Big weight loss now never hungry

[swampyseifer]

Hi

I've been a long time lurker...

Quick background...I've always been big and just after my wedding I had reached a whopping 26st (i'm 6'1).

I was shamed on a rush-hour bus in London, by a young child saying out loud to his mother that I was the biggest man he'd ever seen and why was I so fat. Clearly it was the kick in the rear I need as I nigh-on instantly went on a diet...

Skip forward 18 months and I am now down to 16st 10 or thereabouts...so a total weight loss of around 9st. I try to get to the gym 3 times a week and I was riding a bike once or so a week, until it was stolen just after christmas...although I bought another one last weekend so hopefully I can start that up again.

Problem is that I've slowly been eating less and less as the diet has gone on and now I think, in the last two months or so, that I've reached a point where I just dont feel hungry anymore.

I'm worried that maybe I'm getting into a mindset of associating not eating with weight loss and its more that I'm almost sub-conciously ignoring my hunger.

My wife says that I'm not the man I was before I dieted and I'm worried that its some kind of deficiancy (from not eating a good diet) coming out as excess tiredness, lack of concentration, forgetfullness and irritability.

Dont get me wrong, the diet has made some amazing changes. My tops have gone from XXXL to currently wearing XL which is starting to be too large and my waist went from 54" to 40" which is also starting to feel baggy.

I'm wondering whether I should go to the doctor about it before I develop a real eating disorder or something?

Sorry, I meandered all over the place a bit with this!

 

[tranquility]

I would say go to the doctor and get some bloods done. Some of the symptoms you mention can be attributed to thryoid/diabetes and also if your electrolytes are out of balance that can affect your memory.

It could just be that as the diet has gone on your body requires less and less food. Try looking at a few nutrition web sites because the food you eat can affect your mood.

I went through a period where I was just too busy to eat especially when at work, so I made a conscious effort by setting reminders on my phone to make me eat something every 4 hours, even if it was just a piece of fruit or a few nuts.

 

[swampyseifer]

I would say go to the doctor and get some bloods done. Some of the symptoms you mention can be attributed to thryoid/diabetes and also if your electrolytes are out of balance that can affect your memory.

It could just be that as the diet has gone on your body requires less and less food. Try looking at a few nutrition web sites because the food you eat can affect your mood.

I went through a period where I was just too busy to eat especially when at work, so I made a conscious effort by setting reminders on my phone to make me eat something every 4 hours, even if it was just a piece of fruit or a few nuts.

Thanks, I do intend to go to my GP about it but I'm worried they'll just think I'm being silly.

I know it makes sense that I should need to eat less as the diet goes on but its not so much that I feel hungry less often, its that I just dont feel hungry.

For example, yesterday, I got up around 930am and didnt eat or drink until around 1pm when the wife practically dragged in me the kitchen and forced me to make something! I only ate half that and then didnt eat again til this morning.

As an aside...just to damage my confidence in my weight loss...was speaking to someone at work who sees me a few times a week and mentioned that I'd been loosing weight (I should mention that out of a team of around 10 people, only 1 person has noticed that I've shed the weight of an average teenager!) and she was just all like, "oh thats good". nothing about, "yes I thought you looked a lot thinner!"

It just reinforces this idea I have that I've not lost anywhere near enough (I still see a fat man in the mirror) and need to loose lots more!

 

[tranquility]

Well I would like to think they would notice 10 stones off but maybe not. I've managed to loose five without any mention of weight loss apart from when I came back into work from a chest infection and a lot of weight dropped off my face very quickly. Sometimes it's a case of them not knowing whether to mention it or not in case it embarrasses us and to be honest it is something I don't like to discuss and never tell anyone outside of minimins about my diet.

At your height unless you have a very small frame I wouldn't think you'd need to loose more than 1-2 stones but you could check it against one of those height/weight charts.

I can go for hours in the mornings without eating and the longer I go the less hungry I am but I make sure eating breakfast is part of my routine. You have noticed you could have a potential problem with eating so you need to be pro-active in dealing with it, the doctor will not think you are silly especially when you detail your symptoms because they are indicative of certain medical conditions.

 

[Jodie-D]

I get like this sometimes now already. Especially in the mornings, I do not feel like eating in the slightest.
I try and have something small like a piece of fruit to say I've eaten etc.. because ive attempted to force myself to have weetabix or something some mornings and I think surely its better to not have it if I dont feel like it just for the sake of having something..

