Hi everyone,

Ruth Ann, you made me seriously laugh out loud! Love your idea of a hammer to redecorate!!!

Westwillow- I am so impressed by your exercise. I agree, the yoga really does help in many ways. Your summer sounded fun too.

Mars- how was the apple? Way to stay strong at the market. The hours right after work are tough for me too.

Skye and Taye, my range is 5 pounds. Have only gone over it once, after vacation. I did 3 strict phase 1 days and was quickly back in my range. Usually, I do a phase 1 day right after my free meal and that has really limited my up pounds so far.

Sylvie, saying a prayer for your pup. Hope you get some sleep tonight.

Eve, many of my tastes have changed, but I still love good pizza.

Liana, as always- I love your humor.

Hello ladies

Ruth Ann- How was your half day return to work?

Skyavery - great question about setting your range weight, I am finding it helpful to read the discussion, have no comment as I am still trying to figure it out.

Susan - Great NSV about your 2 nephews not recognizing you. I am impressed with Slipfree, Eve, and you for doing yoga, I find it a challenging workout. I can't wait to hear about your 8km run/walk at Thanksgiving - good for you

Eve- those muffins look yummy. I may have to make a batch and put in the freezer and ration for myself.

Mars - Glad you made it out of the grocery store without sabatoging. I am heading there now and will tell myself that I have already eaten and will not go off plan. I hope to get in and out fast.

Hope everyone had a good start to the week.

SkyeAvery, kick them neuroses to the back of the line!
I was looking over my MFP Reports for net calories over the past 90 days (can't seem to go back any further) and I eat back my exercise calories and above my 'allowed' calories about 30% of the time. This doesn't seem to have a correlation with uppage in pounds so I mainly try to cut back my carbs to closer to 100g instead of 150 when I've been up pounds for a bit. If I've been near 150 net carbs for several days in a row, that is when I get the up pounds. Fat grams don't seem to matter for me. I think that is why P4 is so difficult for clinics to quantify... the losing weight part of the diet almost without exception works the same for most people, but when we are looking at a lifetime of maintenance, bodies can react so differently. Some of the gals in maintenance still have to eat like P3 (with the P4 funday and P1 afterward) to keep their weight where they want it, and keep to 70g of carbs or even less. Others have more leeway with the amount of carbs, as long as they do the dissociation which is the main part of ALL P4'ers successful plans.

I think with a bit of observation and trying things out you will find your 'happy place' lol. No need to fret, if things do start to go up consistently then do P1 strictly till it's down again. As long as you don't just observe yourself gaining weight steadily til you are 20 lbs over your top range...

Liana

Yeah, that's me in the supermarket, evemomma, my cart filled with bok choy & herbal tea....until I hit the prepared food area. Sounds like you are discovering your groove with maintenance. I look forward to reading how you're doing with exercise. Do you use yoga DVDs?

I'm a year in and still sorting out maintenance. Liana's suggestions are spot on. My range has turned out to be ~10 lbs up, which is when my clothes feel a bit snug. I hope to tighten this range, but there it is for now. I used to dread going back on P1 even for a day, but now, like evemomma, I kind of like the safe feeling of getting back in control & resetting by brain. You will figure it out. It takes a little trial and error and then you will gain confidence in your ability to stay the course and correct if needed.

I'm sorry to hear about your pooch, Sylviesgirl . Hope tonight is more restful for both of you. I'm with you re cheap veggies, esp. cauliflower. I love how P1 makes me renew the spark with produce.

Thanks, Slipfree! Alas no apple for me. I walked right past them and all of my other faves, did not turn my eyes from straight ahead to get chicken and broccoli.

Hope it went well Jenny! I can really do a number on myself with rationalizing why it's ok to eat things that will totally derail me Seems to work if I go with a list & keep my eyes straight ahead

Thanks, this is great info, Liana! Alas I am a dedicated neurotic who loves to think....and think,,, and think. Too bad it burns so few calories

Mars, Sorry, I messed up my post! I read that someone went apple picking. My tired mind can't keep track these days.

Slipfree, it was nice to think about having an apple. Hope you get some good rest

Interesting topic on what to do after fun days or when the scale starts moving in the wrong direction. At the moment, if I eat in a 'non-P4 manner', I do a day of P1/P2. This seems to be working well, although I'm trying not to coincide the P1 days with heavy exercise days.

My biggest struggle at the moment is eating out. Through 7 months of P1, I ate out a lot but was always, faithfully P1. Now that I can choose to have anything on the menu, I'm having it, plus some!! I really have to start setting some rules around eating out. Maybe I should make myself a list - no bread and no fries!! What do others do when eating out on P4? Do you have set rules or is it a fly by the seat of your pants situation?

It's your body...you get to make the rules RosiePosie! Just make 'em and stick with 'em. Try to find a couple of compliant meals at each of a few different restaurants, but try not to just eat around randomly. Take control like you did in P1. I think sometimes when we are at goal it is easy to pat ourselves on the back and keep celebrating that fact... and thinking a little bit here & there doesn't matter since we are at goal. And then, before you know it POW you are up more pounds than you care to admit and redoing all the bad food habits!
Talk to yourself before you enter the restaurant door, make the right choices, and ask the chef for something special if you need to. People who have allergies do it everyday without thinking because they HAVE TO. You can too!

Go Rosie, Go Rosie, Go Rosie! You got this!!!

Liana
Ok... done now.

