tinyjo | (no subject)

So, back on the weight loss trail again now that I am feeling well enough to cook and Glastonbury is out of the way. I'm trying to decide how systematic to be about it this time around. I've had sucess and failures both ways before so I could go either way.

In principle I like having a counter or target to use. I like online food planners and trackers but I also find them frustrating. Because I cook for myself so much I have to enter all the ingredients and some of the sites I've tried are not so good on generics either - looking for chicken breast can get you a lot of Breaded Chicken Breast meals but not always the straight forward ingredient. If the site has a recipies feature then that's pretty good because I do have a core of tried and trusteds that cut down on this problem but it's still not nearly as easy as it would be if I just ate ready meals.

Also, close though it may be, I'm not actually on the computer all the time. Ideally I'd like to be able to update the tracker thing through my mobile phone but surprisingly few places I've looked at offer this. I did trial one but it had the problem with not having many generics in it's food list (although it did have a lookup by barcode for products, which I thought was pretty neat). At the very least, it would be nice if the website was light weight enough to use on the go - that was where Weightwatchers online fell down for me - it was a pretty poorly designed site, which was unfortunate because otherwise it was offering a good service. The other problem with most of the tracker sites I've tried is that they tend to have quite inflexible targets. Again, the weightwatchers one was good here but most of the others I tried wouldn't even let you carry over between days.

Then there's the clubs. Now this is fine in principle. I can quite agree that weightloss is easier if you've got someone to do it with - you can support each other, share good ideas, even police each other if that's what works for you. In practice however, I have never managed to meet anyone even remotely like me at a slimming club. I used to go to a lunchtime weight watchers meeting and it was full of old women and young mums with young babies. All nice enough but facing completely different weight loss challenges to me. As a support group it just didn't really work for me, although I did get some good ideas from the hand outs. Still, I am drawn to the idea of a support group. Anyone know any good ones? Want to form one perhaps even?

Overall, having written this, I think I like the idea of having a structure, but I don't know where to get one that'll work long term for me. Any recommendations? I only actually tried out a couple of online systems before getting discouraged and moving on so there's probably loads out there I haven't seen.

Threaded | Flat

Well,

topicaltim and I used Weight Loss Resources with a fair amount of success, and he's just signed up again (annoyingly, his calorie allowance to lose weight is more than I should have to maintain mine!). You do have to create recipes, but they have plenty of generic ingredients and I found that after a few weeks most of the things I cooked regularly were in there and just needed tweaking each time. And it gives you weekly or fortnightly reports so you can carry your allowance over if you want.

Interestingly what you didn't say here is why you, personally, want to lose weight now (as opposed to at some other time), and, indeed, if you want to at all (rather than "thinking you should" which is quite different).
Nor do you mention why you think you will keep the weight off after it has been lost.
Weight loss (and more importantly weight maintenance) does involve a good deal of planning and thinking. Unless it is truly important to someone, what very often happens is that they don't prioritize their time so that the planning and thinking gets done, and then they don't succeed.
It is very much a thing done for the "future you", like saving.

Best thing I can say: until you find yourself putting pretty much everything to #2 on the list, and saying, "I'll do that *after* I've sorted out my menu and exercise for next week and given away the crackers", the best thing you can do is forget about weight loss. Really !

Well, one reason you may be seeing grannies and young mothers at the group is that you're going at lunchtime! There's probably going to be an evening or weekend group that'll have a better balance of young professionals in it-- people who have to work all day and can't get to meetings, but who are more in their 20s and 30s and trying to drop the pounds they've had for years. Maybe that cuts into your friends or family time, but if it's a priority, you can make the time.

You can carry a small notebook, write everything down, and then enter it later on. Sometimes just having to write it down can deter you from snacking on crappy stuff.

Set a goal of eating healthy snacks-- more fruits and veggies during the day between meals-- so that you aren't as hungry at the meals.

With bigger meals, cut it in half and set half aside right away as leftovers. That way you aren't tempted to go back for one more spoonful or to try to clean a really big plate.

Ooh! And exercise. 40 minutes a day is best (that way you get your warmup and cooldown with about 20-30 mins of aerobic exercise), but if you can't do that, just do *anything*. Get used to a 15-minute walk around the block or a local building. Do the stairs a couple of times. Do a small number of situps every morning, and add more as you get used to doing them. Start tiny, set patterns, and build from there.

Those are some of the things that have worked for me in the past, and which I'm trying to do now.

I can't recommend targetty stuff, but I do love the chapter on low fat eating in Nigella Lawson's How to Eat. It's inherently flawed because it's predicated on an eat-oh god I'm fat-diet-Hurrah, Thin - eat-oh god I'm fat-diet- cycle, but the recipes and thoughts are really interesting (however that chapter's probably not enough to justify buying the book - borrow it from someone).