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Need to find the willpower

nannoo_bird

nannoo_bird

Well-Known Member
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I am so impressed with the amazing willpower and discipline of so many of you. How do you do it? I have tried and failed so many times to give up carbs, but I crave them. It does not help that high end food and restaurants are my and my husband's hobby! How do you learn to be strong willed? My health will just get worse if I don't find a way.
 
Wow I admire type 2s. I am type1 but I'd imagine food can be a challenge. Sorry I can't help but all I can say is I was on a strict diet for 4 years and could only eat limited things from this I struggled to keep weight on. My only motivation was if I eat this bread I'll get Ill
 
Hi Nannoo, yes carbs are addictive .. yes for the first few weeks I was worst than a bear with a sore head .. but its a matter of balance .. once you get your head round LCHF way of eating is is very good .. Remember if you reduce your carbs to a low carb level around 20g a day then you need to increase your fats ..olive oil, coconut oil is good and nuts ..
Think do you want to keep seeing your feet !!! because diabetic complications could either cause you to loose your feet or your sight .. either way you will not be seeing your feet... that keeps my food choices on track every time :)

edit to add ... do you have a bs meter .. thats a great way to see how the carbs are affecting your blood sugars, just read some of your other postings .. you do test your BS thats good .. and bad that you are getting the complications. The sooner you break your carb addiction the sooner your body can hopefully start to repair itself
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Enclave said:
Hi Nannoo, yes carbs are addictive .. yes for the first few weeks I was worst than a bear with a sore head .. but its a matter of balance .. once you get your head round LCHF way of eating is is very good .. Remember if you reduce your carbs to a low carb level around 20g a day then you need to increase your fats ..olive oil, coconut oil is good and nuts ..
Think do you want to keep seeing your feet !!! because diabetic complications could either cause you to loose your feet or your sight .. either way you will not be seeing your feet... that keeps my food choices on track every time :)

edit to add ... do you have a bs meter .. thats a great way to see how the carbs are affecting your blood sugars, just read some of your other postings .. you do test your BS thats good .. and bad that you are getting the complications. The sooner you break your carb addiction the sooner your body can hopefully start to repair itself
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Thank you Enclave. I know what to do, I think we are all probably more knowledgeable than our doctors!! It is just finding the willpower to go low carb and stick to it. I have a lot of other issues, and get so much comfort from my carb intake. You would think that I would stop as I am well aware of the complications. But I haven't been able to .....
 
Maybe reduce carbs slowly - I did this initially before I found the forum and started a "proper" low carb diet. I first cut right down on all sugary foods, then a few weeks later reduced my starchy carbohydrate consumption. This way I didn't actually suffer any withdrawal effects.

Any reduction at all in carbohydrates is a good thing, you don't necessarily have to go "all out"!

But you can generally find some great lower carb alternatives for high carb foods, and the low carb recipes and "What have you eaten today?" thread can give you some ideas in this area. And reducing carbs doesn't mean you have to deny yourself, it just means a bit of rethinking.:D

Robbity
 
I went through my store cupboard and just threw out the pasta, sugars, flours and gave my beer collection away to chums at work. I stopped snacks between meals, eating after 20:00 and pretty soon it was the new regime and it seemed to work and so self supporting.

If high end food and restaurants are your thing then I would look for ways in which you could swap carb items for something else, suggest it and see what they say.

It's not easy to give up the carbs but, I hope worth it.
 
I'm going to be radical and say I don't believe in willpower, in this context. I believe in a reason to change.

Every single one of us has to have a reason to change, and whilst there may be common factors in that, we each have our own. Timing certainly can influence this reasoning too. Reasons like "better health" are rarely sufficiently specific to actually engender change.

For me, I was diagnosed three weeks before embarking in an overseas trip, scheduled to last 9 months. The prospect of starting on any medication before I went was horrendous. I've never taken any long term meds, and the prospect of leaving the country with half a chemist in my bag just wasn't acceptable to me.

The impact of that was that I knew I had to do something to change my diabetic blood scores, in order to stave off medication - initially for my trip, then for as long as possible. Having then realised that testing would give me the feedback on how I was doing in that objective, without the need to see a Doc, I "tooled up" before I went away.

I actually broke my 9 month trip at 4 months, and came back to the UK for a month to have my initial bloods and review. I then resumed as before.

So that was my reason, and by the time I came back at 4 months, I had already learned a lot. Seeing my day-to-day blood scores reduce helped me stick with it, and within a relatively short period it wasn't second nature, but it was a bit easier.

So, maybe you need to think if a real reason you want to change. Knowing you need to isn't at all the same.

Good luck with it all. The hardest part are the first couple of weeks.
 
@AndBreathe pretty much said exactly what I believe, but I’ll say it in a different way:
Personally, I don’t have the willpower to give up carbs.
I don’t have the willpower to lose weight.
I don’t have the willpower to exercise every day.
I don’t have the willpower to avoid fancy and expensive restaurants or even fast food for that matter.

Those things are impossible…at least for me.

However, I do have the willpower to want to avoid going blind from diabetes complications.
I have the willpower to want to live long enough to have children, and eventually grandchildren.
I have the willpower to want to look in the mirror and respect what looks back at me.
I have the willpower to never allow my fiancé to lose respect for me because I’ve “Let myself go” or don’t take my diabetes seriously.

Having found the willpower to do those things has "Indirectly" allowed me to achieve what I otherwise could not.

The point @AndBreathe and I are getting at is that it needs to be about something much more powerful and something much more personal to you. If it was truly as easy as “Eating less and exercising more” we’d all be in perfect physical shape and there would be no obesity.
 
Thank you, all of you, for taking the time to reply, and with such good advice. This disease is so awful, because for most of us it just creeps up. It isn't initially debilitating, so you just carry on. I have a lot of other issues, and use carb-heavy food as comfort, so I need to find a way around that. But I will go over all you have said again, as it all makes so much sense.
 
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