It is very difficult if your food choices are accompanied by either guilt or or a pat on the back. The constant self judgement drives one to food time and time again. In my case I find it much easier to navigate food if I don't make it a moral choice. If I'm hungry and can find satisfaction in a donut I eat it. If I'm not hungry, then what kind of satisfaction can I actually derive from this donut? So I don't. My stomach is a much better guide than my ego and so I've chosen to go with that and do without the moralizing.

This is exactly what happened to me. Maintenance was easy for the first 2 – 2 ½ years. The longer I maintained, though, the hungrier I seemed to get.

Again, ditto. It’s the always having to think about food that bothers me. My inner petulant child comes out and I start to get resentful that “normal” eaters don’t have to do that (this sense of unfairness is a trait of yo-yo dieters, by the way).

I think food is a major part of a vacation (or a holiday or a family get together), and I know many “normal” eaters who feel the same way. Yes, it’s also about the place and the people, but food is inherently wrapped up in culture, so it’s part of exploring that culture. I get your point about eating in moderation, but that’s really the rub, isn’t it? If we could eat in moderation, we probably wouldn’t be having this discussion. I find that I always want to eat more than what’s in front of me. I have some strategies for coping with that, but I don’t always succeed in implementing them.

Actually, I derive a great deal of satisfaction regardless of physical hunger. There's a "mouth" hunger that I find I often want to satisfy that is separate from physical hunger. Whereas my physical hunger might be satisfied with one doughnut, my mouth hunger needs three. The only exception to this is when I am really full---e.g., I've eaten a big meal. At that point, my desire for even something delicious is easier to resist. But to get to that fullness point, I'm eating over what will sustain a healthy weight for me.

I can definitely identify with that feel cause I used to go with that too. Some how I made it all fit into my stomach way beyond fullness and liked it. I did have satisfaction from that. But I chalk it up to being a bad habit and have been working hard to rid myself of it. Brain Over Binge has helped a lot with that but I would not have been able to implement any of it without being fully in touch with my physical hunger via IE. It's working and it was just a bad habit that can be unlearned just like all bad habits.

Yes, ITA. I believe establishing good habits will be the key to maintaining a healthy weight for me. It's just getting there, though. I'm not trying to make excuses---just venting a little. This past week, for instance, I felt something I had not felt in a while: I actually disliked the "heaviness" I felt after eating a big meal (and it was an overly large meal, but it was a bit much). I thought to myself that if I could just hold on to that feeling and remember it, I could easily maintain my weight. Of course, today, it's rainy and chilly for June, and I feel as if I could eat the house down.

Thanks for all the thoughtful replies.

I've been tracking calories every day since October 2011 so I have a good idea of what I lose on. My main beef is that 2000 calories a day will cause me to gain weight now as opposed to to when I first started out and could maintain on that. It also irritates me that I exercise more now that ever in my life (I'm a competive fencer) and I still struggle.

Granted I was 80 lbs heavier and 4 years younger. My metabolism has changed that much though, which is why I believe it comes back so fast for formerly obese people.

I suppose I'm just irritated and whining about it though and get back down to 1200 a day and be done with it. It just doesn't seem like an enjoyable style of living though...and yes being fat isn't either.

Guess that's just our lot in life for some of us. A lot of people are a lot worse off.

I don't know, I can't hold on to feelings, habits are habits because we do them over and over again regardless of how we feel about them. That's why it's so easy to end up hating ourselves. I remember feeling total disgust with myself after I would binge on a whole box of donuts. But even feeling that disgust on a daily basis never deterred me from eating a whole box of donuts because I had created a habit of it that was hard to break and when it was time for my body to crave donuts the urge to eat was far more powerful than any memory of self-disgust I felt even the day before.

Rather, a habit is built by repetition. You just have to separate yourself from whatever feeling you have about your actions (guilt, shame, even the positive ones like pride). It's like brushing your teeth, I don't feel anything about brushing my teeth, I just do it and it's done. It doesn't need a pep talk on a daily basis, how tedious and undoable is that!

I think she was talking about herself, not suggesting that you adopt her way of thinking.

I am confused about what your ideas are, just for you.

