I was raised in a heavyset household. My parents have been obese (pretty consistently >300 lbs) for my entire life. I was a little pudgy as a kid, but not terribly so, and naturally I wasn't really taught a ton of great habits or encouraged to have a healthy relationship with food. I slimmed down to 180 lbs my senior year of high school, and I was pretty happy with my weight at that time. College (and especially post-college) life steadily packed on the pounds until I found myself here at the same weight my parents have bounced on either side of. At one point in the last year when both of my parents were doing fairly well on their respective diets, I actually weighed more than both of them. That was hard.
Tangentially, I have had lower back problems since I was 12 years old. I won't detail the whole history (it's extensive), but suffice to say that I chronically deal with pretty severe sciatica from a herniated disc that lays me out about once a year. Naturally, losing weight would help out with that. What has started to scare me and become a wake-up call is that I am starting to experience knee pain.
The significance of the knee pain is that both of my parents are now dealing with loss of mobility, especially my mom. Her knees are at a point of being bone-on-bone (cartilage break-down and such), and she has been dealing with severe back and hip pain recently which have finally been diagnosed as spinal stenosis. She is terrified and in so much pain, while also trying to take care of my equally obese grandmother who has nearly no mobility and is about to have a heart valve replaced (a whole 'nother can of worms). My mother doesn't have much by way of treatment options that we know of because no one will do a back operation on a woman of her weight. Also, my dad has breathing issues in addition to really bad knees. And the reality of how I am barreling down the same path as my family is laughing in my face.
I am having a really hard time dealing with my family's declining health and what I can/should do to help them, and I am becoming increasingly fearful for my own health. I am 30 years old now. I know that's not old by any means, but it definitely feels like it is old enough to stop screwing around. I won't lie; it hasn't been a defining moment of "oh, shoot, I gotta change!" It's been natural. It's been using MyFitnessPal as it's intended. If it goes in my mouth, it goes on that tracker. It's actually looking at the nutrition macros instead of just shooting for "staying under" (and failing when I decide to binge). It's being willing to grocery shop instead of eat out all the time. It's paying a little extra for healthier foods I enjoy, and taking the time to measure out servings and create meals. It's been not buying the on sale soda and then drinking it all like it's a competition.
I haven't weighed myself in a long time, so I don't really know where I'm at, but I do know that I am already feeling like I have more energy on my walks with my dog. I'm gently looking forward to taking care of myself. I'm not really looking at "losing X amount of weight" or looking a certain way.
I just want to be healthy... and as much as it hurts to put it this way, I just don't want to wind up like my parents.
[link] [comments]
source https://www.reddit.com/r/loseit/comments/i9f628/nsv_fear_is_decent_motivator/
No comments:
Post a Comment