Where does your maintenance line end?
 

I was maintaining, or what I consider maintaining, for about 3 years. Throughout that time my weight mostly stayed the same, give or take a few pounds. Recently I've put on more weight than I ever have in these past 3 years, and I no longer consider myself in maintenance. I'm about 8.5 pounds higher than I want to be. I think I consider this no longer maintenance because all my clothes are snug, some don't even fit, and I've bought some bigger size pants because they're the truth. ;) I also don't feel nearly as fit and can see a difference in my body.

So I'm wondering: Does your weight fluctuate at all? If so, at what point do you feel like you've transitioned out of maintenance into "kick it up a notch and refocus" territory?

Actually, what makes me most feel like I fell out of maintenance is because I moved too far and for too long from my way of eating and activity level. I don't think of maintenance so much as maintaining a weight but as maintaining behaviors/a healthy lifestyle, and I wasn't. It's hard because my life radically changed. My daily free time went from 4 hours a day to maybe 15 minutes during the week, nightly sleep from a solid 8 to 5 if I'm lucky. I just haven't been able to successfully transfer how I lived to this new world.

My green zone is 123-125, comfy zone 126-128, red zone 129-130. The line in the sand is at 130! This system works for me, because it doesn't take much to stay in my comfy zone. It's never a huge surprise if I start to creep up, so I just evaluate what I have changed and it is usually negative foods choices, portion sizes, etc, and seeing the red line motivates me to get back on track.

I had a 3-pound limit.

I like two pounds up or down of a happy weight, and bounced over that by quite a bit with a freak out a few weeks ago. So now I'm back to daily trying to get in the game. It's a big struggle, but I can't just sit here above my maintenance range and not do anything about it, either. So I'm in maintenance, but my correction is more extensive right now thanks to a slight regain.

But what makes a slight regain stay slight is accountability and a willingness to deal with it, instead of just going "oh well!" and falling off the deep end for a month or ten.

My range is tiny. Most days I have a fairly regular intake.

Under 120 is "great"
120-121 is "ok"
121+ is "bloated"

I've probably crossed my maintenance line, honestly. When I started out I had a +/- 3 pound range, but I didn't keep up with that.

Usually about 3 lbs for me. That's about all I can rationalize as being PMS related. Anything over that and I start panicking. Especially when I feel like I'm wanting to eat more off plan.

This! I do not regularly weigh myself (the scale drives me nuts). However, when I start exhibiting out-of-control behaviors, I get a bit panicked. I've been doing that lately, and I'm trying to reign it in now. My main problems are eating while standing and constantly having BLTs (bites, licks, tastes). Of course, those behaviors inevitably result in weight gain, and I can tell I've gained a bit (probably 5 lbs or less). I've just started reading The Beck Diet Solution hoping to gain some strategies for changing my behaviors. One important thing I realize this time around is that what worked for me previously may not always work for me, but I need to adjust to what will work.

These days my weight goes up by about 8 lbs at the worst point in my cycle. It freaks me out seeing that much higher number on the scale (even though I am always pretty sure it's water weight, it's still tough to swallow!), but worse is how my clothes fit. 8 lbs is basically a whole clothing size difference! I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around what my "red line" should be when I see such huge swings in my weight over the course of a month.

I work outside at a physical job (commercial dog walker) so I have "winter" and "summer" weight ranges. The winter one is 135-138 lbs. and the summer is 132-135. For winter I'm in trouble if I see the 140 on the scale. For summer 135.

I am now gearing up to transition from "winter" to "summer". I don't change a full clothing size but i do find everything for summer is a bit tight when I try it on at the end of April. The annual wardrobe change over is a good reminder to get going on losing the winter lbs.

Dagmar :dizzy: