Originally Posted by
sstorkel
I did the opposite: worried only about exercise at first. For me, moderate exercise causes my appetite to decrease, rather than increase. Knowing just how much work it took to burn 400 or 500 calories on the bike made that 800-calorie cheeseburger or three 600-calorie slices of pizza much less enticing. Not to mention the fact that it doesn't take many calories to maintain your weight if you're not physically active. I never found dieting alone to be terribly productive...
I think it depends on your physical condition when you're starting out. At the beginning of this year I weighed more than 400 lbs and I couldn't even walk through walmart or down to the end of my block to check the mail. I'd had a major bleeding problem that left me, even after transfusions, so anemic that I was out of breath every time I stood up. If I had told myself that it wasn't possible for me to lose weight without exercise, I would have been doomed to failure. Instead, I decreased my calories and waited for my health to improve so I could exercise. I had to have surgery in March, and once I was able to exercise after that, I started doing seated workouts because that was all I could do...put my chair in front of the TV, turn on Youtube and start sweating while I tried to keep up with the older ladies in the videos. But the weight was coming off even without exercise. I weigh 265 now and I can walk further than I could (partly because I take meds for neuropathy) and ride my bike a lot further than I ever could before. I still don't exercise very regularly, I ride my bike for fun around the neighborhood. I don't really feel much better without the extra weight, I spend a couple weeks each month feeling really sore and achy and depressed, and it's hard to make myself do anything when I feel like that. But I'm still losing weight.