To Exercise or Not?

     Every time I see my doctor I'm asked if I exercise.  I hate being asked that question.  Well you see, I'm in pain every day and the weather often is a trigger for my migraines and doing any cardio gives me very bad exertion headaches.  So, no I don't.  Now, don't go thinking that I don't want to or that I really enjoy being overweight.  I have a good day with low pain or no pain and start back on an exercise regime.  Then later on I wind up in extreme pain due to reasons stated earlier.  So when doctors, who are thin and aren't in chronic pain, ask me if I exercise and that I should I want to lose it.  Right there in the examination room I want to go off.  But, instead I say no and that I try and how it gets very demotivating to start anew just to be slapped back down in pain.
     I hate my body and I want to lose weight.  So I try over and over again.  At my last visit to my doctor I wanted assistance in starting my weight loss endeavor.  Unfortunately, due to a very fast resting heart rate from taking Abilify, I couldn't be put on phentermine to help me start dropping the pounds.  So I was given a referral to a nutritionist and told to stick to a 1200 calories a day and to not eat any carbs.  I try to stick to it but I'm not very invested these days.  Yet, I have begun to do some light exercise with the help of a free website given to me by my doctor, SparkPeople.com.  I can track what I eat and how much I exercise.  I'm supposed to alternate days by walking 10,000 steps a day and strength building exercises.  With my exercise ball I was able to do about 15 minutes of strength training.  Tomorrow my daughter has a four mile hike to do with her girl scout troop which will help get me to 10,000 steps.  I really want to go but can never rely on how my head will feel when I wake up in the morning.
     I read an article about a study done in Germany, I think, where 52 individuals were put into groups of runners and walkers to see how either form of exercise affects the longevity, frequency, and pain level of migraines.  The study was over a 10 week period and those who were on a running regime had better results.  You can read more about it here.  I just want to be happy and not feel so self-conscious and embarrassed by my size, even though so many people say that I look fine.  I swear that they are just being nice and say to them it's OK to acknowledge my fatness because I'm aware of it daily.  I eat.  I LOVE to eat.  And I have a very bad relationship with food.  It will always be a struggle trying to change how I eat but I can at least really try to stick to an exercise program that will work for me.  I guess we'll have to "weight" and see how it all goes down. I'll keep you posted!