Sustainability....

[therealdlg]

Hey friends! Ive been trying to lose weight all my life and never had true success. Im 42 now and 300 pounds..6'2" tall. My struggle has always been sustainability. Im crank up the workouts...eat clean...lose 30-40 pounds and then i burn out and lose motivation. This happening time and time again is crippling mentally. How do I overcome this and lock in for the long run?

 

[byefatlicia]

Hey friends! Ive been trying to lose weight all my life and never had true success. Im 42 now and 300 pounds..6'2" tall. My struggle has always been sustainability. Im crank up the workouts...eat clean...lose 30-40 pounds and then i burn out and lose motivation. This happening time and time again is crippling mentally. How do I overcome this and lock in for the long run?

Have you started pinning GLP1s yet? bcuz this was the answer for me. No mo YoYo fo sho!!!

 

[dondada109]

Honestly, don’t lose 30–40 pounds and then think, “Wow, I made it, now I can have a cheat day,” only to stop tracking and fall back into old habits.

Instead, aim for the best shape of ur life. Really commit to getting lean. Don’t focus on seeing a lower number on the scale, focus on looking athletic, muscular, and having a low body fat percentage. Get lean enough that u start seeing vascularity in your arms, so you see something u never did

By the time you reach that point, training and eating properly will have become a habit. And chances are, u will value maintaining that physique more than having random cheat meals all the time

Also, take a deep dive into body recomposition and learn how to lose fat while holding on to or even build muscle. Most people know very little about nutrition. They just eat less, live on 2–3 salads a day, barely get any protein, cut out all carbs, have no energy for training, and eventually burn themselves out because the approach isn’t sustainable and reasonable

Understand how your body works. When u wake up, get protein in to stay out of a catabolic state (after 8-12 hours no food). Before training, eat some carbs because ur glycogen stores will be lower and u need energy to get muscle stimulus. A lot of the weight people lose during the first 2 weeks is glycogen and water, not pure fat

After training, don’t be afraid to eat a proper meal, ur body needs protein and carbs to recover. Don’t do a hard workout and then think, “I’m just going to eat a salad and stay hungry until tomorrow morning.” That’s not how it works

Learn nutrition, build sustainable habits, train hard, keep your protein high, and focus on improving your physique not just making the number on the scale smaller.

 

[wildweasel]

Hey friends! Ive been trying to lose weight all my life and never had true success. Im 42 now and 300 pounds..6'2" tall. My struggle has always been sustainability. Im crank up the workouts...eat clean...lose 30-40 pounds and then i burn out and lose motivation. This happening time and time again is crippling mentally. How do I overcome this and lock in for the long run?

you are burning yourself out. its a marathon not a sprint, stop treating it like a sprint. people who treat it as a sprint stop making progress.

maintin reasonable daily deficits in calories, get exercise you enjoy not exercise you feel you are obligated to do. count macros.

make lifestyle changes. change eating habbits. explore cooking new cuisines and as you do so dont use shit ingredients that are high fat, if it says yogurt, use fat free yogurt when you try making your indian curry.

it sounds dumb, but clean up the house. change shit up. make yourself feel like a new you. find something to occupy your time that you find interesting. hiking. walks, idk, you do you.

of course drugs help. glp1, cagri, etc, but dont use those as a crutch, use them instead to accelerate the results of the new habits you form.

 

[lessthanhalf]

Your experience with long term weight loss is completely normal. Nearly everyone who loses weight with diet and exercise puts it back on again. I think once the system that regulates appetite and weight gets damaged, it does not really seem to recover in most people, and especially so if the obesity is severe, so to sustain weight loss requires a lower calorie intake than normal due to metabolic adaptation, plus increased hunger due to weight loss. This combo is almost impossible to overcome, and few succeed.

GLP drugs are by a long way the best solution that has ever existed for this problem, with the possible exception of bariatric surgery, which is even more effective, but comes with costs.

So start reta or tirz and stay on it once the weight is lost, and you should only have to lose the weight one last time. And yes you should absolutely use it as a crutch, that is what it is for , the long term treatment of severe obesity. The more you set up losing the weight as some sort of typical diet/exercise program, the more likely it is that it will be unsustainable long term, as if eating less or even exercising is requiring constant mental effort , then eventually people just get worn out from it and give up and put the weight back on. Making sensible better food choices on glp's is a good idea, but thankfully they actually work to do that anyway without any special effort. For long term health good diet and exercise are important, but GLP drugs do cause weight loss regardless of changes in lifestyle. And long term GLP drugs reduce the risks of a large number of serious illnesses, partly due to weight loss and partly as a drug effect, and the worse the obesity, the more important this becomes.

 

[therealdlg]

Your experience with long term weight loss is completely normal. Nearly everyone who loses weight with diet and exercise puts it back on again. I think once the system that regulates appetite and weight gets damaged, it does not really seem to recover in most people, and especially so if the obesity is severe, so to sustain weight loss requires a lower calorie intake than normal due to metabolic adaptation, plus increased hunger due to weight loss. This combo is almost impossible to overcome, and few succeed.

