Long post is long, but to say any less feels like a disservice to all the things I've fought so hard to overcome. I've been lurking here for a while and I felt like it was time to share my story.
I've recently started trying to make my first solid attempt at losing weight. I'm 5'8", female, 32 y/o, and currently 303 lbs. I weighed in at my highest weight ever at 353 lbs in Dec of 2020. Since then I've lost 50 lbs, 20 lbs of that weight loss was unintentional, but the last 30 lbs I've worked my ass off for. I'm walking for exercise, around 7k steps a day, and I'm still on track with my diet (I use noom to track) which I've been adjusting to include lots more vegetables and lean proteins as well as healthy snacks. But what really bothers me is that despite all this, I'm still fat.
I was an extremely average weight for most of my young adult life (typically I fluctuated between 150-160 lbs), I only really started gaining weight after college. I got an office job where I was very sedentary and there were always snacks readily available. I was able to keep that mostly in check, but then I lost my job due to untreated anxiety/depression and that's where things really started to spiral. I was having panic attacks daily and too scared to leave my house, I started using food as comfort and eating ridiculous amounts of anything and everything I wanted. My anxiety and depression got so crippling that I finally got help about a year later, but the damage was already done. In that time I had packed on 100 lbs.
As time went on I continued to eat to mitigate stress at work, financial stress, etc etc. You name it, I used food to deal with it; It was my biggest source of comfort. My self image deteriorated until I was so ashamed I gave up altogether, baggy jeans, dirty T-shirts and no makeup became my norm because I just didn't care. I felt like being that weight, I would be disgusting no matter what I did, so why even bother? This is in stark contrast to what had been the norm for most of my life prior, I was a don't leave the house without makeup type of person. Conventionally attractive enough that men regularly paid attention to me, I got dates without issue. I felt pretty, I felt like I was worth it. I did have some self esteem issues that I struggled with because of how I was raised, my mother always was very critical of my weight and acted like being fat was tantamount to committing some kind of heinous crime. My father was extremely verbally abusive and demeaning. Both of these things contributed to what would be a very unhealthy relationship with food. But for the most part after I got out of the house and struck out on my own, I was comfortable and confident in my own skin. That is, until the weight gain started.
Fast forward to August 2020 when I lost my job due to Covid and had been eating completely uncontrolled for about 7 years at that point. I weighed in at my highest ever weight, 353 lbs, in December of that year. At some point, I started to lose weight out of sheer laziness at home (think literally too lazy to get up and go to the kitchen). My car also broke down so I had no means of transportation to even go get fast food or the like even if I wanted it desperately, which I think helped as well. So at my next dr appointment I was surprised to learn I had lost ten pounds, then another ten pounds at the subsequent appointment a few months later. About the middle of 2021, when my unemployment was about to run out, I started working on making real positive changes to what had become a very sad and purposeless existence. I got my car fixed, I started applying for jobs and was hired on to a great place I'm still very happy at, I even started dating again and started a relationship, something I hadn't had the self worth to attempt in years. Things were looking up in a way they hadn't for years and I was excited for the future for the first time in a long time. But like most good things, some of that came to an abrupt end.
My relationship started to take a downward turn, I had made the mistake of showing my partner pictures from when I was younger and in shape, and really hurtful comments started getting made on the regular. Things like "Man if you still looked like that I'd be all over you", or "if you could get to the weight my ex was, I guess I could settle for that", and "Not to say you're not attractive, but I've always wanted to be with a really skinny girl". On top of the hurtful comments there was food shaming, when we exercised together there was only negative criticism. I was never trying hard enough, never walking long enough, never moving fast enough. Nothing I did was satisfactory. It even got to the point where I was informed out of the blue that I would be staying the night less because I was so fat I was making a dent in the mattress. Needless to say when I became less important than the integrity of a used mattress, I ended the relationship. But the last two months of it were incredibly stressful and I broke down and binged more than once to deal with all the pressure and the hurt. I hit a plateau for a month or two where I wasn't necessarily gaining weight, but I wasn't losing any either.
Its been about a month since then and I've got back on track with my eating, reduced my stress levels, and shifted my focus back to myself and improving my circumstances, but the weight loss has slowed down considerably. I've only been losing maybe a pound a week, which has been really frustrating when you feel like you're doing everything right. On top of that is the real crux of the issue: I'm still fat. I'm still considered morbidly obese, I'm still at the farthest upper range for most commercially available clothing, no one who doesn't know me personally and hasn't seen my progress is going to look at me and think wow she looks great! I struggle to see the difference myself, although my friends assure me they can tell the difference. I want to keep losing weight and being healthier, but its disheartening that I've lost so much and still have such a long way to go, especially considering how slow the weight loss has become. My next goal is 253 lbs, which I hope to accomplish by the end of the year, then 200 lbs, which I haven't set a timeline for. Ideally I'd like to get back to my 'normal ' weight of 160 lbs, but I have trouble believing that will ever be a reality again.
Physically I do see a definite difference in things like my endurance and stamina, when I started dating my partner walking up a single flight of stairs winded me and I had to sit down. By the end of the relationship I could walk several hours and go up and down the stairs at will without issue. My self confidence has also improved, I feel more like myself than I've felt in a long time, and I don't feel automatic disgust when I look in the mirror. I went out and bought new clothes last week for the first time in years and was actually happy about how I looked.
I think part of why it's hard for me to see progress is just the way my body distributes fat. My arms and legs have remained fairly normal sized, while my belly has continued to swell until I basically have an entire extra person draped around my abdomen, an 'apple' body shape if you will. My belly is huge and drapes over the top of my legs, and my breasts gave up the ghost a long time ago which contributes to my overall saggy/lumpy look.
So TLDR, I've lost a lot of weight and overcome a lot of poor life circumstances, but I feel overwhelmed and disheartened by how much weight I still have to lose to be even close to a healthy weight.
Have any of you struggled with the same thing? I used to use the sheer amount of weight I needed to lose as a means of psychological sabbotage for not even making the attempt at weight loss, and it still overwhelms me sometimes.
