This is really long, y’all. My weight loss lifestory with all the indulgent twists and turns of a novelist. I’m a perpetual lurker and posting makes me nervous, so I’ve created a new account just for posting to LoseIt. There’s a tl;dr at bottom.
First, let me paint you a picture. Indulge me for a moment, I promise that I have a point.
When I lost weight, I worked in a public facing job at a public library.
Most of the weight came off over the summer of 2018 from May to October. Since I worked in a library, I made the money a small town library pays a library assistant, which wasn’t much, so I couldn’t afford to replace my clothes as I went. When my jeans became ridiculously cinched at the hips, I finally bought a new pair on sale. Thing was, I wasn’t confident that I wouldn’t just wake up one day and gain it all back. Mostly, I kept wearing the baggy t-shirts and eventually, the replacement jeans I bought were also getting a little baggy. After a while, it becomes difficult for people to not notice weight loss.
So, my regular patrons started casually commenting on the loss. Sometimes it was just a quick comment, but it almost always led to the question, “How did you do it?”
Honestly, I didn’t have a good answer. I was usually embarrassed about the attention to my body (especially in front of my coworkers who were very aware of my diet and exercise, cuz, you know, I got preachy, what evs). I wanted to play it cool. My standard response was that I ate less and moved more.
You know, CICO. Calories In, Calories Out. Good bye, Farewell and Amen.
It wasn’t the answer anyone wanted to hear.
I thought at the time that they wanted to hear about some miracle cure for fatness. Like, take two ketos and call me in the morning.
I left that job the following May for a better paying job at a law firm (in records management, no, I’m not a lawyer, thank the gods). So much more stressful and sedentary. Hoo boy. Mistake number one was actually overindulging in the unlimited coffee. The resulting afternoon crash led to me becoming a ravenous food monster when three o’clock rolled around. I went from walking 20,000 steps a day to only walking on my lunch break and walking home from the bus stop. Also, there’s always free food at a law firm, especially a swank one. I mean, us mere staff only get the partners’ scraps, but they are pretty good scraps.
But this isn’t the story of my downfall. I maintained my weight loss. I just couldn’t figure out the magical combination to continue to lose weight in my new environment. I went from an active-ish job with a strong social support to a job that stressed me out with coworkers that legit drove me bonkers.
But then, 2020.
I know, I know, you either come out of quarantine fat or fit. Well, I gained a few pounds. I ate my grief when my dog died. I ate my boredom during WFH. I ate my pain when I got hurt (a few times, I’m an adventurous soul). 2020 sucked, y’all, but “bad times are tough but not tougher than me”. (KFAM, anyone?)
So, this left me wondering the same thing that my patrons asked me in 2018. How did I lose weight? My list in 2018 would have looked like this:
1. Cut out fast food and soda. (I’ll come back to this one later. It’s a whole thing.)
2. Drink water. Like so, so much water. Jugs of the stuff. It’s basic weight loss advice, I know, but it’s genuinely pretty good. Thirst feels like hunger sometimes. If you feel out of sorts, if you just drank way too much coffee and you’re floating from the caffeine overload, if you are hung over, if you just ate too much food, water helps. It’s not a panacea, but it’s pretty close.
3. Do exercise you love and will continue doing forever. For me, it was walking. I made and completed goals for long distance walking. Walking lifted my mood, gave me “me time”, got me outside in nature or window shopping (obviously, in the before-times). Most importantly, it didn’t increase my hunger dramatically, but it did burn extra calories. I tried to never eat back what I burned. I just used it as “extra” calories out.
That’s how I lost the weight. That’s what I would tell anyone who pressed for details.
But it’s not the right how. I think what people were asking was more about motivation than mechanics, because that’s what I was wondering myself last year when I was stuck in maintenance mode and that’s what I’m asking myself now in 2020.
How do you lose weight? How do you find the motivation? How do you get in the mindset of weight loss?
20 days ago, I hit the misery point. I hit it in 2018 as well. Rock bottom. Day one. Whatever you want to call it. I had that “I got to fix my crap” moment.
