>>279621323Like anon said dumbells are harder than a barbell because you have to use more of your weak, untrained stabilizer muscles. Make sure you're working out those other muscle groups in isolation (Triceps, Delts) as well as doing other chest exercises (Flys, Inclined Bench Press, etc). If you're doing the same exact routine every time you can try to switch it up, like doing the things you usually leave off to the end first and vice-versa, that way you're not neglecting the same muscle groups every week.
Another thing, its fine to do the same weight the same amount of times when you're starting but you should move up in weight in your sets. If you're doing 3x12 with 33lbs, try 25-30lbs x 15, then 33-35 x 10-12, then try 40s x 6-8. After doing that you'll notice yourself actually gaining strength every week. High rep/low weight is good for weight loss but you'll plateau once you've got your initial gains, so building muscle and lifting higher weights is important. Two last things you can do to go further beyond is add more resistance in your exercises be slowly disengaging when you bring the weight down instead of just "letting it fall", so you maintain the tension and basically get twice as much work out of the same movements and double your progress, and doing a superset after your heavier lifts, so if you can do say 4 dumbbell presses with 40lb dumbbells, immediately after grab some 20lb-25lb dumbbells and crunch out 4-5 more reps without resting. You'll be surprised by how much more sore you feel but also by how quickly your strength grows doing that.
>>279633939Learn to love chicken and rice, yogurts, oatmeal, and protein shakes. When you lose enough weight and get strong enough you're body will crave it and the right portions. The #1 thing is to just keep going, if you don't stop you'll get there eventually.
