[shr1nk1ngme]

Hello friends. I have been gone for a long time now. A few years in fact. I finally reached my goal only to gain it back over the past three years!

So here I am again getting back on the diet wagon. This time I have about fifty - sixty pounds to lose.

So I thought I'd re-introduce myself and get started again.

[Bindii]

Welcome back

[newleaf123]

Welcome back!!!

[Mrs Snark]

Welcome back! I'm a long-time 3fc user who has bounced up and down the scale several times. Hopefully for the last time this go 'round! I know where you are coming from!

[Leeh]

Mrs Snark do you find that you are enjoying logging in here even if you reached your target? I wonder if it is a good thing not to just shut the door on our food issues when we reach goal. It is a while away for me but I kind of feel like this community will be the one who will be able to support the daily struggles and seeing successes of others will help keep the motivation.

Good luck ShrinkingMe. I know you don't want to be here (because of what it means to have regained) but I find the people are great.

I wish I had signed up years ago when I initially was on track. I think the little initial weight gain might have reined me in before it was out of control had I been posting.

[Mrs Snark]

Leeh -- I have reached goal before, wandered away from the site, lost focus, and regained the weight. I've done that a couple of times, actually.

So this time I am staying put and hopefully keeping my focus. Losing the weight is only the first part of the equation -- I've lost weight several times. But I've never maintained the loss LONG TERM.

Reading this site and chatting with all the good people here who can really relate to my struggle helps me enormously!

[shr1nk1ngme]

Originally Posted by Leeh

I wonder if it is a good thing not to just shut the door on our food issues when we reach goal.

I find that just because I have reached my goal doesn't mean my food issues are over. I have made goal and regained SIX TIMES. The first two times it was about 40 pounds. But four of those six times I lost more than 60 pounds and got down to a size 4, only to gain it all back.

Going off on my own and acting like, "I've got this now" is clearly not working for me. I have to embrace the reality that this is a permanent thing for me: logging what I eat, weighing/measuring myself, and belonging to/regularly participating in a support group. I will never be "done" with my "diet". The attitude of "I have arrived" is my personal maintenance kryptonite.

[Leeh]

Exactly. I was never at goal but more than halfway and enough that people were commenting and then it was +1 pound here and there until I was right back where I started. You'd think that increase would scare me but for whatever self destructive reason I let it go. I live where there is winter and I had a cute coat that I can't even zip now so it is back to the fat coat.
My dream is to be able to get nice boots that aren't "wide calf" style.

[Mad Donnelly]

So what would be your advice for ways not to become a "returner" once we reach maintenance? I hope to not let myself go this bad again; but once you get there, it's too way to think, yeah, I got this, I can eat that.

[Leeh]

I guess for me it is going to be about making life changes. The successful weight losses I have had have been centred around eliminating specific food groups (mainly carb related- Atkins, Dukan) so once I saw results and let myself "slip" I went off the rails.

This time it is about portion control, moderation and having little bits of stuff and being satisfied.

[Mrs Snark]

I will pretty much continue doing what worked for me in the weight-loss phase, as I have been since I got under goal, so no big changes on the horizon.

I'll keep eating the same foods I've been eating for the last 8 months, tracking it in my notebook, exercising, avoiding my "no no don't go there" foods, and hanging at 3fc with all you fine ladies.