My vacation weight is gone and hasn't come back--no bounce.

"Forced" restriction no longer works for me. All it ever did was give me a tendency to binge, which I had never had before.

My current strategy is that I can eat whatever I want, but not huge amounts and not constantly. For example, I had been getting into this thing with dark chocolate M&Ms two or three times a day, and I had to cut that out. Also, I've found that most meals out are too large, so half of what I get for lunch comes home with me for dinner. Or it just gets left behind.

At 154.7 this morning, the same as the day after vacation. Maybe this is a real weight and I ought to record it on my ticker.

I know this is wrong, but I see the number on the scale as one particularly bright indicator on a gigantic dashboard telling me whether I am directing my life and making some kind of progress. Do the things that I do add up to anything or get me any further? Am I actively participating, or passively accepting whatever punches get thrown at me, and succumbing to victimization? It's when I feel ineffectual and like I am just running in place that I get sad. At least I can see progress in lower numbers on the scale, and that helps. There are so few things in life with immediately quantifiable results, with a clear cause and effect.

Part-time restriction is really hard for me - I suspect it's for reasons similar to what you have said. In my case, it's because the overeating is usually due to work stress, not to any joyous occasion or actual enjoyment of the food. The subsequent restriction is therefore harder to accept as it only deprives me of my coping mechanism on top of everything else; there's no positive/negative tradeoff. If I could adopt JayEll's approach of constant moderation, it would surely be an improvement.

Saef, I also feel like I am running in place with minimal net gain most of the time. It is a frustrating feeling... but part of my brain says "that's life". Very little IS immediately quantifiable. My metrics now are things like how many miles did I run over the week, etc. Which is also frustrating since work interferes greatly with how much I'd actually like to run (and the lengthening darkness is always the nail in the coffin on weekdays, starting in October). I'm trying not to let how many calories I eat be my primary metric. But of course it often is.

Andrea, in terms of part-time restriction, I have to say that I tried alternate-day fasting and that was a total flop for me. I ate too much on the days I wasn't fasting. I seem to do better with the same schedule every day which I get used to. I really restrict heavily most of the day, but every day I do get to eat as much as I want at one point (I avoid too many calories by a volumetrics-style first course). I generally eat pretty healthy, but my food isn't calorie-counted. Last night's dinner was chicken with massaman curry on black rice (after I ate some grape tomatoes with guac to fill up a bit). Limited dessert, usually (2 squares dark chili choc in that case).

That seems to keep the pity party away and binge-tendency at bay. It's also very compatible with eating out, though I try to eat some fresh veggies or low-sugar fruit before I get to the restaurant. Anyway, it's something to think about if you are looking for an alternative that might help you stay in control.

Saef, I'm sorry you feel sad that you are treading water. There are some periods in our lives where that's a good thing. At the moment, I am holding my breath as DD (only child) is applying to college. Things will be so different next year! Luckily, she is only applying to nearby schools, so I will be able to see her sometimes.

We went apple picking this weekend, and I broke my usual daytime fast to eat a couple of sample apples as well as a hot, fresh cider doughnut. But we didn't end up eating out either night which is a little unusual lately. I clocked 138.2 on the scale this morning.

I'd agree that on the dashboard of life, weight has an unusually large gage. I like that imagery since I can fancy myself as a dashboard designer, moving and re-sizing as life changes. Perhaps it's more of a bubble chart and the scale number's bubble is so huge that it has all the other little bubbles all compressed up into the corners and against the axes ...

I'm trying to concentrate on food quality at the moment, while swimming ramps up. Much as I love the pool, there is nothing quite like swimming, especially hard swimming in cold competition pools, to make one violently hungry.

Becky-- that has always been my experience with swimming-- more than any other exercise-- it makes me ravenous! Good luck!

Ditto here - swimming makes me strangely hungry, while a long run suppresses my appetite for hours (until it comes back with a vengeance). Does anyone know if there's "science" behind that? Is it something as basic as core temperature change?

Some masochistic impulse made me weigh myself this morning, after a salty dinner and mid-PMS bloat. And of course the number was high and made me depressed. I know that weighing regularly is strongly associated with weight maintenance, but I still resist it.

