When I was at my highest weight of 305, I never completely gave up dieting. I’d be “content” for a while, but inevitably, I’d try some new eating plan in the hopes of losing weight once and for all. And the happy thing for me was that I could lose weight. I’d pretty easily drop 20 pounds but then I’d just as easily gain that 20 pounds back.
What made me quit so soon? Why wasn’t the scale moving motivation enough for me to keep going with my attempt at weight loss? I don’t have the definitive answer, but one little piece of the puzzle for me was that it was hard to do all that work of eating “better” and not have anyone notice.
Because, at 300 pounds, it took a lot more than 20 pounds lost for someone to notice the change. But I didn’t realize that at the time. Instead, I thought that people should just notice. The funny thing was that even I couldn’t tell a difference so I don’t know why I expected/hoped that my friends would be able to.
So, discouraged by my lack of stellar progress and saddened that all my hard work wasn’t being rewarded, I’d quit yet again. The 20 pounds would come back on and guess what? No one even noticed I had gained weight – not that they said anyway.
How do you feel when no one notices that you’ve lost weight? How do you stay motivated?
Obviously it took a long time for me to stay motivated without verbal acknowledgement from people I knew. I let that (and other things) stop me dead in my weight loss tracks.
The final time I lost weight I went into the whole experience with different eyes. Instead of losing weight and achieving a new level of fitness for praise and acknowledgement from other people, I embarked on my journey for me.
♥ I was the one who needed to get fit.
♥ I was the one making daily choices that would help or hurt my health.
♥ I was the one wearing sized 28 clothes.
♥ I was the one who could change my life and reap the benefits.
I have to be honest though – it was still hard to push through alone. 20 pounds down. No one noticed. 30 pounds. No one said anything. It wasn’t until I had lost 50 pounds that the first person noticed I had lost some weight, and even then, they weren’t entirely sure. I still remember my good friend saying, “Diane, have you lost some weight?” She asked tentatively, as if she didn’t want to hurt my feelings if I hadn’t.
I wanted to grab her and jump up and down but I was afraid I’d hurt her so I just calmly said, “Yes, I’ve lost some weight.” I didn’t tell her how much and she didn’t ask. It was a still a good feeling to finally have her notice.
But her noticing didn’t increase my motivation to lose weight that last time because her reactions and the reactions of other people weren’t why I was finally lose weight. I was losing weight because I knew I needed to and was ready. I knew that no matter what other people thought – I needed to stay motivated for me.
Where are you on your journey? Do you have a hard time staying motivated if people don’t seem to notice your efforts? Diane
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