Obviously I've never met you and don't know what you looked like then or now but I'm sorry, almost 10 stone is a substancial and noticeable loss no matter what your size was. There is a woman at my SW group who has about 2/3 stone to go I think and she has lost 8 stone so far, and it is definately noticeable.
I think you need to find a picture of yourself from back then and compare it to one from now so you can see just how far you've come

 

[Jessica_London]

I am a former anorexic and bulimic, and I found that not eating properly messed around with my mindset (irritability, stress, etc - v similar things to what your wife has noticed in you).

My attitude to food has changed now, and I eat (or say no to excess food) for health reasons rather than because I am addicted to the number on the scale.

How often do you weigh yourself? I find the more I weigh myself, the more down I can feel and the more obsessed I get with losing weight. (My story is I'm struggling to lose 2.5st, due to PCOS, so I rarely see a loss on the scales).
Maybe you should live without being a slave to the scales for a while, continuing healthy diet / exercise, and letting yourself notice the baggy trousers etc rather than focussing on the numbers dropping on the scale.

Needing to make such huge lifestyle changes given your former weight will obviously have affected who you are as a person. My dilemma is I'm scared of losing the weight, but hate keeping it - reading these forums, emotions around weight loss are huge.

I know they are expensive, but have you considered visiting a nutritionist? They will be able to look at your diet and tell you if you're missing out on any vits / minerals / food groups. They might also be able to recommend supplements to boost your mood (I've been put on fish oils, B Complex etc).

In terms of talking to people, if you can't afford / don't want a counsellor to help you out, you might think about going to some OA meetings. (the ones at Hind Street in the west end often have more of an overeating focus - the ones at Chelsea hospital have a lot of recovering anorexics and bulimics, which some of the larger members, who are there to find a healthier lifestyle to lose weight, can find a bit triggering - me included!).
OA don't believe in crash diets, just healthy lifestyle changes. No one will try to push diets / diet tips onto you, but the discussions about how to develop a healthy mindset around food are helpful.

I think just realising you're developing a potentially unhealthy attitude to food is important. It took me ten years of eating disorders, no periods, acid-eroded teeth, depression etc etc to accept that I had an unhealthy attitude.

You should capitalise on the attitude you have now, and decide on what action to take, otherwise if you let it go on too long, the journey back is longer and harder.

Thinking of you on your journey
J x

 

[trw1972]

Firstly, well done on the weight loss!, im sure it is very evident on you whatever you see in the mirror.

I know what you mean about reduced appetite, when i switched to healthy eating i found my appetite went down gradually as well (despite increased exercise). I also had other issues such as (TMI alert) i was going a week between going to the loo!

If i was you, id plan your meals a week ahead, write them down as a meal plan and then stick to the plan even if you dont really feel hungry...

 

[swampyseifer]

Thanks for the comments...

I have now been to my GP who was, as expected, unhelpful and didnt really get where I was coming from. He did congratulate me on my weightloss so far though. He tried to fob me off saying that such a large change in my weight is bound to cause some chemical imbalances as my body tries hard to deal with the sudden and extreme changes in food intake and exercise. However I pushed him more and asked if there was a surgery-based nutritionalist I could visit or whether he could refer me to a hospital-based one. He said that he didnt see a need to refer me to the hospital, but there was a HCA (health care assistant I guess) who did see people to assist them in weightloss through looking at diet and nutrition based at the surgery.

Which as an aside is interersting because when I started dieting 18months ago I went to another GP at this surgery and asked if there was someone I could see about dieting and was told they had noone there who could assist!

So anyway, I've been asked to make a food diary for a week which I finish tomorrow and the appointment is next monday.

So we shall see what this HCA says!

 

[xAlisonx]

Well done on your brilliant weight loss. if you suffer a lot from tiredness it may be worth asking for a blood test to check for anaemia, not sure if you've cut back a lot on red meat during your diet?

I work in a predominantly female profession and since feb I've dieted down 3 dress sizes and I have been dissapointed that not one single person commented on my weight loss. I think weight's a sensitive issue though and maybe some people don't like to mention it because of this?

 

[tranquility]

Be prepared to fight your corner with the HCA if necessary on what you are eating as a lot of them run the diabetes clinics as well. You may get lucky though as some of them do call for blood tests if they feel it necessary.

I think the GP is fobbing you off a bit as you seem to have lost the weight steadily from your signature, if you had used Cambridge/Lighter Life or similar and dropped it in a matter of six months then I could see his point.

 

[swampyseifer]

Well not a lot happened tbh...

