hi ladies

lately i find myself reading the maintenance posts daily! so many of you are so inspirational and motivational that i can't help but reach out! i want to be more active here and join you in your daily adventures in maintenance.

that said, how many of you track consumption and activity? to what degree? how many of you have let go of the rigidity of logging every morsel of food and every minute of cardio? is it possible?

also, what is your average caloric intake as well as average daily activity? are you sedentary?

...as mentioned in a previous post today, i aim for a minimum of 50 minutes of cardio 5-6 x/week, sometimes 90 mins in the summer when i am running outside and 30-40 mins of weight training 4 days a week. i also stand all day at work in my cubicle and don't own a car so its two feet and a heart beat to get around.

my caloric intake has been averaging about 2,000 for the last three months and i haven't gained any weight (yet).

since having hit maintenance have you also had to re-lose or lost additional weight? ...i would like to lose that final 10lbs but can't seem to control the calories!!

cheers

I still plan my meals ahead . I stiil count calories. I still weigh every day.
I still keep a food log. This is not too grueling a task and it is preferable to wearing extra size clothing again I eat about 1400 calories a day. If I ate 2000 calories a day I would soon be 200 Plus pounds again.

I log every minute of activity only because I started the President's Fitness Challenge several years ago as a member of 3FC. In fact, I'd almost made it to the platinum level (highest level) this time last year when, without warning, the university that runs the website changed the points from 500,000 to 1,000,000. Now that was upsetting!

If I find myself gaining a few pounds, then I track my food, but otherwise I don't.

I track my weight and my exercise daily. I try to exercise daily (usually 60-90 minutes) but I do miss a day here and there.

I am currently not tracking unless I go over 120 for more than a few days. I've been hovering around there for a few days and will probably go back to tracking because I prefer a little wiggle room. When I've tracked my calories, I'm usually around 1300-1400. I suspect that I've been over that lately which would explain the few extra pounds.

i guess i should have been a bit more specific...

i currently use an excel file where i log my activity as follows:
type/duration/speed/miles/pace/sets/reps/METS/cals in/cals out/Heart Rate

I use a baseline of 1500 as a "BMR" (activity done is added to this amount for total 'burn' and total cals in is subtracted from this to give me the net).

I also have a sheet where I input everything I eat (recipes are on a seperate sheet wehre i list ingredients, their weight and cals/gram) to determine my total 'input' for the day.

on top of all this i have a sheet that tracks the running totals for these items so i can see the weekly, monthly, and now annual trends.

i insert comments in the dates column of the activity sheet to track my menses cycle, when i'm sick and for how long as well as my weight.

is this overkill?! i don't know? anyone else a stats freak like this?

For me it would be overkill, but if you enjoy it and it gives you useful data, then you should continue. In the maintenance game, it's whatever works for you.

I log all my food and activity on myfitnesspal. At first continuing to log pi$$ed me off, but now it's so part of my day - it's like brushing my teeth. I still calorie cycle and my cals range from 1400 - 3000, seriously. Now it averages out to I'd say 1700-2000/day on a good week, but when I'm emotional - yes I still overeat and pay for it.

I'm an exercise nut and workout anywhere from 60 mins to 2 1/2 hrs a day. Now that 2 1/2 hours is because I do a long run once a week. My workouts otherwise are anything from a light walk or yoga to spinning and running.

This is my lifestyle now and it took a lot of "acceptance" to really get into the grove of it and enjoy it for what it is. But in general I think you'll find maintenance strategies as vast and diverse as weight loss strategies. Hope this helps.

Oh and btw, yeah I kinda think your tracking is a bit more than necessary, however, if you dig it and it's interesting to you then don't fix what isn't broken. But if you're finding affecting your mood or complicating your food and exercise decisions, then maybe backing off may be a good thing.

I don't track. I follow Susie Orbach's advice from her book On Eating (Eat when you feel physically hungry, stop when you are full). I lost all the weight calorie counting though so I can estimate that I eat around 2000 calories a day.

