I just checked Frances's blog and she posted last night that she sold the book proposal about relapse and recovery for six figures (!) So the book about regain is going to happen - should be very interesting.
Just based on my previous experiences with weight loss, it is no surprise to me that she regained. I did that exact same thing before - started a diet, that was very restricted and completely non-sustainable with the only goal to lose weight. She said all her food was weighed and measured and she could only eat her weighed/measured food. You can diet like that short-term, but you can't LIVE like that your entire life.
When I decided to change my life in July 2004, I looked at all my old dieting attempts, what had gone well, what had failed and I realized I had never planned ahead for keeping the weight off. I think that's why I've finally been successful, finally maintained a weight loss over one year. I made permanent, sustainable changes and my goal was based on long term health, not specifically weight loss.
I feel a lot of empathy for her and I will definitely read her follow up book. I'm tempted to email her. I fit her research critiera as someone who lost 40+ lbs and gained it back, I did that 3 times before I finally figured out why I kept failing over and over again.
Glory, you should email her! Not only do you fit the criteria for the new book and she's soliciting people just like you ... but you're succeeding at maintenance. I daresay she could learn a lot from you.
When I decided to change my life in July 2004, I looked at all my old dieting attempts, what had gone well, what had failed and I realized I had never planned ahead for keeping the weight off. I think that's why I've finally been successful, finally maintained a weight loss over one year. I made permanent, sustainable changes and my goal was based on long term health, not specifically weight loss.
I really believe that focusing on long term health is the key. Sometimes I've lost sight of what is important because like anyone else, I want this extra weight gone, but in my case obesity is not the "disease" it is merely a symptom of a much larger problem. Gluttony and sloth.. those two things are my disease. I have plenty of symptoms...
heart problems
weak body
apathy
extra mass (weight.. body fat)
poor skin
severe...SEVERE cluster headaches
poor sleep
distored view of physical self and denial about reality
I often wonder what other symptoms there are going on inside me.
I am not focusing on losing weight anymore than any one of the symptoms mentioned above. Weight is surely one that is just easier to measure.
When I lost approx 50 pounds a few years ago, I managed to change nearly every symptom listed above except the last one. And I lost the weight eating the same things I am now.. and exercising about the same (I've added yoga and more strength training than before). I knew then that I'd be eating the same way for life. I just didn't realize how essential daily exercise would be for maintenance and how even a few weeks without it would begin a spiral back to where I had just been.
I'm envious when I see someone reaching my goal weight. I can't help it. Because I remember how I felt the brief moment when I was there.. for the first time in my life I not only looked good, I felt great.. I was sleeping great, had no heart pains or headaches.
Obesity is surely a symptom of a much larger problem... until I get my head around that 24/7 for the rest of my life it will always be lurking over me.
Wow.. what prompted me to get so serious so early on a Sunday morning..
distored view of physical self and denial about reality
That one is a killer. I would never have gotten up to 385# if I was really aware of how fat I was. I still have a good 30# lag in my body image. It is very disapointing to lose 100# and have a BMI of 35.
Quote:
Obesity is surely a symptom of a much larger problem... until I get my head around that 24/7 for the rest of my life it will always be lurking over me.
I think that, for me at least, obesity IS the root of the problem. It is just natural for me to get fat as long as there is plenty of food around. My natural appetite is >5,000 Cal/day, and I am just going to have to fight it.
Did any of you read Fat Girl: A True Story by Judith Moore? It's a long the same line as Frances Kuffel's book, but if anything more brutal and self-loathing. But still fascinating for those of us who can't read enough weight-loss sagas (fat porn? *LOL*). Anyway, I mention this because I see she recently died of colon cancer. She was 66 I think.
Here's a synopses of the book: From Publishers Weekly
In her memoir of growing up fat, Moore, who previously wrote about food in Never Eat Your Heart Out, employs her edgy, refreshingly candid voice to tell the story of a little girl who weighed 112 pounds in second grade; whose father abandoned her to a raging, wicked mother straight out of the Brothers Grimm; whose lifelong dieting endeavors failed as miserably as her childhood attempts to find love at home. As relentless as this catalogue of beatings, humiliation and self-loathing can be, it's tolerable—even inspiring in places—because Moore pulls it off without a glimmer of self-pity. The book does have some high points, especially while Moore is stashed at the home of a kind uncle who harbors his own secrets, but the happiest moments are tinged with dread. Who can help wondering what will become of this tortured and miserable child? Alas, Moore cuts her story short after briefly touching on an unsatisfying reunion with her father and her two failed marriages. The ending feels hurried, but perhaps the publication of this book will give Moore's story the happy ending she deserves.
Another book along these lines is Diary of a Fat Housewife by Rosemary Green. I find this book interesting because I've read it twice, at different times in my life. I first read it several years ago and just thought it was a good book about a woman trying to lose weight. Her weight loss attempts didn't seem odd to me, she tried to lose weight the same way I always did - restriction.
I read it again last summer after changing my life and I almost cried reading it. She struggled with her weight since 1984 and what she documents is so heart breaking, cycles of restriction and purging. She starved herself until her body forced her to eat, she wrecked her metabolism, she caused herself so much pain. Her manic descriptions of being so happy and "in control" when she was dieting, her sad descriptions of 800 calorie "perfect" days, the same 50 lbs she lost and gained, lost and gained.
I could have written that book at any time in my 30s. It was just sad and eerie. I am so glad I was finally able to break that miserable cycle for myself.
Update: I've been reading Frances' blog and she announced today that she's lost 30 of her 100 regained pounds. It's a fascinating blog that's worth checking out: http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile...193318-4639234
She talks about the book she's writing - Just This Once - about losing, regaining and relosing her weight. A good read for maintainers and losers.
