I counted calories for about three years. Not
obsessively, not every single day, but enough that I always had a rough number
running in the back of my head. Enough that I'd do quick mental math before
deciding whether to eat something. Enough that dinner felt less like a meal and
more like a subtraction problem.
A year. I gave the gym a full year.
I went consistently — not perfectly, but consistently.
I showed up two, sometimes three times a week. I did the cardio. I tried the
classes. I downloaded the apps that told me what to eat and when. And after
twelve months of this, I stood on the scale and looked at a number that had
barely moved.
I wasn't doing anything obviously wrong. I wasn't
eating terribly. I wasn't skipping workouts for months at a time. I was just…
not losing weight. And the most frustrating part wasn't the number on the scale
— it was that I genuinely didn't enjoy any of it. Every session felt like
something I had to get through. I kept waiting for the moment people talk about
when exercise becomes something you love. It never came.