GLP drugs are by a long way the best solution that has ever existed for this problem, with the possible exception of bariatric surgery, which is even more effective, but comes with costs.

So start reta or tirz and stay on it once the weight is lost, and you should only have to lose the weight one last time. And yes you should absolutely use it as a crutch, that is what it is for , the long term treatment of severe obesity. The more you set up losing the weight as some sort of typical diet/exercise program, the more likely it is that it will be unsustainable long term, as if eating less or even exercising is requiring constant mental effort , then eventually people just get worn out from it and give up and put the weight back on. Making sensible better food choices on glp's is a good idea, but thankfully they actually work to do that anyway without any special effort. For long term health good diet and exercise are important, but GLP drugs do cause weight loss regardless of changes in lifestyle. And long term GLP drugs reduce the risks of a large number of serious illnesses, partly due to weight loss and partly as a drug effect, and the worse the obesity, the more important this becomes.

Ty so much for a thoughtful response. Sure there are the health affect of being this big...but the mental aspect is a whole other animal. Im scared to death this will just be another failure of mine. I just want to love then man in the mirror..not vainly but in a way that I dont want to cry.

 

[sheilarae74]

The only way for me, and a lot of others I'm sure, to succeed in keeping the weight off is through GLPs and other assorted peptides. Unless you plan on counting calories and exercising consistently for the rest of your life without fail. I personally would never be able to pull that off.

 

[lessthanhalf]

Though I lost most of the weight without GLP drugs, and sadly it was a long way from the first time, they have made a huge difference in terms of quality of life, or just feeling I can relax a bit about food and eating, without suddenly stacking on kilos per week. A year of maintaining a 70kg weight loss without GLP drugs versus a year and a half with them is really a different experience. I no longer have to constantly force myself to eat less than my body tells me to, I am still being pretty careful about the types of food I eat, but so long as I stick to foods that not extremely calorie dense or addictive I can eat as much as I need to, to not be hungry. Before it seemed like a choice, be thin and permanently hungry , or put weight on.

It certainly has not solved all my problems, but it is a much more comfortable experience being in my body than it was and I appreciate being able to move around and do things that were more or less impossible at 145kg.

 

[Grogu]

Ty so much for a thoughtful response. Sure there are the health affect of being this big...but the mental aspect is a whole other animal. Im scared to death this will just be another failure of mine. I just want to love then man in the mirror..not vainly but in a way that I dont want to cry.

About half way through my journey of losing 120 pounds (at this point) and binge watching about 100 episodes of My 600lbs Life , I came to the realization that, like many people in those episodes, my lifetime of obesity was probably partly related to some underlying psychological issue(s). It was tough to admit and my family was very confused as to why I would seek therapy, but I did just that. It was extremely helpful talking to someone to help wrap my head around some of the learned behaviors and coping mechanisms that have persisted into my adult life from childhood. It didn't take many sessions, so I would encourage you to consider CBT at some point. It was really helpful.

Also consider this graph when you are having thoughts about the persistence of weight loss on these medications. Because I've also had those same exact thoughts as you. A common thought would be something like: Why is this time losing 100+ pounds going to be any different that the prior 3 times in my life that I did the same thing.. .

This is the long-term outcomes on tirzepatide over a number of years. Notice how the weight loss curve flattens and then stays persistent for years. YEARS. It only starts to increase because participants were taken off the medication. This is a beautiful thing to me and probably what I'm looking forward to most. Getting off the Yo-Yo. I've attached the underlying study.

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[Jfrick11]

Hey friends! Ive been trying to lose weight all my life and never had true success. Im 42 now and 300 pounds..6'2" tall. My struggle has always been sustainability. Im crank up the workouts...eat clean...lose 30-40 pounds and then i burn out and lose motivation. This happening time and time again is crippling mentally. How do I overcome this and lock in for the long run?

Hey friend.

I don't think your problem is motivation. Someone who has lost 30-40 pounds multiple times is clearly capable of doing the work. If motivation was the issue, you never would have gotten that far in the first place.

What you're describing is what happens when obesity is treated like a willpower problem instead of a disease. Every time you lose weight, your body starts pushing back. Hunger increases, cravings increase, and it becomes harder and harder to maintain the same habits that got the weight off.

After years of that cycle, of course you're exhausted.

Please don't look at those past attempts as failures. I see someone who has spent years fighting their own biology and keeps getting back up to try again.

I don't think the goal is to find more motivation.....The goal is to find a plan that's sustainable so you don't have to be perfect every day and enough that you don't have to rely on motivation forever.

 

[birdwhacker]

Honestly, don’t lose 30–40 pounds and then think, “Wow, I made it, now I can have a cheat day,” only to stop tracking and fall back into old habits.

Instead, aim for the best shape of ur life.

Terrible advice. Listen to this dork and you'll end up with a wife that's younger than you. Is that really something you have the income to support?

