An epiphany
 

I posted about this briefly on the Operation 5-10 thread, but I thought it deserved its own thread. This morning I had something of an epiphany. The past week and a half I've been back in weight loss mode to try to get to the bottom of my maintenance range before the holidays (which I expect to push me back up to the top of my range). You know what? Eating for weight loss is easy.

It's easy for me to eat 1400 cals/day . . . for a week. It's easy to do it for two weeks. It's even easy to do it for three weeks. What's HARD is continuing to do it for an extended time period.

In September 09 I went from maintenance mode to weight loss mode to try to get rid of the weight I'd gained from my thryoid problem and from slacking off. I watched my calories and logged and weighed everything until February of this year, and I lost 9lbs. But by February, even though I was still up 8lbs from my original goal weight, I was at the point where I said screw it, I can't handle the weighing and measuring anymore, it's driving me nuts, and I went back to maintenance eating and revised my goal weight up 5lbs and my red line up 5lbs, which made my weight at the time of 139 within maintenance range.

Maintaining is both easy and hard. I've been doing it long enough now that it's mostly habit, and checking in at 3fc to remind myself that I still need to be paying attention. It's also easy to become complacent and slip up more frequently than is really acceptable, leading to slow gain.

In any case I was able to maintain between 137-139 from February through September of this year with no problem. After going on vacation though my weight was up at 140 and I said, okay, I'm at red line and the holidays are coming so I need to be at 135 before the holidays if I want to stay in my range. So, back to weight loss mode. My weight is already going steadily down with only a week and a half of weight loss eating. I know how to do this. I know exactly what needs to be done to lose weight.

I almost wonder if this is the approach that we should be advocating for people who are new to weight loss. Work hard and lose weight for 2 months, then practice maintenance for 6 months. Then lose for 2 months, maintain for 6 months. That way people would get experience working at maintenance, without burning out on losing.

I'm curious to see what other people think about this. Are there others of you for whom weight loss is easy, but only for a certain period of time? Is this why we maintain by "yo-yo dieting on a very short string"? Because it's easy to lose weight for a couple of weeks, so we just have to catch it before we gain enough that it takes more than a couple of weeks to lose again?

My friend did a medically supervised diet and that was the basic principal. They went into maintenance for several weeks and then went back to weight loss mode again. It made sense.

I've wondered if this approach would be good for me. Right now, I just want it gone! My body seems to put itself in maintenance mode every few months anyway! :rofl: Why help it along?

I really think you have something here. My highest recorded non pregnancy weight was 169. I started losing weight when I was a graduate student, about 2 yrs ago. For 2 summers, I worked hard at losing weight, but decided to maintain during the school year just because I was not able to commit to it with all the stress. I was successful at maintaining within a few lbs. both school years, even without much effort or thought to my weight. I absolutely think this approach works for people like me :)

I've graduated and recommitted to weight loss in July. I am losing slowly, but I know it's something I can keep up forever, and I'm grateful for that. I know maintenance is something I will have to think about forever, and I think this is excellent practice

congrats on maintaining your loss!

This can work for some people, I'm sure. With supervision, it makes sense that it would work.

The danger is that one doesn't continue maintaining and instead starts gaining--and fails to get back quickly enough to weight loss. IMO six months is too long before going back into weight loss mode. And, if someone has a lot of weight to lose, that can get really discouraging.

Since we're talking theoretically, I'd say three weeks on weight loss and then one week on maintenance level might work better, as long as one was prepared to see a slight rebound on the scale during the maintenance week.

Jay

Jay, you're right, as with anything weight-related, different things work for different people. The durations of loss and maintenance would have to be related to the person's amount of weight they had to lose and the speed at which they lose it. If you are losing 2lbs/week, then a 3 week/1 week spread make sense. If you are losing 1lb/month, then you might want a longer time period on loss before switching to maintenance.

Plus, I know there are folks out there who weigh and measure every bite as their maintenance plan, so for them losing and maintaining might not be different enough to even notice. For myself, the difference between losing and maintaining is basically whether I weigh and measure portions and carefully track calories or whether I eyeball portions and approximate calories. My exercise stays the same either way, which is why I didn't include any talk of exercise in here.

YESSSS!!!! I totally agree!! I find if I eat in a calorie deficit for too long and am also exercising a lot, I tend to go nuts after about 2-3 wks of it. I've tried eating more calories while still staying in a small deficit, I've tried increasing fats for satiety, increasing veggies, more lean protein, fewer carbs, paleo, primal, but at some point I end up eating more than I planned for several days and then things calm back down.

For awhile I was really hard on myself about it. Where was my discipline? My will-power? My motivation? My commitment? After all, it's still me making the choice to eat "xyz". Was I copping out? Making excuses? So then I started wondering if the problem was less in my head and more in my body.

I think, for me anyway, my body really latches on to certain weights. I like healthy food. I like to exercise and run and lift and push myself. And my body thinks it's in trouble when the fuel =/= what it needs for homeostasis. I believe that for me, there is a biological drive from my body to have a certain amount of fuel, and all of my intellectual reasoning cannot always stifle that drive. Doesn't mean I am giving up my own sense of control here, just trying to understand my own behaviors more.

The more I consider your epiphany, Jessica, the more I think I will give it a shot, perhaps trying for shorter periods of a deficit, knowing that having a period of maintenance for fuel equilibrium is okay, and taking a longer view of things rather than looking at lbs on the scale or time on plan.

Hmmm.....

I could never, ever suggest something like this. I think for many it's a recipe for disaster.

First of all, my life was on the line. After two months, it was still on the line. Going to maintenance would have been playing Russian Roulette.

And after two months I was on a roll. For me to have practiced maintenance could have been the beginning of the end. I'd lose steam. I'd lose momentum. And just what would I do with those extra calories? Cookies? Cake? Ice Cream? One minute you're practicing maintenance, the next minute your gaining weight and fighting off cravings.

No, I hadn't had these wonderful habits firmly implanted in me. Would have been way too easy to slide back. Besides, I've said this often lately. I actually find the stricter I am, the easier it is for me. I like black and white. Gray is where I get into trouble.

For me, it was much easier continuing on. No stopping. It would have been waaaay too hard for me to ADD back more calories, just to get them pulled again and have to re-start. And than have to keep repeating that. No, much easier to keep on going.

I for one don't think it got harder after two months, I think it gets easier and easier and dare I say - easy. To switch gears, that would have been too difficult and frankly, unnecessary, for me.

One other thing, if you're practicing maintenance, you're still working hard, still focusing - but where is the reward? Where is the thrill of your clothing size plummeting, discovering new bones, fitting into places, compliments, etc? You're still working hard and it still may seem like sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice without the wonderful rewards surfacing. I say work a little harder - get the habits firmly ingrained and reap the benefits, find the thrills and the joys.

Oh and lastly (I think ;)), maintaining for me and losing are almost identical - I keep my calories just the same, but get my added calories through splurge meals/days every now and then. I couldn't have handled that back then. And more importantly I wasn't interested. I wasn't taking any chances. That could have sent me out and over.

Losing was an absolute thrilling journey for me. I LOVED every second of it. It was an unbelievable time of self growth and self discovery and a heckuva lot of fun! I wouldn't change a thing about it. :)

this could work for some.

also, each plateu is a chance to practice maintenance.

That is how I lost 160 lbs... losing, maintaining, losing, etc. I'm still maintaining even if I'm considered 'obese'. I have been maintaining for nearly 3 years with only slight ups/downs.

Hey, hope its okay for me to snoop over into a maintenance thread, but I was reading though this and though I'd comment. I actually do something similar to what JayEll suggested, which I learned through the Curves I go to, except I do 4 weeks on, 2 weeks off. Its worked pretty well for me so far.

I started June 1st and am in the middle of my 4th cycle right now, which means I've had 3 full maintenance periods so far. I don't just eat whatever I want then, I just try to continue eating a balanced diet with increased calories. I'm not as strict about weighting things out and such for every meal, but I pay close attention to my hunger levels, and don't overeat.

There is another part of the maintenance phase that I think is important though. If you gain more then your normal water fluctuation (normally about 3lbs for me), then you go back on the diet until you get back to the low weight you started that part of the cycle on. Once you are back to your low weight, you can go back to the maintenance if you still have part of the 2 weeks left.

So far, I haven't had to diet in the middle of any of my maintenance phases, since I've always stayed within three pounds of my low weight for the whole 2 weeks. And actually, it was only the first time that I ended up higher at the end then the beginning at all (the first time I was up 2 lbs, but the next two times I stayed the same).

