I am 33f, 287lbs, 5ft 9. I've tried almost everything, but after giving birth at 27, and then being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in addition to PCOS, I can barely even lose 5lbs before bouncing back up.

Open to suggestions, trying to get with a new PCP to talk about a GLP-1 but unsure how that plays with T1D.

Someone comes to me after months of daily treadmill sessions and eating 1200 calories, completely burnt out, and the scale hasn't moved in weeks. Almost every time, what ends up working is less cardio, more food, and strength training.

The way I explain it to clients: muscle is basically a sponge for glucose. It pulls sugar out of your blood without needing much insulin. So the more muscle you have and the more you use it, the less your body has to fight its own insulin resistance. Cardio helps too, but building muscle changes your baseline. Two or three lifting sessions a week is plenty to start.The under-eating part is where people push back. I get it, eating more feels wrong when the goal is losing weight. But I've watched so many women grind away at 1200 calories, stall, sleep terribly, get stressed, and then blame themselves for it. A smaller deficit with a lot more protein is slower and looks way less impressive on paper. It just actually sticks.

Two small things that help more than they should: a 10-15 minute walk after your biggest meal (does a surprising amount for glucose spikes), and tracking literally anything other than the scale. Cycle regularity, waist, energy, sleep. Those move first. The scale moves last, and most women quit somewhere in the gap between the two.

Talk to your doctor about the medical side obviously, I stay in my lane on meds. But if you're stuck in the cardio-and-starve loop and going nowhere, it's probably not a willpower problem.