well i have been on this forum before, a good number of years ago now, but thought i'd come back and try again. So last year i started on Optifast, in part because of a back injury (herniated discs and very very bad sciatica) and ended up losing about 37kg. After coming off the shakes (I did all 3 phases of the program) I managed to maintain my weight within about 4-5 kg of the lowest weight that I acheived which I was reasonably happy with, i was still between 90 and 95kg but much better than the nearly 130kg that i had been previously, and i was able to buy clothes in "normal" stores! Anyways, after about 3 or so months of maintaining my weight I became depressed and had to start on antidepressants (Lexapro).....and here is where my problems started....over the next 3 months I gained a good 20kg, in large part due to the lexapro, whilst only about 5-10% of people on it experience weight gain as a side effect, apparently I am one of those people, something I wish I had realised when on it previously, as now when i look back a few years the first time i was on it i gained about 30kg in something up to 12 months (not sure of the exact time frame but 12 months after i started lexapro i was 30kg heavier). Needless to say I am now no longer on lexapro, and since ceasing it my weight gain has slowed but not stopped, mainly because I am not eating well, unfortunately i am an emotional eater and gaining all that weight back was fairly emotional and now that i've started eating bad again its hard to stop. I have also recently injured my back again at work (similar but different problem to last year), which means for the last 2 weeks i have spent my days sitting or lying on the couch because anything else I do just causes me pain. Thankfully I am booked in for a cortisone injection in 6 days so that should at least take care of the lack of activity problem, though the boredom and pain of the last two weeks seems to have just thrown any progress I was making on my eating out the window! (pain and illness are 2 of my other triggers for eating crap!).
So, anyways, I see a dietician regularly and she is of some help, though currently isn't being of significant help, we sit down and talk about what i should be eating and "minimising the damage" but I just can't seem to stick to that plan. I've spent so much of the past month doing internet searches trying to find that magical thing that will work for me. My dietician wants me to prove to myself that I can lose weight without shakes, something which i do know, but honestly the most successful method i have ever used to lose weight has been the optifast shakes, i think the most i have ever lost with diet and exercise (even on various programs which offer support) has been about 10kg.
So anyway, I am thinking perhaps that I might go back onto Optifast for a short ish period of time, I would like to get back to under 100kg (currently in the vicinity of 20kg away), and then transition over to diet and exercise for the remainder of my weight loss, which was the plan last time, and I was in the process of doing that however life and the universe apparently had other plans. And I know that this time I will need to ensure good support from dietician and whoever else when I come to that point. I also thinking just doing the 2 shakes a day and a main meal plus snacks (fruit and yoghurt) rather than the more extreme "intensive phase" which uses 3 shakes and 2 cups of non-starchy vegies a day, just don't know if i'm up for that level of strictness currently.
I've also noted on this site the advertisement of weight loss retreats today, and find them intriguing....has anyone gone to one of these or know someone that has...thinking that may be an option down the line when i have some money.
Not going to be starting any optifast or anything till at least thursday this week, have no money (too many dr's bills!!!), just gonna try and "minimise the damage" as my dietician says and eat proper food instead of takeaway and other junk, which being that I have no money shouldn't be too hard coz I only have "real" food in my house currently!
Anyways, sorry for the lengthy post, but just wanted to put it all out there, so to speak