I know this way won't for for everyone, but for me its been really helpful. I get to practice healthy recipes with a few more calories to work with, and I get a change of mindset periodically, which helps me stay focused. It also helped me work though a lot of my issues with overeating, and after getting though that first week of higher calories and figuring out how to interpret my bodies signals to deal with them, I haven't had much issue with it.

years and years ago I bought a book on the same sort of principles. That few people could stay on a diet long enough to lose that much weight without getting discouraged. It was a 21 day cycle. 7 days at extremely low calories then 2 weeks of more reasonable calories. Then you maintained till you were ready to do it again.

For me, no way. I was sick and tired of being fat. I had driven the wrong way using a wrong plan for about 18 months. No more isle of denial. I wanted the weight gone yesterday and my life back today.

Looking back on all of the fantastic experiences I had this past year because I dropped the weight quickly (1 1/2 #/week on avg & consistently) I would do it exactly the same again. I lvoed the challenge of figuring out how to eat what was good for me in many difficult situations. I have tips and strategies, and still add to them, that was made possible with my desire to avoid a self induced plateau. In fact, how many impassioned posts do we read about from those experiencing them.

Therefore, I really cannot promote this process to someone else. However, if it floats your boat, more power to you. I can't argue with success.

I understand that individuals are different and that different things work for different people, but I'm firmly in rockinrobin's camp on this issue--I don't see this approach working for me At All, and I have reservations about it in general. To me, it seems geared to a mentality of being On A Diet/Not On A Diet. If someone is on a diet that they can only stick to for weeks at a time, I'd say that either there's something wrong with the diet (e.g., too restrictive) or it's not right for the person.

For me, it's actually easier to stick to plan once I'm "on a roll", and I can't imagine wanting to stop and start and stop and start like that. My particular approach allows me to "save up" calories for special meals and treats now and then, and 1400 calories a day gives me enough flexibility that, even if I'm eating 1200 or 1300 for a few days to pay for a splurge, I'm not feeling hungry or deprived.

Maybe an option would be to permit a special meal every three weeks or so if that would make it easier for you to stay on plan the rest of the time. It seems to me that would still result in more progress than planning not to lose any weight for months at a time.

All that having been said, if the approach of switching between dieting and maintaining works for some people, I have no right to be judgmental about it.

Another one who doesn't want to "work hard" for a limited cycle. I've incorporated changes in my eating and activity level that I plan to continue indefinitely. As my weight drops, my calorie deficit drops and I expect that my body will pick its maintenace weight when I stop losing based when my body "deciding" what weight it will maintain on 1600-1800 calories per day and 6 hours of weekly exercise.

I'm not sure of a plan that institutes actual maintenance and how that'd work. For me, my weight loss was a couple years of losing weight and then weight loss stopping, so me tweaking, losing more weight, etc. It wasn't exactly planned to have periods of maintenance but it worked for me. I see a lot of people here who have over 100 lbs to lose that have had similar issues. A lot of people feel defeated if their weight stalls for various reasons. I think it is best to tell them to maintain their weight loss and work on tweaking until they lose again.

I think it would be best to tell them that yes, they should definitely keep on tweaking until they find something that gets them losing again (even if it's just time), but not to tell them to intentionally maintain.

I think it's vital to keep that focus strong and to keep to the main objective.

It's a personal thing, no doubt.

I had the same epiphany about 2 years ago. It changed everything.

I had lost 60+ lbs but was yo-yoing between 150-180 over and over again....felt frustrated and lost and sometimes hopeless...but Id always keep trying. I could adhere to any plan, and usually see the results but somehow in times things would happen in life and my diet would unravel.

Then the epiphany came, and it morphed into a solution! In short - my solution was constant adaptation.

My problem was that I had expected there to be ONE answer. One plan, one set calorie range, or way to maintain, whatever. Just eat right and workout, duh? Ummmmm - no!

My focus and commitment are to my health - weight, strength, agility, appropriately fueled/diverse/local/antioxidant rich food, emotional stability and a good quality of life. And to realize the goal of achieving those things will take..........*adaptability*.

