Maybe you are not really wanting to jump into not restricting because for now your pay off for restricting is too great. You have been successful in maintaining your low weight. I find that most people don't actually want to change anything when they are at their low or lowest weight. Why would they. Negatives must outweigh the positives for a change to take place. If you were to ever regain some weight, possibly you would want to try something else. Or maybe you might start obsessing too much mentally where you find it cuts into your life and enjoyment too much. There are some people who do okay with restriction and can keep the weight off (not very many but there are some and you could be one).

Good points you guys. There's always a war. The society vs. body war. Society values a super thin ideal (at the current time; many, many moons ago a curvier, plumper body was deemed attractive, and thin would have been heavily frowned upon). It's so unrealistic that even models themselves don't have it -- they have to be airbrushed! Yet we're all spending hours of our days and years of our lives chasing after it. When we lose weight and look thin we feel good about ourselves, so it's hard to find a good reason to stop shedding pounds or put some back on.

The body on the other hand doesn't give two craps about how you look in your clothes; it wants to survive and have an ample amount of fat and muscle tissue onboard. It also wants enough daily energy coming in, in order to support metabolic function. When it doesn't get it because you decide that looking good is more important, it shuts you down: it makes me you tired, sluggish, obsessed with food, cranky, irritable, and a general hot mess. Thus begins the body vs. you wars, and they are BRUTAL.

Eventually, most people get worn down and surrender (acceptance). I did. Heck, I regained the weight anyway as I would have had to whether involuntarily (bingeing) or by choice. For me, I realized that I just don't want to be 75 years old and reflect that I wasted 55+ years worrying about my weight, and for what exactly? No one likes me better or worse no matter how much I weigh. Wait, maybe that's a lie. I think people IRL do like me better now that I have put weight back on and eat more. For one, I don't turn down dinner invitations and avoid outings like I used to because I was scared of food, and two, I'm not perpetually starving so my moods and attitude are WAY better.

I'm still too wrapped up in aesthetics and obsessed with having a flat stomach because so many people have them and I feel like I'm selling myself short by not having one. I didn't admit it on this thread but I recently tried to "cut" which is of course fitnessspeak for "diet" and I've been overeating a lot on the weekends.

Why won't I learn?

Thank you for posting this. Needed to hear it today.

Aww, krampus, don't be so hard on yourself. It took me 6 years to get a grip.

You'll stop when you reach a breaking point. For me, it was spending an entire summer suicidal because I was afraid of my thighs touching, while everyone else around me was living.

edit: you're welcome :)

It's so ridiculous. My effort to "cut" consisted of tiny things like "nonfat yogurt instead of 2% with lunch" and "less cheese on the salad" and somehow that small amount of caloric reduction felt like horrid deprivation. Just feels disappointing as I'm definitely not "lean" and I am "allowed" to eat everything and have dessert every day. I guess I thought I could trick myself. It's hard to shake the attitude that remaining at a certain body fat % is just due to being unwilling to put in effort.

I read Women, Food and God last night. It was basically just a broader version of the idea that you need to love yourself in order to break the food addiction. I think it's true--that my issues are deep-seated. I don't think it's necessarily true for everyone...but i definitely have mental/emotional issues that if i could address, food wouldn't be a problem--and that is her point in the book. I'm not sure how to address all of them at once, but i do think a first step is to stop hating myself and telling myself i'm fat. I've already begun to do that, but i need to truly believe it.

Everything in life is better when we can love ourselves. Loving yourself gives you courage.

If you store fat on your stomach, you probably have really shapely thighs. I have the opposite problem: my stomach is nice and flat (really no different from when I was a teenager), but if I gain even a few pounds my thighs start to get that "piano leg" look. In order to have a well-proportioned figure (by today's standards) I have to maintain more or less my current weight. Unnatural? Probably. On the other hand I seem to eat more than most people, including those who've never dieted, so part of me feels I shouldn't be complaining.

Freelance

My thighs are pretty beefy. No complaints here.

I haven't gained a few pounds in a while. Just your usual "blow up and deflate in 72 hours from overeating." I just looked at a recent picture taken of me - I definitely need to move on to complaining about things other than my own imaginary fatness. So here's my pledge to SHUT UP about it and concentrate on other things.

Whenever I get even a twinge down about my body (and in today's society, it's damn near impossible not to find fault with something), I shrug and tell myself, "hey, it could be worse. And if you even try to restrict to lose weight, you will binge eventually and WILL make it even worse. So shut the F-up, get a life, and leave it alone!"

That usually snaps me out of it. But for myself, tough love usually works. I need someone to tell me to stop whining.

While the decision to forget about being at 120 lbs or lower was liberating for me, I still get toxic thoughts in my head about body shape and size.

Not sure whether anyone here watches Supersize vs Superskinny? I have always seen the superskinny girls as having the ideal body shapes when they first appear on the show and they lost that "perfect" shape after being told to put on weight. Who am I kidding? I still do, huh.

I have thunder thighs and used to hate my body because of that reason precisely. I never wore jeans in my teens, and pants only when I was thin. Now I am 48, fitter than my friends, and thogh I weigh more than then, and found jeans that fit and I walk in my thighs and my round bum quite happily, because I know how difficult it was for me to lose 20 pounds.
As to bingeing and restricting, something strange happened today: I am trying to contol my eating to make it more orderly and healthier, and was not being very successful. I don't like cooking for myself, so I cook for my boys and then I eat crackers and fruit; I get hungry quickly after that, and then ... you know the rest of the story.
I enrolled in my first 4k marathon today. It is in a month, and though I don't dream of winning any prize, I am soooo happy about it that I immediately found myself in a sort of "training mood" that has kept me away from non-nourishing foods. I don't intend to diet, just to eat only healthy stuff. In a month I will tell you how things go!

It's odd, but the older I've gotten, the less critical I've gotten of my body (even though I have plenty of flaws). As a matter of fact, I'm pretty darned satisfied with my body--even though my boobs are sagging (as is the case for most big-breasted, over-40 women) and my belly button is a frown :). I guess at some point, I've just come to appreciate that I'm doing the best I can, I look pretty decent in clothes, and, most important, I'm healthy! I can do a lot more than I ever thought I would be able to. I'm happy with that!

You are one tough cookie ;)