the restrictions that send me into binge mode. Its also why I stopped bothering with VLCDs and keto etc. They work for some people but for me its a really bad idea.

Tonight is pizza night! For DH and DC.
I'm having cottage cheese salad. Maybe I have turned the corner. Nearly 3 weeks in and I'm doing ok and starting to feel a tiny bit better.
My knees and his still hurt but I feel a bit less bloated and slightly more lively.

If anyone reading this wants to start and join me please do.

I have no idea why things are working for me this time. I think it's probably the physical pain I was in.
No amount of diabetes, stroke, threats etc made any difference.

I will keep checking in on the thread.

@Arrarker
Well done. 3 weeks is good. So glad you are starting to feel better. I do still worry that you are depriving yourself too much ,but you know yourself best. I’m still going too. Not lost much weight this week, been a bit lazy I think, but some of my habits are bedding in, I’m not snacking and I have less sweet stuff by miles. Having never been much of a drinker, we have started drinking more lately. So that needs to stop.

@Zebracat - how much have you lost?
Are you managing to fit in any exercise?

I don't feel deprived and my problem is I couldn't just have one slice of pizza. I'd want a whole pizza.
I've not been so strict today as I'm not at work and I like to cook to relax! It's difficult for me not to pick at things when I'm cooking. I dread to think how much cheese I ate mindlessly.
I am walking most days but only one or two miles. I have an exercise bike I have used a few times.
I'm wondering if any vitamin supplements might help me continue to improve?
Anyway, no sign of my resolve fading yet. It's a miracle!

I would really like to join you. I have a good five stone to lose (possibly more but the scales have disappeared). I put weight on with each baby and struggled to lose it. I was in an abusive relationship and had no support and often deliberate undermining of my efforts to lose weight. After getting free from that I lost a couple of stone and. kept it off until I suffered a mental health breakdown five years ago. The depression and medication led to more weight gain and it's only in the last year or so that I:be been well enough to start to tackle it.

I became vegan last year and lost some weight but then plateaued despite quite an active job working with under-2s. Over the last month I've been focusing on improving my eating habits so
-no snacks
-no baking
-swapping from jam to marmite on my breakfast toast and exchanging one slice for a banana
-swapping some fruit for salad veg
-reducing portions especially of pasta
-drinking more water
-cutting out my evening chocolate ration

I feel I've lost a bit as my clothes fit better but I need to do some exercise. I walk the dog every day but I work 8-6 and am shattered when I get in. I also have bad anxiety and can't face exercising in public.

Anyway, that's a bit of an essay but I hope I can pick up some tips here and we can support each other. We will be slimmer by Christmas!

@KateF
Please keep us company.
Sounds like some weight loss will help your mood generally. You seem to have packed a lot in.
I'm also too shattered after work to do anything exercisey. And no way am I being seen in public either.
I'm vegetarian so any vegan diet ideas will be useful.
I made ratatouille today. Lowish carbs and calories.

I’ve lost3.5 kilos. What about you. I’m walking more and doing loads of gardening. I really miss swimming.
I’m not veggie, but I am really cutting down on meat to help with gout, I love vegan curries, any good recipes would be appreciated.
Really bad insomnia tonight, so I’ve just had tea and toast. Insomnia is linked to obesity, and in my case, that’s why!
Welcome KateF.

If you have the financial resources, you should go private and get weight loss surgery. I'm sorry to be blunt, but at your age, your weight, and the physical issues you already have, you don't have time to waste. You have already failed at every weight loss attempt you've ever made, and if you remain obese for too much longer, you are going to find yourself severely, and possibly permanently, disabled.

Surgery may very well be the best investment you will ever make.

hi OP

well done sticking with it.

tbh I think the fabled "energy increase" is a myth. I am now on week about 17 ish of my own efforts and I have not seen any such phenomenon.

I am certainly seeing results - my bmi is now just around 34, it was 43 and a bit at the start of lockdown in March.

When it comes to family pizza nights I am ordering a whole pizza for me every other time, and putting my leftovers in the freezer for next time. so mostly I am eating half and that leaves me reasonably fed but really wanting more. I try to assuage that with some lettuce. if I crack and have an extra slice then I get less than half a pizza next time.

Hi OP, weight warriors and cheerleaders. I’m in a similar boat, drifted in the wrong direction during lockdown and desperately trying to row back (here endeth the boat metaphor).

It was very encouraging to read your explanation of the role of poor sleep MashedPotatoBrainz. I’m convinced disturbed sleep plays a huge role in my difficulty losing weight. Unfortunately it’s partly due to care responsibility.

It’s good that you’re staying on track OP but the bit about too much restriction is serious. The issue is that you will never be able to eat as you have been doing up until now and, unless you find a sustainable new way to eat, you will find it very difficult to sustain it. Eating cottage cheese salad while your family eats pizza might be doable a couple of times but not in the long run. It’s far better to work out the amount of pizza that you can have and still stay on track, maybe going for a veg or half cheese option. As I said before, at your weight, you can eat quite a lot of calories and still lose. If you restrict to a really low level just to make it come off faster, you’re shooting yourself in the foot. It will feel like an ordeal which you’re counting down to get away from. There’s also no point to eating too little because I reckon if you are say 1800 or 1900 calories, the rate of loss wouldn’t be hugely different to if you were eating 1200. I don’t want to put a downer on your efforts and I’m not saying surgery is your only option at this stage like a pp is but deprivation is a sure way to fail.

@Aquamarine1029
Odfod.

I wouldn’t necessarily tell people who recommend surgery to fuck off. Realistically it has the best outcome for treating severe obesity out of all potential options. At the same time, it is expensive and drastic but I would never judge anyone who went down that route. It’s very difficult to make a judgement about what is best for someone without knowing them though (and of course, not being a doctor!)

I completely agree. I would never judge someone for having surgery. Nor would I go on to a thread for obese people who were clearly looking to lose weight without recourse to surgery and tell them surgery is what they should be doing.

Yes, that’s fair enough. I think there’s quite a lot of unnecessary stigma around weight loss surgery though and I think that when someone has serious health problems as a result of long term obesity it is an option that should be considered, alongside others.

You shouldn't be depriving yourself. You will never stick to it otherwise. It shouldn't be seen as a 'diet', but simply a lifestyle change.

Work out your daily calories needed to lose weight, and you can technically eat anything as long as you strictly monitor calories in, calories out etc. It sounds like you still have quite a large number of calories you can eat while still losing weight which is good!

I've lost 9.5 KG since May, I still eat chocolate biscuits, couple slices of pizza, slice of cake etc and lose weight weekly as I make sure I stay under my daily calories. I do a lot of exercise to balance it out, but that's the choice I made in order to eat a little bit more.

I don’t want to stigmatise weight loss surgery, but it’s not a magic bullet. These are major surgeries . All surgery carries risk, especially when performed on obese people. Having had the surgery people still have to limit their calories. And I do know people who have learnt that lesson the hard way. I could look up the stats but I doubt very much that these surgeries have a 100% success rate, or that no fat person ever managed to achieve a healthy weight without recourse to them, but that was definitely the thrust of Aquamarines argument.

Also, in any thread about substantial weight loss, people appear, have nothing to say about the participants individual circumstances, and in rather stock ways tell the regulars that they will die unless they have surgery. That is much ruder than telling someone to fuck off,IMO.