On May 12th, 2018, I ate a massive meal with my partner at our favorite fast food place. We were miserable, bloated and achy and just done. Later, I calculated my usual meal to be more than a days worth of calories. I went for a short walk after our meal and felt so low. Fast food was a real problem in our lives, eating out a few times a week. We couldn’t really afford it at the time (remember, I worked at a library ha) and we were both obese. The health problems were only around the corner. My parents had already gone down this road and I didn’t want to join them.
I promised myself that I wouldn’t eat fast food for a year. I threw in soda as well, because why not? It was a problem, too.
And I accomplished that goal. As a result, I haven’t had soda since May 12th, 2018. Once my year without fast food was over, I’ve had a few sandwiches from Subway or Jimmy John’s over my lunch breaks and a pizza every once in a while, but nothing much else. We still avoid our favorite place 2 1/2 years later. I’m not totally confident that I could resist that demon temptation, that siren song.
Honestly, cutting out fast food and soda was really successful when I started my lifestyle change and once I hit my eternal plateau, I couldn’t figure out how to continue. I ate pretty well, just apparently too much to lose any more weight. So, I’ve had to dig deeper to find the real answer to how to lose weight. Here’s what I’ve got so far:
Step one: Look at how food makes you feel. What are your behaviors with food? Do certain foods make you hungry after a while? Do they cause energy spikes and then drops?
Some of my food problems stem from when I drink coffee. If I have too much caffeine later in the day, I have a crash. If I limit myself to two cups in the early morning, I feel better later in the day. I love coffee and when I tried to give it up, it really wasn’t helpful overall. So, I’m trying moderation with my caffeine. (Ew, moderation, boo.)
Step two: Cut out problem foods. It’s important to take small steps. Make a change, do it until it’s a habit, rinse and repeat. Don’t overwhelm yourself.
I found that I was overeating with bread. White bread is a nutritional void. It added a lot of sugar to my diet and would lead me to feel hungry later. I’d mindlessly eat it as toast or just plain. I’ve quit eating bread entirely. When we have our homemade burgers or brats, I skip the bun. It was a big part of my diet, but 20 days in, I don’t really miss it.
Step three: Add foods that work better for you.
I’ve started eating oatmeal every morning. Let me preface this by saying, your oatmeal is only as good as the stuff you add to it. My parents would take a base of Maple and Brown Sugar oatmeal (two or three packets each) add peanut butter (solid choice on its own), whipped cream (huh?) and chocolate sprinkles. Kid you not. Sprinkles. In oatmeal.
Since I’m trying to cut out as much sugar as possible and up my fiber intake, I eat plain rolled oats with a splash of unsweetened soy milk and occasionally some frozen fruit. It’s super filling and doesn’t lead to that crash. I save what I don’t eat in the morning and add it cold to some greek yogurt in the late afternoon for a snack. Obviously, do what works for you. Do things you can stick with for the rest of your life.
Step four: Add nutritious, filling, low calorie foods where you can. Check out r/volumeeating for some tips and tricky. Spoiler: It’s mostly veggies.
My go-to solution for lunch has been to make soup with a bag of frozen vegetables, low/no sodium broth and a basic soup mix. It’s lower in calories and sodium, and I can have a huge bowl of it.
Step five: Don’t get bored. Keep yourself moving, busy, whatever. If you have a lot of downtime, find some way to fill it.
The answer to the how question is small changes to your lifestyle. Motivation takes a backseat to habits.
Got bad habits? Gonna lose your motivation eventually.
Got better habits? You don’t have to rely on the ever elusive motivation.
Over the last twenty days, I’ve noticed my clothes fitting better. I don’t have the afternoon crash/binge cycle. My mood has been better. Here’s to a better 2021, everyone!
Tl;dr - lost 70 pounds in 2018, maintained in 2019, gained a bit in 2020 (cuz 2020, yo). Found my own answer to motivation and am hopefully back on track to a better 2021. Also, support libraries. They are important.
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