I saw the HCA on Monday. She started off by complaining that I rarely eat breakfast, then skimmed over the rest didnt seem to really take it in and just said that I might want to cut back on eggs and try getting some more fruit/eg in. So much for hoping she might analyze it a bit and offer advice on whether I'm not getting enough protein or oils or something. Maybe I should just assume it means that she doesnt think I'm missing out on anything, personally I assumed it meant she didnt realy bother looking.

I tried to argue with her a bit and say that my own personal concern is that I have begun to associate that "eating less=weight loss" and then to compound that, it means that when I have a choice of having something I like for dinner with veg, I'm having a larger percentage of the thing I like compared to the veg.

But to be fair, thats not her area...which is why I cant see why the GP sent me in her direction in the first place...so she kinda glazed over and then ploughed back into telling me I've done really well to loose the weight!

Her other advice was to take supplements, like an A-Z tablet once a day, just to make sure that I'm not lacking in anything.

So result....doctor didnt listen/understand/care and passed the buck. The HCA seemed to not care either and saved any effort of checking whether I have any deficiencies by advising to take a supplement to "fill any gaps".

 

[Jessica_London]

I still think an appointment with a nutritionist is a worthwhile investment. Mine was very good at recommending tests for deficiencies, and advising on what I was eating. I had the discussion with her about the weight loss vs eating disorder thing.

You might also find people giving you advice here, if you post a food diary blog. It will also help you notice your emotions each day, and whether they're in correlation with when your calories are higher or lower.

Doctors are notoriously bad at giving anything other than cursory weight advice, so I think you should look to other avenues of support. (From what I've heard many NHS nutritionists aren't very good either). Doctors are keen on pathology, finding what's wrong, whereas good nutritionists will advise on how to make things better than they currently are and how to avoid the pathological symptoms.

The kind of tests that show deficiencies before they become pathological are not generally available on the NHS. The two clinics I'm using are Genova and Red Apple clinics, who both offer a range of deficiency tests...

J

 

[AnnieAnnie]

Depending on how many calories you are eating you may be in ketosis, which acts as an appetite suppressant...

 

[bessie73]

Hey, first of all a very big congrats on losing so much weight. How people at work have not noticed I am not sure, maybe they should get their eyes checked or something. I feel so sad for you because after such an incredible achievement, in which you should be floating on a cloud for achieving, you seem so sad. Doctors are useless, you would think with the obsession over obesity they would be jumping to help you. The only thing I can suggest is you either change your doctor and hopefully get a human being or demand that blood tests are carried out because you know deep down that something is amiss. My partner had symptoms very much like yours and put it all down to stress and grief after losing his mom. It turned out he had an overactive thyroid. He had a blood test and within 2 weeks he was taking medication and he is back to his normal annoying self lol (I do love him). You have done amazing and you are amazing for achieving what few do. Take care Clair x

 

[Patchninja]

Firstly, well done for losing SO much. You've done your health so much good already.
You're following SW. Which plan are you following?
In truth you're not really following any plan at the moment if you're not eating properly. You have to eat well if you want your body to feel and react well. Your body needs water, protein, carbs vitamins, fibre and a little fat.
Even if you don't feel like it, make sure that you have some breakfast, lunch and dinner. And drink lots of water.
You have to make an effort. The doc is a shocker for not sending you for blood tests. Insist. Say you want a general, all-over blood test to eliminate any problems and to re-assure you.
Then, it's up to you. No-one can help you of you won't help yourself first and that means sticking to a sensible eating plan and not worrying your wife silly!

 

[noname314]

First of all, well done on loosing so much weight! You've done amazing and pity nobody around you have commented. Maybe they are not sure what to say? A guy at work had dropped a huge amount and when I saw him tbh I wasn't sure if I should comment at all, he is one of those unfortunate people who actually look sickly when they've lost weight. He since told me he had others approachin him asking if he had cancer (eejits! but comes to show you people really don't know how to react)
Not sure about the lack of apetite but blood tests are definitelly a good idea, it could be something simple as tyroid or iron deficiency. If your GP is not supportive, change him/her!

Finally on the diet, have you tried myfitnesspal, there is a phone app and a website version. I use it for tracking what I eat and it's great as it breaks it down automactically to carbs, protein, fiber, etc - it may give you an insight into whether you are covering the major food groups

 

[xSinead]

I've lost 4 stone in 16 weeks, and i am never hungry anymore either. Never have temptations, or cravings, nothing.
I love it though, as it means there's no distractions or anything getting in the way from now until christmas which is my goal for getting to 11 stone

 

[Suzystar]

How are you feeling today?