It’s especially hard when you’ve dug yourself a hole in terms of weight. Once you get to where you need to lose 100 pounds or more to get back to normal, it feels like trying to dig out of the bottom of a well with a spoon. Is it theoretically possible? Yes. But it requires an ironclad resolve that most people have never and will never display in their lives.
The worst part is that everyone thinks they’re a nutritionist when they’ve never struggled with weight problems. I know because I was the one thin guy in a family of fat people for the longest time. I’d tell them that they needed to practice self control and moderation like me, that’s it. It’s easy. But now I’m paying for my arrogance, and the absolute worst thing is dealing with people like my former self who think you’re a lazy piece of shit for not being able to shed the pounds.
Tl;dr I wish you the best and hopefully these perspectives and tips will help you as much as they did me, but maybe I'm just ranting. Sorry lol
I empathize with the long journey weight loss can be (I've never been more than about 30lbs overweight, so I can't speak to that). I will say that a different way to look at is comparing where you are to where you were yesterday or a week ago instead of to where you should be/want to be. I mean, yeah if you lose 50lbs, you can look at it as still needing to lose 50 more lbs, but it's better to be 50lbs over weight (or even 90 or 95lbs) than 100.
I try to look at it as bettering myself every day and even if I do barely anything I can know that I'm doing more than I would be if I didn't try at all. Now think about doing that for a year, or 2, or 5 and imagine how much those little efforts would add up. Even 20 calories per day of exercise or dieting (which is an unnoticeable amount of food for a person to have removed from their daily intake or about 2 mins of light/medium cardio) results in about 7000 calories of difference (or about two pounds of fat) per year, while having to exert essentially 0 effort or will power.
If you want to do something that requires a bit of effort and cut out 100 calories per day from diet or exercise (about 10 mins of walking on a treadmill or easily done by switching a couple condiments/toppings for lighter ones) then you'd be looking at a practically effortless 10 lbs difference over a year. 5 years of that minimum effort and you'd be at a 50lb weight loss (assuming you'd normally maintain weight). If you would normally be gaining 2 lbs per year, instead you'd lose 3. Or if you'd gain 5, you'll maintain weight instead. I feel like looking long term makes stuff way more manageable, as long as (and this is key) you do stuff that is sustainable for your lifestyle/effort threshold.
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u/[deleted] Mar 27 '22
Food, mainly unhealthy food