On the one hand, you say that if you're hungry and a donut will satisfy, you'll have the donut.

On the other hand, you say you built good habits by practicing them.

So, I assume that at some point, you wanted a donut and told yourself not to eat it and had to resist it in order to build good habits. Am I wrong?

Or did you kind of wake up one day and say, "Hey, I've got this all figured out!" and just go from there, with it all being easy-peasy, no effort, done deal?

You obviously have been successful with what you've done and are confident that it's the right way for you. How did you begin?

sThis is annoying, isn't it? I used to maintain on 2200 per day, and now I weigh more even though I'm eating 2100 a day. Also, I exercise approx. 2 hours, 6 days a week. Most people would gasp in horror at that , but I don't mind it because I've incorporated it into my life. Still . . . 2 hours a day?? (And that's not counting walking my dog, housework, etc.). My mind tells me that if I exercise that much, I should be able to eat with abandon, but nope.

Okay, I'll throw in my .2 here.

IMO, the only way you'll lose and then maintain for life is to make a firm, solid, intellectual commitment to living the rest of your life as you've done through the weight loss phase. For years & years, I tried losing weight through militaristic regimes - way too restrictive. They'd work to lose weight, but it was impossible to maintain because I just couldn't live like that.

The year I turned 40, in 2011, I finally wised up. I made big changes, but I learned (slowly) that life creeps in and I wasn't going to always be able to eat the exact calories, or work out like I had "planned" or journal as I did each day. That's when the bell went off - because that is how all the "normal weight" people I knew already lived. They ate sensibly most of the time, were active or did planned exercise most of the time and took care of themselves - and then when they "splurged" or had a bad day (or bad week!) it just wasn't a big deal, as long as they went back to living normally.

So, that's my point. My new normal is about watching what I eat every single day. It's about being active. It's about planned exercise, getting enough rest, drinking herbal and green tea all day long and managing my emotional state so I don't slip into a binge. I can deviate from this for a bit, when I'm on vacation or recently, after I had a major surgery; however, I have to go back to living that way or it's over.

BTW, the "normal" for my sister-in-law, who is 5'5 and maybe weighs 120 lbs, or my mother-in-law, who is 5'6 and maybe weighs 130 lbs, is very different than my normal. Neither of them have ever been overweight or ever had binging issues like I do. So me trying to live like they live would never work, I have to be a lot more diligent. But I have accepted that fact and I'm no longer bitter about it. I would definitely regain if I tried to live like them, absolutely.

Wise post!

THIS is the story of my life right now.

I've regained about 15 lbs (more or less) without actually reaching my weight goal anyway. I was in the low 160s for a long time, but somehow, I've crept up to 177 lbs, and this is the problem I'm having.

I eat healthy for a meal or a day, and I expect to see the result on the scale the next day. Nevermind that for the last 5 years or longer, I've known that my body doesn't react that quickly to weight loss, that I have to do it consistently, that if I eat M&Ms in the evening, even if I eat healthy all day, it counteracts everything that I did (because I have IR and I am not under control right now).

*Sigh*

I don't know how to find my way back, to be honest. It's harder to make the choices and not see the change on the scale. I want instant gratification and it's hard because I think I still beat myself up for having gain it back in the first place.

Vex -- Good luck. I truly sympathize.

I've experienced very fast weight regain in the past. There are many reasons for this:

i) Calorie restriction causes the metabolism to slow. It can take some time for it to correct itself.

ii) When you resume 'normal' calorie intake your metabolism doesn't work fast enough to burn increased calories

iii) Many diets trigger loss of muscle mass. Lean muscle mass burns calories

iv) I did not find appropriate food substitutes when I was attempting weight loss. I was depriving myself. It set me up for failure.

v) I placed too much emphasis on exercise as a means to try and offset weight gain. I now realize it's not very effective at doing so.

Having realized these and other things, my weight has stabilized to a healthy level. I've kept 50lbs off for at least 5 years. I'm confident I won't have any further issues with weight gain again.

I also recall reading that fat cells are created when we gain, but they are not destroyed when we lose. So when we regain, not only are we creating new fat cells, we're dealing with the ones we have "puffing up"

I wish I could remember the article where I read that or had a link.

Awesome post thanks!