Maintenance problems

[Nelly]

By around October of last year, I pretty much reached my weight loss goal and I was feeling really great. I’d been working really hard to eat right and to exercise very regularly. I got one of those tracker things that lets you monitor your steps and your calorie burning and I was monitoring that all the time. Now I just can’t seem to get back into it and I’ve gained 5 pounds since my lowest point.

I don’t know what to do to get back on track. The weather makes it hard for me to walk – and walking was my biggest regular exercise – and I just find that I’m hungry all of the time so I’m eating more than I was.

I know that I need to apply more willpower but I can’t seem to find it. Does anyone have any advice. I don’t want to go back to how I was.

[tobetinytina]

There is no single way to just get your motivation back. This is something that only you can do. You need to pick yourself up, start to focus on your goal again, and do what you did in the first place to get yourself started. Write your goals down, review them every day, and build healthy steps back into your lifestyle.

You can do it just a little bit at a time and create short term goals to build you up to your long term goal. Do things to challenge yourself. Like tell yourself that by the end of the winter, you’ll put yourself in good enough shape that you’ll be able to start running when the snow is gone. Or make sure that you trim down the part of you that you dislike the least and build up your muscles in that area so that you won’t just be slimmer but you’ll also look good.

You can do this!

[jan]

That's exactly it. You need to find your own motivation within yourself. What was it that was making your wieght loss so important the last time you were really into it and dedicated? Were you trying to be a certain weight by an event? Did you have something specific in mind? What caused you to decide to drop the pounds and then stick to it at full tilt? When you identify that, remind yourself of how important it is or create a new version of that goal if it has already passed. It will help you to start driving things forward again and to put yourself back on track. All you need to do is get back into your routine and see one pound lost on the scale. ONce you do that, you'll find that the drive will start coming back because you'll be seeing results again.

[tobetinytina]

Start gradually. Instead of making your goal to jump right back into how you were when you were at your best, try building your way pack in a manageable way. YOu will find it a lot less overwhelming if you try to ease your way back into living a healthier lifestyle. Out of the number of days that you currently eat unhealthy foods in a week, try kicking one of them to start. The rest can stay put. Then just try to squeak in an extra 2 days of exercise over what you’re doing now. So if you’re only exercising 1 or 2 times a week, then make it 3 or 4 instead. Then just see where that takes you. You might find that as you get into it, your motivation will naturally start to build again.

[jenny25]

Start changing things up. I just finished reading this thing about how to get past a plateau when you’ve hit the wall and it said that you should really change up what you are doing to get your motivation back.

It recommended that you change when you exercise and what you do, so that things are always new and somewhat fresh for you. Try something new like go to the pool or sign up for a piloga class if you’ve never really done that before. It also says that if you usually exercise in the afternoon, then try doing it in the morning before you go to work. That way it is a new routine that you can build from scratch with fresh motivation and drive. Plus it means that you have time to get it over with right away and then you can just move on with your day.

[chefmel]

It sounds like it’s time to recreate your strategy. If you’re struggling with thigns as they are, then you have to change things. They’re not working. Try to think about what helped you to lose weight and re-incorporate the best parts of that into your life.