Just as an example from my day today, RosiePosie: My dad & I like to go to Wendy's Restaurants. I know they have a fair bit of stuff that is Gluten Free and I have two meals picked out depending on whether it's a fat meal or a carb meal. For the fat meal, I take extra mac or walnuts in my purse and sometimes an HB egg or two. I get the Apple Pecan chicken salad 1/2 size and get regular helping of bleu cheese and then an extra helping. I sub the Lemon Garlic Caesar dressing for the pomegranate and I have a fat meal. If it's a carb meal like today I get a baked potato with broccoli & cheese sauce and a small order of chili with 2 packets of hot sauce. There you go. those are the only two choices I let myself have. No fries and no frosty unless it's funday.
It is what it is.
The point is, you have to choose something that you think tastes good and enjoy while still on your plan, or there is no reason to go to that restaurant.

Liana

Thanks Liana for your detailed reply. This is very helpful. I definitely need to think ahead a bit more and check out menus on line and then make choices before I go rather than being overwhelmed by the choices once I'm there. It's definitely a learning process!

Good morning!

Sylviesgirl - hope your pup is doing better. They become such a big part of the family, it's hard when they aren't doing well.

Love the discussion on weight ranges. I try to stay between 130 and 135 and usually 132 is pretty easy for me to maintain. If I've had a few higher carb days in a row I will cut way back for a few days even if the scale doesn't go up - kind of a preemptive strike. Being short, every pound tends to show on me. I don't have a lot of fun days/meals but try to work things into my day.

That said, I did notice today that I'm still a couple of pounds over my regular weight. I went up 8 pounds after surgery but should have lost it by now. I'm back to my regular eating now, so if the pounds are still there in a couple of days I will do a couple of P2 days and get them back down (still trying to keep my protein up while I heal).

You guys are so inspirational - I love hearing how everyone deals with maintenance in real life, gives me hope that I can do this long term!

I've been to meaning to put this out there from ~ 1 yr ago....My last weigh in when I hit goal coincided with a check up with internist. (So nice to see his lack of recognition of the smaller me). He mentioned that ketosis produces some euphoria.
In hindsight, I wonder if that accounts for some of the perceived ease of P1 and difficulty of maintenance. My elation as the scale went down, right up to goal, was harder to tap into in P4. I had to keep reminding myself how great it was rather than just feeling joyful. Maybe this experience is an extra layer to the uncertainty inherent in the process of figuring out what to eat. Eventually upping calories and healthy fats seems to have reconnected me with the joy. Maybe exercise will do that too. Hope this is helpful

RuthAnn....never underestimate the power of inflammation that is probably still playing a role with you! I have had multiple abdominal surgeries (where you can see the inflammation so easily since it's right at the waistline), and I would say I STILL had inflammation for more than a month following. Keep up the healing!

I love the practical discussion about weight ranges and weight management on here. I am back down to my 127 today. I find that I am regularly cycling from 127 at my low end and 130 at my high end. At least for right now, 131 at least two days in a row would be my trigger to take a look at what might be going on: am I building muscle mass? too many carbs? TOM?

I have been having good success doing a P1 day after a fun day (and I'll admit it's not just a fun meal, though my calories were still under 1800 for my last fun day). I really don't mind a weekly P1 at all.....I can be on automatic pilot! I have not pushed heavy exercise on P1 days either, RosiePosie.

I need to get a better list of P4 compliant meals for eating out. I have tried to keep the rule of saving the eating out for my fun day, just because that way I have so much more control over my choices. I have also set the rule for myself not to have any fast food even on a fun day (fried burger and french fries)- mostly because it was such an AWFUL habit of mine pre-IP AND I don't even like the way it tastes anyway! But I do need to have some go-tos for when life gets crazy.

Those go-to P4 meals out would be a GREAT topic to post!

Hi ladies. Just wanted to pop in and say hello, as I've been reading every day getting ready for the transition off. Have been sticking to this thread and the 100% zone for the most part as I find I'm tempted by more things the closer I get to phasing off. Kind of backwards to think oh I'm so close, I'm practically there, a little of this or that won't hurt. Sticking to it though!

I'm wondering if there are any maintainers who phased off at their initial goal and later decided that they wanted to go farther and did a reboot after maintaining successfully for a bit? I've seen a lot of reboots for regains but not so many to see if they can go farther and maintain at a lower weight. My coach is pushing me to go for a few pounds more (which I will be doing) just to give myself more cushion in my range, as you all have discussed, but I'm thinking I may revisit P1 in the winter to go even farther and get that real bikini bod ready for the summer. I might find I'm able to achieve that with exercise, but just wondering what others have done.

This is unbelievably helpful to me. I have been actively thinking about what the difference is and have been getting rather irritated with myself. I remember being so elated on P1 (once I really got rolling), feeling so good and so positive, everything was just great. I remember noting the difference and thinking it was related to losing the weight and gaining self esteem, etc, and that I had found my bliss. But once I hit goal, the further I got away from the losing days, the more the joy and elation wore off. This made no sense to me since I had actually finally arrived at goal. Shouldn't I feel better than ever? Since then, I have been scratching my head and wondering what my deal is. This hits home perfectly. Thank you for sharing it. I had never read this or heard this anywhere, but now that I read it, it fits me to a T. Maybe this is one thing I can stop analyzing now . . . like you, mars, I am a champion over-analyzer. Boy, we seem to be in the same place on a lot of things. Thanks again.

Pish -- I know there have been maintainers who have done this, but no name comes to mind. Hopefully, people will respond.

Eve -- I think you're right about an eating-out-on-P4 discussion. So far, I have usually counted it as my fun day and followed with a P1 day. However, as we get into fall and then the holidays, these circumstances will present themselves more often than once a week.

Off to the dentist . . .