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« on: July 28, 2016, 05:41:05 am »
When I was younger, I had that kind of metabolism that made most people hate me (or accuse me of being anorexic). I was CRAZY thin and I ate ALL the time. And not healthy food. Oh, no, no. Fast food, chips, soda, ice cream... Just absolute garbage, all the time. And I was always thin. Always hungry, in fact.
Now I'm 31, and a few years ago, my body changed. It wasn't gradual, either. Within a week I went from Olive Oyl to not being able to button my pants and having to go buy new clothes. I am told this is known as "getting older", an apparently irreversible process.
I'm still far from fat. But I still have super thin arms and a tiny head, so the fat that's built up in my hips, stomach, thighs, and butt really stands out. I don't like it. I'm trying to lose a bit of weight. I know I'll never be as thin as I used to be, but I'd like to slim down a little bit. I try to exercise, but due to various health problems mostly related to breathing, joints, and tendons, my ability to exercise is severely restricted (by doctor's orders). I play Kinect Sports and Dance Central 3. I do sit-ups and various simple exercises at home that don't cause me any damage. But they're really not enough to make up for a high-calorie diet. I need to eat less.
I've been trying to eat healthy for the past year or so. I eat a shitton of vegetables every day - I always have. I love veggies. Great big salads, steamed veggies, roasted veggies, all kinds of veggies. I have switched from eating eggs and buttered toast for breakfast, to eating oatmeal. The bread I eat is dark and full of seeds. I cook at home as much as possible, and when I have to order food, I always go for something low in salty fatty stuff. I very rarely eat meat - it's expensive and I prefer beans, tofu, etc. I don't use salt at all - the only salt I get is what's already in the food I eat (bread, etc.). I try to snack on nuts and raisins instead of sweets. When I pack a snack to take to work, it's apples and carrots and cucumber. I drink green tea with no sugar added to it, or on rare occasions, black coffee, and tons of water.
I am, without a doubt, still getting plenty of calories and nutrition. Today, for breakfast, I had two small pieces of dark toast with peanut butter and a cup of plain full-fat yogurt with chia seeds in it. Between breakfast and lunch I downed an apple, a carrot, and half a cucumber, all cut up into manageable pieces for me to much on while I worked. For lunch I had leftover roasted vegetables and tofu - a pile of roast potatoes, peppers, carrots, zuchinni, and mushrooms, along with a big slab of fried tofu which I cooked up and tossed on there this morning to make the lunch more filling. There was a LOT of olive oil in that lunch, and it was mostly potatoes and tofu. All together, this should be more than enough nutrition to get me through until I leave work in a few hours. I'm not running around, here. I'm sitting at a desk staring at a computer screen, literally all day. And based on the current size of my gut, I know I'm getting plenty more nutrition than I need.
And I am STARVING.
I'm so hungry it's making me dizzy. It's giving me a headache. I can't concentrate on my work. All I can think about is how badly I want to eat. It's always this way. All day, I'm hungry. I fantasize about french fries and hamburgers and ice cream. I'm so hungry I can't do my job. It seems that until I eat something unhealthy - fatty or sugary, generally - I never feel satiated, no matter how much healthy stuff I eat. Presumably, after so many years of eating crap, I'm addicted to the fat and sugar - but even after a year of trying to give it up, it still won't stop. Inevitably, at least a few times a week I cave and eat something really bad for me. I feel like it's undoing all the healthy eating, and I haven't managed to lose a single bit of weight. But if I don't do that, I can't even function.
I have to be able to do my job. It is a job of the "thinking of new ideas, solving problems, being creative on demand" variety, and I can't do it if I'm dizzy or have a headache or can't concentrate. I'm under pressure to meet deadlines. In the end, I often have to give in and just eat a candy bar or something, just so I can get my work done.
Does anyone have any advice, here? I really do want to get healthier. If it were simply a case of "gotta feel hungry in oder to get healthier", I could deal with that - but the hunger interferes with everything in my life. The hunger screws up my head, and I need my head to be working.
I am not interested in a short-term diet, a fad diet, or some "quick fix". I know that in order to be healthy and look good, I need to find a permanent way of eating which I can keep up forever. But I keep trying and failing. I think I need some help.
