My Journey With Weight Loss – Not Everything Happens The Way They Say

Another day, another excellent training session followed by a long walk to the pier and back. So far this week I have managed to do at least 25,000 steps each day and have walked/run 10-11 miles each day. I’m feeling great helped by a few new summer wardrobe items purchase in the past few days though I admit some are for walking outdoors as the temperature gets warmer.

Not everything you hear about weight loss will happen to you. For example, about 5 years ago I seemed to lose my ability to have a good night’s sleep. Previously I had been one of those 8 hours a night sleepers and always woke up feeling refreshed. And then one day I lost that ability. Nothing had changed, I just stopped being able to sleep more than 4-5 hours a night and I was exhausted all the time. I started having to take intermittent sleeping pills which at least let me sleep deeply occasionally. I was so excited to read that as I kept losing weight that a benefit was better sleep especially if like me you were obese. Absolutely incorrect, or at least for me. I still struggle to get a good night’s sleep despite my normal weight. I still at least one night each week take a sleeping pill just to get a good sleep in. I have been a bit frustrated that the internet is perpetuating this lie. Sigh, I hope if you are doing this journey you have better success in this area than I did.

Now this next one is a bit personal. I had been going along with great success, weight was coming off, my medical issues were drastically improving and mentally I was feeling great. Then when I hit the 60 lbs mark I slammed into a wall. My body decided to drastically rebel and I got constipated. When this situation continued I did what all intelligent, well educated women do, I consulted Dr Google. Everything I read said hydrate well, eat lots of fruits and veg, eat plenty of whole grains and make sure to exercise. Guess what, I was doing all of those things but to no avail. Finally I consulted my real doctor (who has gotten used to dealing with the fact I am a bit neurotic and paranoid) as I thought something must be horribly wrong. She reminded me that all of my regular medical test results had come back normal so it would be pretty hard for something to be wrong given there was no indication of it. She also talked me through the fact that my body was basically protecting itself by going into starvation mode. It had done so because all of the stored up fuel I had for so long (read ‘fat’) was now going away so my body was trying to protect itself from eminent danger. Ok, that is not what Dr Google said but in reality this made sense to me. Simple solution, she told me, you just need to take daily fiber supplements. Hmm, I thought, now I kind of feel like an old woman. But, she was right. I take the fiber supplement and that prevents my body from ‘hoarding’ anything and I guess I just have to get over the old lady thoughts.

Ultimately this weight loss journey can be very individualized and you just need to go with the flow. Your body reacts to you, not what others have experienced. Maybe for you everything happens in a positive way and all those awesome benefits of weight loss happen for you. Or, maybe like me there’s a few things missing and some others that no one talks about. The bottom line is somewhere along this journey there will be a lot of positives and that is what you should look for rather than having the expectation that the journey won’t be without several bumps in the road. Oh, and using real medical professionals is always the better choice compared to using Dr Google.