I have started and stopped a hundred or more diets in my 30 years as an adult. Three major losses were successful. The rest were disastrous.
I went on a hiatus from dieting for several years and learned a more intuitive approach which worked well for maintaining my weight. Long story short, I ended up eating well past hunger cues from job/life upheavals. I gained a tremendous amount of weight.
I started a diet last August (which I swore I would never do again!). I have been faithfully counting calories ever since, and for the first time in my dieting history, actually have found a sense of peace with it. Yet, I realize that I cannot so this forever. It works for me now in the lifestyle I am in and for the goals I want to achieve. I think of this as a project me.
What worries me is that I feel as though I am becoming disconnected from food again. I am eating according to planned meals, according to numbers. So my reliance is on numbers for health (external cues) and not from inner cues. I am currently working on balancing the two in some way, but it feels like trying to mixing oil and water. I have about another year of calorie counting to get to goal (sigh). I wonder if I am in a way damaging my ability to eat without calorie counting in the future?
How long do YOU plan on counting and why? Calorie counting is definitely packed full of information, but it is so numbers driven and not intuitive at all. What is YOUR plan for working through a lifetime of maintenance?
Last edited by three herring; 03-09-2010 at 10:20 AM.
I plan to calorie count/track intake even once I get to maintenance. Because I'm logging food on line, I'm not only watching calories, but balancing all the elements of a healthy diet so this is one habit I want to keep going with the rest of my life.
While theoretically, I like the idea of intuitive eating, I know I do not eat a well balanced diet when I eat what I actually want to. I have never in my life (age 50 now) been one of those people who voluntarily even eats a vegetable.
I plan to calorie count for my lifetime of maintenance. I've been counting calories for almost nine years and can't imagine stopping now. At this point, it's automatic and effortless.
Intuitive eating to me is the ideal but I know that for myself, it will never work. But I really wish my brain worked that way! I'm married to an intuitive eater who naturally maintains his weight by eating what he wants to, in the amount that he wants to, and when he wants to. I see how it works and it works for him. It most emphatically doesn't work for me! I've learned through painful experience that my body wants to maintain at 257 pounds and gives me the hunger/satiety cues of a 257 pound woman. In order to weigh less, I need to eat thoughtfully and mindfully, not intuitively.
But we're all different and there are those fortunate ones who can maintain a normal, healthy weight with intuitive eating. It sounds like you might be one of them!
I will calorie count until I get to my weight goal, and eat intuitively there after...(also be intuitively active)...but I believe once you get to goal, you can get to a state of "zen" where you know what it is that you need to eat, and more importantly you know what you shouldn't eat.
Congrats on your loss so far! And I'm glad you're thinking about maintenance already.
I think that on the one hand, yes, it's important to think about what you are willing to do for the rest of your life. But one the other hand, I think it's okay to not necessarily have all of the answers in the beginning. A lot of times, plans and lifestyles evolve a little bit (or a lot!) and you can tweak as you go. Then there is also the power of habit, and you may find that your choices are ingrained and automatic.
IMHO, it is always important to have tools and mindfulness and some way of checking in with yourself to make sure that there is not too great of an insidious regain. And even then you might need to tweak a little bit. We all have to figure out what works for each of us.
I plan on calorie counting forever. If I don't count, I eat WAY too much. And I think the lifestyle is tattooed in my brain. I can't imagine NOT doing it.
I'm like Meg in that I don't get the intuitive thing. If I eat what I want, when I want .... I get to be almost 170 lbs. I've done that a few times.
I can count on one hand the number of times I can remember having a growling tummy type hunger. I can never remember being so full that I couldn't eat another bite. I can always eat more and will, given the chance.
Maybe someday I'll become able to eat properly automatically but I'm not seein' it from here. Counting calories may just be what I have to do to be what I want to be.
the plan here is to plan the meals for as much as i can stand it... even though i believe that if i stop it i'll gain weight..so i am gonna try to do it forever (even though forever is a looong time)
I think I will always be a calorie counter as well. I have gotten used to it this past few months. I automatically look at the nutrition label before putting anything into my mouth. It ultimately boils down to calories in and calories out. If I could remain healthy by not calorie counting then I wouldn't be overweight. I would be a normal weight, and I wouldn't need to diet. Listening to my body's cues made me overweight so I think calorie counting will always be a part of my life.
I am fine with calorie counting for the rest of my life. If it makes me stay in a healthy weight range then it is worth it.
I plan on counting calories as long as I want to stay at goal.. And that is forever. Counting calories is a minor inconvenience compared to what life would be if I gained it all back.
I have been calorie counting since December, and stopped for an entire 4 days about a week and a half/two weeks ago. In that time the scale jumped 2 pounds. It took me until yesterday to get back to where I was, twice as long as it took me to gain it. I thought I had a better grasp on things but clearly I cannot eat intuitively. I think this is going to be a forever thing for me.
But now, it's so well integrated into my life that honestly, it isn't ruling it anymore. Every week, go to the farmer's market and grocery store, plan the menus. Every night before bed, put in the mealplan for the next day (which is also good for remembering to defrost things you need to for the meal you're cooking).
I'm another who can't intuitivly eat. I always have space for more and have seriously disconected food and hunger. But I find that I tend to eat the same thing day after day so I don't have to phsyically write down everything except occasionally to double check that I'm staying within what I need.
Calorie Counting - For How Long?
