Hello Everyone,

I am the son of a serial dieter, my mother has attended many weight loss programmes, and some of them more than once over the years. I'm sure she has had some success, but not enough to carry on with whatever plan she is on at the time.

I'm 28, and since I can remember, weight has always been an issue. I'd be a millionaire if I got a pound for everytime she ate something bad for her and said

"nevermind, I'll start the diet on Monday"

It seems to me that weight loss programmes do work, but more important it is the motivation to actually follow the plan you are on by avoiding unsuitable foods and partaking in physical exercise.

My questions to you is:

In your honest opinion - what is the reason you have not lost weight?
(e.g. over-eating? emotional eating? not exercising? not enough time? lose motivation? Don't believe you can? etc...)

I'd really appreciate your feedback

I do take exception to your assumption that none of us on here have lost weight. This actually turns out not to be the case - I, for one, have lost at least 15 kg, if not more.

However, I think the reason people don't lose weight is that they restrict themselves unnecessarily, rather than working their way into it gradually, and end up feeling hungry and deprived, so give up. It is far better to keep a food journal, and make slow, gradual changes to the proportions of what one eats, until one is eating mostly wholegrains, vegetables and fruit, with some protein and unsaturated fat, and as little saturated fat, sugar and alcohol as one can manage, bearing in mind that nobody is perfect, and eating well 80-90% of the time is fine. And when one falls off the wagon, as invariably happens, to ignore it and carry on regardless - no allowing a large slice of cake (or a large pork pie, in my case!) to be an excuse for a stuffed crust pizza, or vice versa.

I think learning to cook is one of the biggest things people can do to help themselves - ready-meals and take-aways are great servants but poor masters, and while once in awhile is good, every day is bad.

I'm out of time now, but you get the idea!

Hi,

I agree with Annabel.

And the reason I visit this board is to tell people that it is possible. About 4 years ago I lost 42lbs and have kept it off ever since (to put that into context I now weigh about 118lbs so it was a considerable percentage of my body weight). Women use message boards for alot of reasons, not just as a question and answer session!

It sounds like your mum might need a bit of a confidence boost, some people who understand and appreciate her situation and someone inspirational to make her believe that even after all this time of trying and not achieving her goals that it can be done. It's so easy to get stuck in a cycle of failure that it's hard to find that motivation and belief that it can be done.

I can imagine it's difficult for you to hear about it all the time too, you've heard it so often what more can you say? It's what Dave Ramsey calls "the powdered butt syndrome" when someone has powdered your butt and changed your nappy they don't really want your advice about anything they think they "should" know about, lol.

I do apologise for the assumption I made and would like to congratulate you on your successes.

I would also like to thank you for your comments. There is no one answer to the problem, but it does all start with people's motivation to a weight loss programme or fitness regime and making their health the highest priority.

Do you agree that its so confusing walking into a supermarket and knowing whats good for you and whats bad?

Thank you again

Hi,

One of the first slimming tips I read was to only shop around the perimeter of the supermarket - that's generally where all the fresh stuff is. The deeper you get into the aisles of the store the more junk there is.

I think we need to re-educate ourselves a little. It seems alot of the time we choose to do things the "easy-hard" way. What I mean by that is we'll buy spend money on something that allows us to kid ourselves that we're doing something because it's easier than to just make that sacrifice and get things done.

Examples of this (imo) are low fat things - we say "oh that's low fat so it's ok" just because it's lower fat doesn't necessarily mean it's better for us BUT we see it advertised as such and can give ourselves a pat on the back (and probably eat twice as much). Also wii fit, it's a game that's kind of pretending to be exercise - could I save myself the cost of the game and just jog on the spot for 30 minutes, yes! Will I? No way! We could do things the "hard-easy" way of learning a bit about nutrition and exercise and doing it. Yes, it'll be harder, yes it might not be as fun but it gets the job done and might even get it done more quickly. But it's not all about what we know a large part of it is about how we feel.

So we know that buying some lean meat, fish or vegetarian source of protein, some fruit and veg and cooking ourselves a nice meal would be best BUT we also give a bit of our knowledge and trust in ourselves away to advertisers that tell us that their diet brand is just as good. It's not that we don't know, it's more that it's easier. It seems that people need things to have an emotional or fun role as well as a functional one. And we have this whole culture set up that healthy isn't fun or luxurious, that it's more expensive and that it's more time consuming. People buy into that if they want to as it's easier to go with the flow than to kick against it.

So, no I don't think supermarket shopping is confusing if you use your rational side, yes I think it can be confusing if you use your emotional side. Hope that makes sense.