Why Is Weight Loss So Hard?

“A strong woman looks a challenge in the eye and gives it a wink.”
- Gina Carey, American Filmmaker and R& B Singer

You’re a busy woman. As you were tackling life, slaying dragons, and becoming successful, you lost yourself along the way. When you look in the mirror, you don’t even recognize yourself.

Your life looks good from the outside – nice husband, great children, fabulous house, cabin, cars, and you go on vacations. But you’re a mess on the inside. Miserable. It feels like you’re in such a life-rut and you don’t understand why. You have every- thing you’ve ever wanted – except for how you look and feel about yourself. You’re overweight. Fat, if you will. You used to run and be active but you’re now out of breath after a flight of stairs. “How’d I let myself get this way?” you wonder. It started after having kids. You were just so busy and tired. You never lost the baby weight and then with all of life’s stresses and demands you put on even more weight. There are twenty-plus extra pounds on your body and you hate it.

It’s not like you’re lazy. You’ve done all the diets. You name it, you’ve tried it – Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, Atkins, South Beach, Whole 30, plus a gazillion more. Maybe you even went keto or tried paleo for a while. Of course, all of the diets worked.

You lost weight when you were on a diet but it was just so hard to stick to it. Diets are restrictive. It became more exhausting for you to be on the diet than to just be miserable with your weight. You couldn’t have a social life, traveling messed things up, and it seemed that by Thursday, you lost your willpower and discipline anyway. You seem to always cheat and fall off the wagon. Then the pounds came piling back on.

You are miserable and unhappy with your body. You hate going out; you feel embarrassed. You have nothing to wear and everything you do try on looks horrible. You can’t even shop in your favorite stores anymore – nothing fits you. There are five different sizes of clothes in your closet right now ranging from your “skinny” ones to your “fat” ones. You hate being in photographs. This breaks your heart because you have few pictures of yourself with your kids. Then there’s your husband. He’s a good man. You were thin and fit when you met. You don’t know how he can stand the sight of you or feel attracted to you in a physical/sexual way, but he seems to. He tells you he loves you and wants you. But you constantly turn him down for sex. You pretend you’re asleep or tell him you’re too tired. You just don’t feel sexy. You don’t even get undressed around him. Eventually, you know you need to have sex to fulfill his sexual needs, but you hate the experience. The lights are off.

You’re so self-conscious. There’s no way you can be on top. That used to be your favorite but it horrifies you to think of what he sees, all your rolls, your flabby body. You just feel so gross. Your sex life is awful, and you know you’re the one to blame. You’ve noticed he’s stopped trying to initiate things. You’re worried he’s going to go seek it elsewhere. He’s not as affectionate as he used to be. No hugs or handholding, no gentle touches as he passes by. It’s almost like the worse you feel about yourself the less he touches you. To be honest, you don’t even talk anymore. It’s like you’re roommates raising kids and running a household.

You don’t know what’s wrong with yourself. Your friend said it was hormones – that weight loss becomes impossible at this age. You don’t know about that. There are plenty of thin women walking around, so that can’t be it. You keep wondering why this is so hard for you. Your mom had weight issues. You remember her taking you to her Weight Watchers meetings when you were a teenager and you learned how to count points. You weren’t even overweight back then.

At least, you didn’t think so. And, you were at a good weight in your twenties too, before kids. A weight that you felt sexy at, strong, confident, and fit at.

Admit it. You like food. And wine. At the end of a long day, food gives you everything you need. You get to have a break and just sit and eat and you don’t have to think about anything. You don’t eat all the time or binge every day. Not at all. You think you and your family eat pretty healthy. You like cooking but you don’t have a ton of time for it, so often you get takeout when life gets busy and the kids have activities.

On work trips, you know you eat and drink more than you should – it’s like a little escape for you from the busyness, the responsibilities. It’s an easy way to forget about all of life’s stresses.

You need to get back in control. It’s like you’ve said before, “Screw it, I don’t care.” But deep down, you do. You know this is affecting other areas of your life. It’s like your self-loathing is oozing into everything – your health, your marriage, even the relationships you have with your kids. They ask you to do things with them like go for a bike ride or pass a ball around and you always say “no.” You make excuses up – too tired, your knee hurts, maybe on the weekend – but they’ve heard this for years. You feel guilty. Like you’re a bad role model.

The fact is, women are overweight because they overeat for either or both of the following reasons:

1. They truly don’t understand the consequences of their actions and the impact that their food choices have on their body

2. They don’t care about that because they’re so busy using food and alcohol as a coping mechanism that emotional eating is now their habit

The dieting industry is a $70 billion industry that preys on the vulnerabilities and insecurities of women. They know that when a woman gets desperate enough, she’s pretty much willing to do anything to lose the weight. The dieting methods/tactics that exist right now are horrible. There’s everything from injections, drops, pills, powders, perfumes, and food supplements that all guarantee weight loss. And, let’s face it – diets do work; the weight comes off. But the minute a woman stops dieting, she puts the weight right back on and more. It’s a vicious cycle. It’s punishing.

There’s a better, simpler way. If you are truly ready to change, then change is possible, but it does mean doing it differently. It means having a willingness of spirit to trust the wisdom that is in these pages as well as your intuition.