Seriously. I have NOT been tracking like I need to and am totally distracted with the move. I don't think I have really gained but I am just not doing what I need to do here to get the results I want. Plus, not tracking and just flying blind gives me guilt and anxiety about my little splurges which isn't good for motivation, at all. I really want to be in a monokini and proud of what I have achieved this upcoming summer!

I will confess...I haven't been working out or tracking calories. I have been snacking. Sometimes they are healthy things but most of the time just sweet things that are somewhat healthy like granola bars, still calorie laden though. I also had 3 and wine last night, oh the calories....

Ok, yes, I am stressed and while house buying over the last few months has thrown me off track to just maintaining , I can't let it start making me revert to gaining now. Yikes, the thought alone scares me.

Please someone kick my butt so I get it together!

Consider it kicked

We all know stress but you have to stop sabatoging yourself...go cut up some veggies put them in a bag and carry them with you everywhere until the snack monster goes away then start tracking

That help? if not

do you want to lose weight? if you do, you'd better change what you're doing. you know what to do instead!

If you think you need a butt kicking, maybe that's part of the problem. In my experience, guilt and punishment (whether from myself or imposed by others) makes for lousy motivation.

I have both a master's and bachelor's degree in psychology, and one of the first thing I learned in college about behavior is that reward is far more effective than punishment. To the point that we'll continue to engage in a punished behavior if the behavior is also rewarded - and food is inherently rewarding.

If you give an animal two ways to get a food reward, but one of those choices will get them a shock first - the rats will choose the unshocked choice more often if the food rewards are the same, but if the punished reward is tastier, they'll "take the shock." And even if the food is the same, they'll still periodically "take the shock." In fact, the shocks themselves seem to increase the animal's motivation to food rewards in general (the act of being punished for eating, may actually increase the power of food as a "reward.")

We are not rats, but the principles of reward and punishment work the same. We've all seen children who even though they were punished, continue to engage in the behavior because they're also being rewarded in some way (which is why parents have to be careful not to smile or giggle when a toddler does something naughty, because even if they're punished for it, that smile or giggle is often worth a lot more than a time out or a spanking).

Personally, I suspect that one of the reason that weight loss failure rates are so high (most research results suggest the 85% - 98% range), is because punishment is the "traditional" model for weight loss in our culture.

We practically insure that the punishments outweigh the rewards, and then wonder why we give up so easily. Giving up in the face of repeated and excessive failure isn't stupid or weak, it's normal and logical. How long would you stay at a job without a paycheck sufficient to meet your needs? If your boss said "your new salary is $25 a week -- oh and we're going to increase your hours to 60 per week."

Or an analogy more closely tied to weight loss patterns - you "start out" at $1,000 per week and you're working 20 hours. Then as you get more experienced, your pay keeps decreasing and your work week keeps getting longer. When would you say "enough is enough?"


With traditional weight loss, failure is built into the system. Primarily, because the number on the scale is the main (often only) reward - and as a person progresses they're likely to see less and less success while requireing more and more work.

Only an idiot would work for a company that payed them less and less and made them work harder and longer, as they gained experience and got better at their job.

So you have to find rewards other than the numbers. You have to find ways to reward experience and effort. Punishment probably isn't going to cut it, especially since animal and human studies have found that punishment loses it's effectiveness the more you use it. If you're punished frequently (by yourself or others), you become immune to it's effects. That's true of guilt as well - if you feel guilty most of the time, it stops acting as a deterrent to behavior - you'll feel the guilt but "do it anyway."

There are countless ways to incorporate rewards, and countless rewards you can use. They don't even have to be tangible. For example, my "goal" every day is to "not gain" so when I step on the scale and see no gain, I've met my first goal of the day. If I have gained, I do celebrate the smaller success (for example when I went up a pound a few days ago, I couldn't celebrate maintaining 101 lb loss, but I could celebrate maintaining 100 lb loss." Celebrating that 100 lb loss (with the mental pat on the back), prevented me from feeling "I've gained a pound - I'm such a failure. I might as well get to eat what I want, and start fresh tomorrow or Monday."

When I started, I couldn't exercise or even move much, so I put a step-counting pedometer on the shoes I wore every day (because it was easier to remember to put on my shoes than to clip on the pedometer), and my goal was to meet or exceed the previous day's step count. Every night I wrote down the count on the calendar. At first I'd forget, so I'd write it down when I remembered and I'd calculate the average for the missing days - so that in every calendar box was the number of steps (or estimated average number of steps), I was able to take. Seeing those numbers get bigger and bigger, was a bigger reward than getting on the scale has ever been.

Now I use a knitting stitch counter I pin to my swimming suit when I swim to count lengths of the pool (I was always losing count). I also keep an exercise log in my gym bag. It's just a little notebook and I write down the distance and duration on the treadmill or bike, and/or the duration/length count in the pool. Seeing my times and distances improve is awesome motivation.

My TOPS group provides even more rewards (it's a very reward-oriented group). If I bring in a food chart/log I earn a paper "TOP" worth ten cents off my monthly dues. For every pound I lose, I earn another paper TOP. And if I've lost for the month, I get a month's dues free. If I gain weight, I owe a TOP (that is technically a punishment, but the opportunities for rewards are much greater than the opportunities for punishments).

At least consider giving rewards a try. Even something as silly as a "sticker chart" can help tremendously.

Lovely post kaplods. I am currently working my brain into a more positive reinforcement space. The punishment stuff won't sustain me for life and actually just feels unreasonable in the entire scheme of life.

Thanks again, I enjoyed reading this.

I have been counting today! Gotta hold myself ac'count'able. LOL! It's all on a sticky note on my phone and will be in range. Packing/cleaning/unpacking will have to count as my workout but it will be all over within the week and I can start walking the new neighborhood.

Thanks for the butt kicking nancylmrn!

And for the reality check, jayohwhy!

Kaplods, Always insightful. I think I could apply those studies to a few areas of my life and see better results. I keep thinking the reward is the loss itself but when I don't have set mini-goals and some sort of celebration I don't see as much progress....BTW I want to give you a little celebration b/c I noticed that you've moved your ticker on down.

So should I just go ahead and buy myself that monokini I want to wear this summer in a size that I should be able to reasonably wear, say one size down from my current size?

VERY well-written! Your post makes perfect sense.

Lots of people attach their self-worth to their weight.

Most people have no problem judging character via weight.

As I've lost weight & people I don't know very well have commented on my weight and praised me, I disregard what they say. Why? Because my worth is not my weight, and I'm personally taking responsibility for not judging people via their weight. Their comments don't reward or punish me.

I absolutely do not 'look' at people and see their weight.
Does that make sense?
Then I don't perpetuate the problem of people punishing themselves.

Do yourself a favor and stock the frige and pantry with go-to foods that are the healthiest on-the-go choices you can make.

Failure to plan is planning to fail.

If you can't track it physically, keep a mental tally. You know the foods you were eating to lose weight--have them available and keep a mental tally and you'll get back to it, even if just a little bit willy-nilly.