Just saying - workout more and eat well did NOT work. I needed to become more in focus with what really worked for me (exact foods that were key, exact types of workouts I liked and would stick with, always trying a new exercise so I have something that works queued up for when the current one starts working less), find tools to recognize when I started going off track early, plans for how to get back on track, and resources to seek out when I get lost. It goes on and on....and while this might seem like more work. Its not - its my life. Focused on heath, and not on the struggle.

It actually, oddly feels easier than the yo-yoing.

The main objective is to lose weight and maintain that weight loss, not just to lose weight. I don't mind telling someone to maintain if it is the right thing for them. For me, when I stalled for months, it was helpful mentally for me to think maintenance for a while. I don't think I'd ever tell someone 'in order to lose weight and keep it off, you need to stop losing weight and maintain' but a maintenance period has worked for many people, whether the maintenance period was unintentional or not.

Xty, I love your philosphy!!

What's so great about 3FC is that we see how many different paths work for different people.

I have seen people intentionally maintain, and I think there are different reasons why it might be helpful, and the reasons can be as individual as the individuals themselves.

Weight loss can actually be a stressful situation for the body---not all stress is bad, of course, but our bodies seek balance and weight loss is a change. Sometimes bodies' need to get used to a new weight for a little while before being willing to release some more fat.

*Scale weight* maintenance can also be extremely useful for people who are seeking athletic goals of different types. Distance running does not necessarily encourage fat loss. I've seen this in other people too, but with my own distance training efforts, my body fat % went up during that time. Shorter interval runs reduces body fat for some people, steady state distance types activities might not always work as well for certain individuals. But if one is training for a marathon or half marathon or a century or some such, there may be a conflict between that training and fat loss.

Again, looking at goals, consider building muscle. Building muscle takes calories. I'm not sure that one can build significant muscle while in a calorie deficit. The reason weight training is so awesome is that more muscle = smaller, denser bodies and more calories burned at rest.

So I think there is definitely something to be said for folks who find success cutting more and more calories and plowing straight ahead with no detours. But I also think there is something to be said for folks whose strategies include specific athletic pursuits, calorie cycling, episodes of maintenance, etc.

For me, personally, I could try to go for 1200 calories a day, but I would bonk on my runs (and I'd be trying to chew my arm off). It's happened and it's not fun. There's a balance between eating for the scale to drop and eating to preserve physical function and mental health (I think the 2 are fairly well meshed---not saying to eat for stress relief, but if I am in a calorie deficit for too long, I do get cranky).

If calorie cycling works in the short term, why not over longer periods of time if that is what an individual needs to meet their own successes?

I am no longer of the mindset that the scale must go down whatever the cost (and I'm not saying that anyone else feels that way, but I used to feel that way a little bit). Now I am of the mindset of balancing healthy foods to meet my energy needs for the physical challenges I put forth for myself.

We all have our own goals and our own needs to meet along the way. Which is another reason I love 3FC so much!! I love these "aha!" moments and I think Jessica is right on the money for me personally.

You make a good point about being on a diet/not on a diet. That sort of mentality may not work so well for people who are just learning to eat right and exercise, since they would go back to their old eating habits during the "maintenance" phase.

I guess I was thinking of this technique working for people whose food plan is like my own -- everything in moderation, plus try to eat fruits, veggies, whole grains, and lean protein. So the food I eat when I'm losing and the food I eat when I'm maintaining is exactly the same, the only difference is that when I'm losing I eat slightly less of it. My exercise is also exactly the same. I think of "going on a diet" as meaning "changing what I eat and do," which for me is not the case when it comes to loss vs. maintenance.

What seems like the key realization for me -- and depending on your mentality and plan, it may not apply to you -- is that it's okay for me to get sick of losing weight and give up. It's okay to say, "I'm sick of weighing and measuring every bite just to lose half a pound in a month." That does NOT mean that it's okay to eat junk and *gain* weight, but it's okay to take a break and maintain. Then after a while of being a bit less strict, I feel like I'm ready to take it on and lose again. It's a lot easier and less stressful for me to work for a small loss, then say "I'm done." Six months later, when I'm ready, do it again.

When I lost the weight, I did lose it all at once. However, I didn't need to be so strict to lose weight then as I do now. I was able to lose weight then eating what I eat for maintenance now, and exercising less. Now that I'm smaller, and since I have had thyroid problems, I need to be much more strict even to lose 1-2lbs than I had to be then, and I find that it's very easy for me to do for a few weeks, but I can't handle it any longer than that.