While I miss DS, it is nice to get back to lighter dinners at night. Last night I used some FlatOut flat bread and made mozzarella, tomato and avocado grilled cheese sandwiches and served them with Campbell's Golden Buttermilk Squash Bisque. The box contains just two servings of 110 calories each and it is SO YUMMY! So weight was down about a pound this morning.

So that is good because I hit the wrong alarm button AND my cat failed to pounce on me so I missed my morning workout today.

So weird that I've actually been looking forward to these workouts. I wonder if that will continue once we go back to standard time.

I've never gone looking for science to back up the swimming-causes-hunger phenomenon - I have enough personal experience to call it a simple reality. I am discovering (or remembering) that some of it can be mitigated with adequate water during the practice, which lends more to the idea that a lot of thirst can hide under the camouflage of hunger. It's very easy to discount the amount of sweating going on in the pool (ew).

Allison, your sandwich sounds lovely! With a strip or two of bacon ... Sorry. Some habits die really, really hard.

Becky~I agree, bacon does sound good in there! I do have a couple other recipes that have bacon. I try to stay away from those as much as possible, but I have one on my plan this week. I think it has goat cheese, bacon and dates. Sounds like an interesting combination.

Both my alarm and my cat worked this morning and I got up for my 4 AM workout. I missed the eclipse, though. I slept like &*(^ last night and I'm chalking that up to the workout I missed yesterday morning. I feel much better today.

I also got my hair colored today and that always raises my mood. I really hate to have my roots show.

Rumor has it that a strip of bacon is less than 50 calories (some packages say 2 strips is 70 cals). That strikes me as diet food :>)

As for swimming, it makes me hungry too. But pretty much any cold outdoor activity will do the same - skiing, ice skating, sledding, even hiking when it's under 60F.

In ancient times, I tried losing weight by just exercising (lifting, cycling, and walking) more and that was a disaster. My hunger increased disproportionately. Recently, I remember reading about a study that seemed to indicate that jarring exercises (running, aerobics) moderate hunger but less jarring exercise increases it.

I found a reference to that study here:

http://www.acefitness.org/prosourcea...e-and-appetite

Regardless of how it affects appetite, I think most successful maintainers incorporate exercise. I think having more muscle works out in the long run and if one doesn't exercise one has to eat what seems like an insanely small amount of food in today's Western culture to avoid weight gain. It's doable, but it's the road less taken. I walk a fair bit, but that's my only form of exercise so I think I'm a bit of an outlier.

We're having a special pot luck today at work, so I intend to eat during the day today. If the food weren't the centerpiece of the gathering, I might opt to attend but skip eating. However, the whole point is ppl bringing in their fall favorites (I'm bringing chili). The scale is at 138.0 today, so no worries.

Online Shopping. How many of you do it? I don't do much as I am usually disappointed. I do see a lot of ads for Zulilly that are attractive. Anyone tried them ? What did you think ?

I do almost all of my shopping online bargoo and I have for about 15 years now. I've found sites where things fit and I keep buying them over and over. Sometimes I have to send stuff back and I prefer using retailers like LL Bean who make that really easy. My major clothing purchases come from there and also from Land's End, Eddie Bauer, and ebay. I buy almost all of my house wares on ebay and have got some really cool vintage stuff there. Vintage in the sense it's made awhile ago but never used. Got a turquoise Fiestaware platter there not long ago and tried to buy a 60's Scandinavian soup tureen but she wouldn't ship to Canada.

I also have some amazing vintage costume jewellery from ebay. And all my hiking boots and running shoes for work come from there as well. I put in search terms for those and buy from whoever I think has the best deal. I don't do the ebay auctions because I'm not near a computer all day but people say you can get great deals if you have the time to do that.

I looked at Zulilly but you have to sign up to access the site. I didn't like that - too much marketing - so I didn't join. I prefer to have the option to shop as a "guest" first to see if I like the site and the quality of the merch. Zulilly doesn't offer that option.

Dagmar

I buy clothing almost exclusively online, except for a bit of shopping at discount retailers and the big department store sales when I'm on vacations. I have a decent success rate, although in recent weeks I've had an odd problem with fitted dress shirts for the office: My biceps make the sleeves tight, though the shirt fits well everywhere else.

I'm 155.1 this morning and am telling myself not to get too upset with this, as it's not that different from 154.7 from this past Monday. Right? It's like stuff priced at $9.99 or $199.99 to fool the eye.