I work out almost every day for at least 1 hour. Either cardio, weight lifting, or yoga. I sometimes take 1 day off a week.

I just did a 30 day yoga challenge during which I did no exercise but yoga every day and I regained about 5 lb. I'm hoping it will come off pretty easily now that I'm back to my regular workout schedule. I hit maintenance about 9 months ago.

I am just starting maintenance, but I have no plans to give up tracking. I use MyFitnessPal to log my food and exercise, and at this point, it's actually kind of fun! (I've been doing this since June). I have it on my smartphone, and it probably takes up five minutes or less of my day, and I would rather do that than gain weight---which would happen if I didn't track. I have tried intuitive eating more than once, and it does not work for me. I am not a good estimator. That's why I have to weigh & measure my food and track it. Maybe one day I won't have to, but for now, I need to, and doing so really isn't a hassle for me.

I completely agree with a couple of other posters who advised you to do what works for you. Part of the reason I regained lost weight in the past is that I kept measuring myself and my habits against some idea of "normal." Using that standard made my habits seem abnormal by comparison. That would lead to me trying to be "normal" and ultimately regaining my weight. Now, I don't really care if what I'm doing is the norm or not. If it works for me, I'll do it. When it stops working for me, I'll stop doing it and try something else.

Thanks ncuneo; i always find your posts refreshing and insightful. ...i've revamped my tracksheet a few times and now its really pretty straight forward (i'm an excel nerd).

its that 'acceptance' piece and fear of letting go that i fight with. i can also vary from 1,400 - 3,000 cals, but average about what you do, 1,700 to 2,000 cals/day with about the same level of activity.

...i don't know how people can survive long term on 1,600 cals/day or less. i'd rather hate and fight through an hour of hard exercise coupled with standing all day long to be able to eat at least 1,800 cals/day. i just love food too much; sadly, there are times too, where i'm a little pantry monster and i eat everything in sight, but i get back on track pretty quickly

I can do without tracking for a few weeks at a time, but find that it's way too easy to lose track of my total intake when I don't track. Then I wonder why I've regained 2-4 pounds. As soon as I start to track again, it's like- oh yeah, I've been eating an extra 100 calories here and an extra 80 calories there, and added anywhere from 200-400 calories to my day without evening noticing.

I'm seriously jealous of maintainers who get to eat over 1600 cal/day and still don't gain. Yeah, I'm looking at a lifetime spent eating that amount along with an hour a day of exercise if I don't want to regain (and, I'm told by many longterm maintainers that it gets harder and harder over the years; that your metabolism adjusts slowly and surely so that after 5-6 years you maintain on 10-15% fewer calories than in the beginning).

Just think--if I live to be 100 I won't be able to eat anything at all, but I sure will be fit from exercising every day... Fit and very, very grumpy...

Jay

I am not quite at goal weight... hovering about 5 lbs above, and I have lost about 55 pounds, all on Weight Watchers. I was in a plateau/rut/whatever you want to call it for several months. I realized that I needed to change my plan, so I tried doing their "simply filling" method. This is where you don't have to track the points of every little thing you put in your mouth, just the stuff that isn't considered a "power food". Eating on this plan has not only busted the plateau, but I feel that it's also teaching me how to eat for the rest of my life. It focuses on fruits, vegetables, lean proteins, and complex carbohydrates. And most importantly, STOPPING WHEN YOU ARE FULL. I no longer play games with eating until I have used all my points for the day. I am making much healthier choices. I still have to watch my indulgences, and probably am doing a much better job of it than I was on the pointsplus plan, in reality. I haven't tracked in about a month yet have been losing consistently and feeling much better than I have in a long time about my relationship with food.

I guess my point is that tracking forever is not a reality for me. My strategy is to get more in tune to my hunger and satiety cues and make smart choices. And it's comforting to know that if the scale starts going up, I have all the tools to start tracking again if I need to.

and very, very, very thin

Dagmar