[Onederchic]

Originally Posted by bargoo

I have lost and regained, too many times. This time I followed the advice of long time maintainers . They told me they kept it off by doing the same thing they did to lose it !!! What a revelation !!! It works . I have 22 months at maintainence . In the past I would usually start regaining at about a year. I plan to never do that again. Planning is the key and a small inconvenience to having to start all over again.

Totally agree.

[TamiL]

I too have done this many times in the past. Diet like the wind and then go back to my old habits only to find myself once again growing out of my clothes. This time is different, I've changed my thinking about how I eat. I know that most carbs and sugars have a negative effect on my body (or maybe they just affect my mind). I've been maintaining within a 5 pound range now for a few months and plan on keeping at this forever. I still am struggling with the mindset that losing a few more pounds would be even better, it won't.....I don't have a few more to lose, I am already at the smallest size in the junior section. Its amazing what gets into our heads sometimes.

[Ellie R]

I've lost over 100lbs twice before, and over 50lbs another 1 or 2 times ( I actually can't keep track anymore)

I totally agree that losing weight is the easy bit -I've done it so much at this stage. the first time, I kept the weight more or less off for around three or four years, the other big loss, as soon as it was lost, after about 3 months i started gaining again.

Each time of course I have had to tell myself that 'this time is different' but historically the records show it hasn't been.

One thing in my head is the goal weight part, I've lost lots, and come close, but I've never actually reached goal before, and I kinda seem to have it stuck in my head that this is one of the big reasons I have never succeeded - you can't maintain until you are at goal, so therefore I have never really seriously had a proper period of maintenance.
This time I am actually looking forward to the maintenance bit, and seeing it as the beginning of something, a new phase.

Most of all though, because I have been here before, I am absolutely terrified of letting it all happen again, and especially now, as the weight I am now is alsways the weight I have stopped at before, and I seem to have a psychological barrier in place to not get under this weight.

Anyway, I feel determined this time, but I also feel that in order to succeed i have to reach my goal, my fear is that if I don't do that, it could all go wrong again

[Cali Doll]

Originally Posted by Mikayla

This is my very first time losing a significant amount of weight, usually I would tell myself I was dieting and only sorta watched what I was eating and then I would give up when I didn't lose weight super fast.

I am terrified I will gain the weight back. I picked a plan that I could sustain for the rest of my life, but I hear so many stories of people gaining all of their weight (and then some). I'm just so scared something will "snap" within me and BAM the weight will be back on :-(

I could have written this word for word.

[Cali Doll]

Originally Posted by carter

Thanks for the comments, folks.

I've always known, intellectually, that what I was doing needed to be a permanent change, not something I did until I hit goal. I am not sure that awareness is going to make the difference this time.

****, I'm not sure anything is going to make the difference this time - I just have to wait and see. But keeping it simple, I hope will be the key for me. Eat less, exercise more - there are no rules for me to break, nothing that's "off my diet" so I can't psych myself into giving up if I fall off the wagon for a day or a week or a month. Just eat less and exercise more. I'm hoping that's all I need.

This is what I'm planning on doing, too. Nothing is off my diet...I just need to keep an eagle eye on my fullness signals and the scale and make sure I get regular exercise. This is my plan. We'll see how it goes.

But, it is scary to me. So many people fail...

[paris81]

Originally Posted by Cali Doll

But, it is scary to me. So many people fail...

It is SO scary! I think that something like 98% of people fail...it's super discouraging. Maybe sites like this can help to break the statistic? Some days, I wonder what the point is, odds are, I won't succeed. Then I remind myself that with that kind of atttitude, I certainly won't succeed. And I at least have to try.

[carter]

Originally Posted by Thighs Be Gone

I do lots of reading from the Maintainers here. Also, I am looking at weightloss like paying bills or keeping friends, keeping house, etc. How do I keep my bills paid? I go to work every day. How do I keep a friend? By being a friend day in and day out. How do I keep my house picked up? By cleaning some every day.

Does this mean I will NEVER play hookie from work? Does this mean I will never let down a friend? Does this mean my house always stay clean? Nope, it doesn't. The path may be curvy or rocky along the way but yep, I'm gonna 'git her 'dun.

This is a very nice way of thinking about things. Thanks for that.

[screamingfatgirl]

I lost about 100-150 lbs. in my last year and a half of college and kept it up for another year, and gained it back and more over the next twenty or so years. I did it the first time by cutting out fats, sugar, red meat, and refined carbs and exercising about 90 minutes a day, 5 days a week. I didn't deal with my compulsive eating, psychological dependence on food, or portion control. I gained it back because I lost the weight and thought I was now "normal" and could eat everything like normal people.

This time around, I'm trying to develop a deeper understanding of my impulses and what being overweight does for me. I realize that I benefit from being fat in multiple ways, and that it's only now that the problems so greatly outweigh the benefits that I've decided to deal with it again.

I'm not one of those people who believes that my relationship with food can be adjusted or normalized by viewing it simplistically. I don't find the whole "eat less, exercise more" repetition to be much more than a mantra that is meant to help you focus on short-term behavior modification. I want to be in a position at the end of the weight loss where I won't be regaining because I'll know what has been motivating me all along.

I've been working at this for the past 5 months or so and have lost between 50-60 lbs., but more importantly I've stopped the need/desire to binge and developed a much better understanding (and developed good control of) my compulsive eating. I'm by no means finished. This is a process that has been developing during my entire life and I don't expect to have it all taken care of in months. That being said, I feel a lot more optimistic about the future of my eating than I have ever felt during the course of my life.

[Ija]

I spent many, many years stuck in a cycle of losing a few pounds and gaining many more back. The yo-yo started when I was just a child and continued until I hit nearly 300 pounds. I would go through periods of subjecting myself to harsh diets and strict food rules, only to launch into a full relapse as soon as I had a single "off" moment. It took me about 20 years to finally get it, but I eventually realized that the all-or-nothing mentality was sabotaging me and that I had to make sustainable changes both to the way I eat and to the way I think about and respond to food. Three years and 150 pounds later, I find myself more satisfied with my food, my body, and my life.

It can be done --destroy the cycle!

[Ija]

Originally Posted by screamingfatgirl

This time around, I'm trying to develop a deeper understanding of my impulses and what being overweight does for me. I realize that I benefit from being fat in multiple ways, and that it's only now that the problems so greatly outweigh the benefits that I've decided to deal with it again.

I'm not one of those people who believes that my relationship with food can be adjusted or normalized by viewing it simplistically. I don't find the whole "eat less, exercise more" repetition to be much more than a mantra that is meant to help you focus on short-term behavior modification. I want to be in a position at the end of the weight loss where I won't be regaining because I'll know what has been motivating me all along.

Wow, kudos to you for getting to the underlying issues, these things get dismissed far too often!

[beescwee]

I have only lost a significant amount of weight a couple of times in my life. Both times, I found myself with a lot of male attention, ended up with a boyfriend, and consequently ended up sitting with pizza on the couch for the next six months before realising that I'd put it all (and more) back on.

This time, I have started with lots of support from my boyfriend of 2 years. (Going out with him in the first place was not a result of months of going to the gym every day) I hope this makes a difference! He deserves better...

[HungryHungryHippo]

Six times, over 25 years. I have a 40-pound range (102-142) that became a 50-pound range this last go-round. The weight loss that lasted the longest (years) was with phen-fen, because something really did change: I wasn't hungry all day. Usually it creeps back on.