 

[dondada109]

Terrible advice. Listen to this dork and you'll end up with a wife that's younger than you. Is that really something you have the income to support?

The curse of attracting women with BBLs and a blue link in her insta bio

 

[LabRatts]

Hey friends! Ive been trying to lose weight all my life and never had true success. Im 42 now and 300 pounds..6'2" tall. My struggle has always been sustainability. Im crank up the workouts...eat clean...lose 30-40 pounds and then i burn out and lose motivation. This happening time and time again is crippling mentally. How do I overcome this and lock in for the long run?

until you fix your ego and mental focus shortcomings/issues and continue self-serving your wants rather than serve your bodies needs instead you'll never get anywhere.

No pill nor injection can help you if you're unwilling to change your mindset.

Facts are facts.

 

[lastresort]

Hey friends! Ive been trying to lose weight all my life and never had true success. Im 42 now and 300 pounds..6'2" tall. My struggle has always been sustainability. Im crank up the workouts...eat clean...lose 30-40 pounds and then i burn out and lose motivation. This happening time and time again is crippling mentally. How do I overcome this and lock in for the long run?

What do you mean by crank up the work outs?

Work out has to be sustainable, not something to be done in an "explosions."

 

[lessthanhalf]

until you fix your ego and mental focus shortcomings/issues and continue self-serving your wants rather than serve your bodies needs instead you'll never get anywhere.

No pill nor injection can help you if you're unwilling to change your mindset.

Facts are facts.

I actually think this way of looking at it is entirely wrong. It is viewing the problem as something can be fixed with diet and exercise and an all round better attitude, and I think the evidence says this approach fails in the long term, even if it can produce short term results. One of the problems in obese people is that the mechanism that controls appetite and weight is not working correctly , so the bodies signals of its needs are actually unhelpful, as it is always telling you to eat more regardless of needs, or harm it causes.

GLP drugs are exactly the pill or injection that helps solve obesity for a large percentage of people who use them. Weight loss from GLP drugs does not depend on a better diet or exercise, they make you less hungry so you eat less, and help fix the metabolic state that is messed up in obese people. While a better diet and exercise is definitely a good idea, GLP drugs will work anyway, and they allow weight loss maintenance long term if you stay on them long term.

Using GLP drugs as part of a more traditional diet and exercise approach is actually ignoring their advantages, and puts you at risk of regaining the weight once the unsustainable diet and exercise part of it becomes too hard to adhere to long term. Adapting better eating habits while on GLP's and doing exercise is still a good idea, but I think seeing those aspects as the main part of the solution is actually unhelpful. As once the GLP drugs are stopped at a lower weight doing regular exercise, weight regain will happen for most, providing pretty good evidence that they were not the solution, the GLP drugs were.

 

[therealdlg]

Clearly I don't have it all figured out. That's why I'm here for support... do this can be the very last time I have to feel the way I do. When you include all of the abuse I've been thru... this goes beyond eating better and exercise for me. Im literally working on changing everything about me.. all of the false beliefs and programming I've put up with for 42 years, both from myself and others. Glps are just a tool in praying will help me start unravel the mess inside my head.

 

[lessthanhalf]

If you are not receiving any expert help , maybe if that is accessible, it is worth looking into. It just sounds like you might be depressed?

It is possible to get out of those stuck and horrible states, it is not something I have always or even quickly been able to do , but it can be done. For what it is worth , this is my experience recently.

4 years ago I was living at my ex's house 145kg , barely able to walk a hundred meters without pouring sweat and out of breath, in chronically very poor health. My business had died with covid and I was unemployed and unemployable, forced to sell my house as I could not afford mortgage repayments. And my ex's place was a bit of a dump as she was a hoarder, but I was still grateful to have somewhere to live. I did not realise how depressed I was at that time.

I just worked out a diet that I thought could work, low calorific density and very high protein, and stuck to it. I believed GLP drugs were unaffordable at that time. And just stuck to it, thinking it will not solve everything, but at least if I can get 20 or 30 kilos lighter at least I will be able to move around and do things. It is usually a question of just deciding to do something and sticking to it , not really anything to do with motivation. And slowly it worked, and eventually got to a point where I could start walking, just for 5 minutes a day without my feet hurting too much, and slowly built it up, and got to 75 kg and able to walk for 3 hours in a bit less than a year, where I could start to sort my life out and get my own place and go from there. With the aid of GLP drugs I have managed to keep my weight down and got to 64kg, with overall hugely improved health and quality of life. Not everything is fixed or even fixable but it never is.

 

[Flash-BCR]

Tons of positive vibe and information in this thread...Losing weight is hard. Losing weight with GLP is substantially better/easier. Food cravings go down. Portion cravings go down. You are still aware that you are minimizing food, and cravings creep in, but food is not driving the bus, so to speak...

I am taken in by the OP's postings, and hope that he can not only find a comfortable food relationship through GLP, but a body and mind relationship with himself that is peaceful and positive...