I'm nowhere near maintaining, but this thread was so helpful for me! As a nursing mom my weight loss is going slooowly, and when the baby has a growth spurt I have an appetite spurt and maintain my weight until she's through it. The idea that it's OK to take a break for a little while is liberating.
Thanks again.

^^THIS. xty FTW.

I realize, looking back at my rather long weight loss journey (~4 years), that I have had pretty long periods of maintenance after each 40-50lb loss. When I stalled out and maintained, it really bothered me that I couldn't seem to push straight through to goal weight, but after reading a post (somewhere on 3FC) about weight maintenance as victory in its own right, I started to see these periods in a much more positive light.

At any other time in my life, I would have given up and just gained everything back. I think these periods taught me a lot about perseverance and my own perfectionism in an accentuate-the-positive/latch-on-to-the-affirmative kind of way; even if things were not going exactly the way I wanted them to be, I could still see a reason to at least not go backwards by regaining, and to keep trying new things and adapting to reach my goals. I think these periods also kept me from getting crazy with the regimentation, too; I can splurge sometimes and maybe even gain some weight, and it is not the END OF THE WORLD (whereas before, in my mind, it would have been). Maintenance periods helped a lot to temper my self-defeating all-or-nothing attitude.

I think I see what you're saying, paperclippy. I guess I'm still of the opinion that, for most people who are significantly overweight and have some bad habits, it would generally be best to try to tweak the diet until a plan is found that can be adhered to for long periods of time.

In my case, I never had a significant period of weight maintenance--I was always either "on a diet" and losing weight, or gaining weight because I had terrible eating habits. When I decided to make a permanent lifestyle change, I had to discard what used to be the conventional low-fat "wisdom". When I try to eat low-fat, I'm hungry 24/7 (probably related to PCOS). With a modified low-carb approach, I find 1400 calories a day not to be terribly restrictive, and I find calorie counting to be *so* comforting.

I think that's the biggest reason why our approaches are so different. You find the counting and measuring to be tiring--for me, I feel like it sets me free. When I get to maintenance, I plan to add back a few calories, but (like you) maintenance won't look much difference from "dieting" for me. The key difference is that I don't think I'll ever be an intuitive eater--I think I'm broken that way. For me, eating 1400 calories a day isn't any more work than eating 1750 would be, and I'm generally satisfied at 1400, so I don't see the point of taking a break before I get to goal. You say you can maintain by eating healthy foods without worrying so much about weighing and measuring--if so, I can see the sense in that.

When I first read this, I thought 'that wouldn't work for me because I lose so slowly'

Then I realized, I've done something like that before. Christmas last year to April of this year I stopped focussing on weight loss after losing 16 lbs. There was too much going on, not enough money to always get fresh healthy groceries, and I was trying to quit smoking, and my weight wasn't really budging anyways. I learnt a lot of good habits during my weight loss stint to the point where I only gained 6 lbs back (I wasn't weighing anymore either)

When I started being accountable again, the first month I started actually calorie counting instead of eyeballing, the second I incorporated exercise.

My weight stalled again in September within 20 lbs of goal, I considered going on maintenance again and just taking a break. This time I'm glad I didn't, because I stuck with it I found a better way of eating that works for me. Now I'm only 12 lbs from goal, I am confident I can maintain when I get there because I've had so much 'practice' at it. I've maintained twice now and feel like I've learnt a lot from my mistakes and how to keep it up in the long run.

Would this work for everyone? Probably not, some people would probably start maintenance and just not start again and lose momentum.

For me, I'm glad I had those experiences because I feel prepared on what to expect when it's time to 'stop' losing weight.

If I had considered this when I had more to lose, I don't think I would have been interested at all. But now that I'm closer to my goal, I'm a lot more concerned about being successful at maintaining, so a temporary maintenance to gain confidence and adjust my body image sounds like a great idea to me. I've been on a plateau for the last month (due to excessive stress) and it's taught me that I can go through **** and not gain back every single pound I've lost. I'm far less worried about maintenance than I was a month ago because I've proven to myself that I have made permanent changes that will serve me well in maintenance as they did while losing. Now I'm ready to lose again, and it's so much easier than it was a month ago. So I think there is a place for this type of practice, but everyone kind of has to figure out when and how temporary maintenance might work for them.