Diet help

[maza1]

Hi Everyone. , I need help to lose weight , I am 60 and I am finding it hard. I need to lose 4 stone for my healths sake ,I hope there is someone out there who can give me some tips

[Zest Healthy BMI]

Hi Maza1,

Have you looked at the NHS websight pages? There's a structured 12 week plan with lots of tips and suggestions for healthy weight loss and exercise. It's very good.

Wishing you lots of success with your weight loss journey, and just join in with the various posts and hopefully you'll feel supported and will be on your way towards a lighter healthier future!

Lowcal

[maza1 in reply to Zest]

Thank you for your advice and help ,I have now looked at the 12 week plan and I am going to give it a go , I will need all the help I can get , I need to do this to improve my health , I want to lose 4 stone and I really find it hard but with support I will get there . Thankyou

[Zest Healthy BMI in reply to maza1]

Hi Maza,

Glad you found it ok, and that you like the look of it. The people in this forum are all very supportive, so anytime you have questions or anything, just post them or join in on existing posts - it all helps.

Wishing you a great first week.

Lowcal

[Candystripe]

Hi Maza,

Well, I am 61 and since the 1st June I have lost 4st and 1 lbs (yes of course the 1 lb is important!) My advice to you is to forget the four stone completely and work on small achievable goals. I started out at 18st 4.5lbs so my first goal was to drop down into the 17's. Once I had achieved that my next goal was to be 17st 11.5lbs (half a stone) and then 17st 4.5lbs for the stone, so forth and so on. It just didn't feel as daunting and I didn't have to think about "what if I can't do it" because the small steps were realistic. Even now I haven't thought about an ideal weight as I'm still just chipping away!

I would also say to you, don't ever say you can never eat food that you enjoy, just be crafty about it. When I go home I sometimes like to have fish and chips once in a while, but I take off the batter and just have half a dozen chips. When I go out for a meal I prepare myself beforehand by telling myself not to have the bread roll, chose wisely and just have a fresh fruit salad for sweet if it's available. You might miss the over indulgence at the time, but you feel so much better for being good afterwards!

Also do whatever exercise you can according to your ability. You don't have to run a marathon or spend hours each day performing the ritual, just do what you think you will enjoy and try pushing yourself a little further each day/week.

Join us on Mondays for Lowcals weekly weigh in and let us know how you are doing, what you are achieveing and what you wish to do for the following week. It's a great support group here. Good luck.

[maza1]

Thank you , I will join the Lowcals weekly weigh in , I can see this will give motivation to stick to a diet and to find out how others are getting on , The exercise bit is difficult for me , its not an excuse not to do any but I also suffer from Agoraphobia so I cannot join a gym but I am willing to try any tips any one can pass on . I am finding everyone on this site so helpful and I am very grateful to you all

[Zest Healthy BMI in reply to maza1]

Hi Maza,

I'm excited you're going to join us for the Monday weigh-in. That's really great. We'll look forward to seeing you there.

Hope your week is going well so far.

Lowcal

[returner]

Hi maza1,

I'm now 60 too and I lost a tad over 4 stones over about 6 months nearly two years ago.

So, it can be done.

It's really about changing your eating habits and upping your exercise and activity levels a bit. Or perhaps changing your relationship with food would be a better way of explaining it.

Food is something that we have lots of ideas and feelings about. It's often very much tied in with ideas of approval or of being loved / valued. We often learn not very good - or sometimes just flippin' awful - eating habits from our families or from various peer groups as we journey through life.

Basically, however, our human digestive system just wasn't designed for the sort of eating that many of us do nowadays and certainly not for the sort of eating that we are only too often encouraged by manufacturers / retailers / caterers / TV chefs to do.

You see humans, quite simply, used to be hunter-gatherers. They foraged for nuts, fruits and berries and the like on most days, varying by season, and from time to time when the "men" (usually) of the group came back with an appropriate catch (wild boar / deer / whatever) the group would have a feast. It's probably because of these feasts that we have gall bladders, to help digest the fats on these community / family blow-outs. It's also why we have stomachs capable of stretching far beyond our day to day needs. In time gone by, our predecessors often lived a life of 'famine and feast'.

But of course, that doesn't happen so much nowadays. Food is only TOO readily available and only TOO often we eat more (either a greater amount, or a greater frequency) than we really need. Nowadays our lives could almost be described as 'feast and feast and more feast'. And our body (perhaps as a contingency against the next famine) stores the excess calories as body fat and we become overweight. And, due to the changes in our endocrine system, becoming overweight causes you to be more likely to become even more overweight.

But that can be stopped and reversed.

And there's plenty of people on this blog that have done exactly that.

[maza1 in reply to returner]

Thankyou for your reply to me I think the support I am getting is great , I hope I can do the same as you and get rid of my 4 stone and then keep it off , You are an inspiration to anyone wanting to do this , its so good that if you have a question or a problem that the people on this site are all too willing to show you the right direction , I would like to Thank you ALL , maz

[westonmill]

Its small changes that are needed with calorie counting,and portion control.and whatever excersise you can do ,I only walk,as I am 65 and find it difficult to exersise,you could see through your doctor if there's a weight management program near you,or log on to the weight management web sight ,hope this has helped

[maza1]

Thankyou for your advice , you don't know how much it means to have some help ,I am finding this site GREAT, MAZ