Hi All,
Sorry if this a double post-I am having internet problems.
I am a semi-lurker who finds a lot of wonderful support from this board.
In the past month, I have been waking up from a "food coma" that consisted of a year's worth of compulsive eating after having lost 60 pounds the year before. Now I have regained 45 pounds and am feeling shell-shocked. I was aware the scale was creeping back up but I never thought that I gain it nearly all back.

Now that I am food sober again and desperately want to lose weight for good, I keep thinking about why did I do such a self-destructive thing to myself. Two years ago, I swore that I never be here again yet I failed.

I know that I have huge issues with stress eating for emotional comfort. I have been to therapists, take pills and read countless books on the subject yet I still have not changed this way of eating.
Sorry for this whine I am feeling really down right now and incredibly frustrated with myself that I could let myself gain back so much and now my physical problems like back pain and shortness of breath have all returned.

I know that the answer lies with me and I have to take responsibility for what I put into my mouth. I already feel better having written this.
Thanks so much for your support.

Pennie

Hi Pennie. I wish I had answers for you, but I don't. I have never ever succeeded at keeping weight off. No matter if I lost it super slow and healthy, or if I crash dieted and starved myself. Regardless of how I lost it, I have always gained it back...quickly and I usually added an additional 50 extra pounds each time.

I have learned a lot this time, and decided to do thing totally different than any other time...though I'm still pretty strict with myself, I'm working on that one. I'm tired of failing. I'm tired of the embarrassment that comes with morbid obesity, I'm tired of letting people down, (meaning not wanting to go places with my family because I'm embarrassed). I eat because I enjoy it. I love food, I love to cook, I love unique tastes. I think the regaining process with me always began with the desire to have the foods I didn't eat while I was dieting...no deep dark emotional deep rooted problem, but just enjoyment. But when a few pounds creep back on, then a few more, that;s when the deep dark emotional bs starts. I'm a failure, so I'm going to eat because I enjoy it, and it's the only enjoyment I ever have, so I'm going to keep doing it until I'm so miserable from something I enjoy that I'll be forced to do something about it again. What a crazy notion.

I think it's something we're just born with. Someone asked me not long ago if I see the glass half empty or half full. I though about it for a bit and I realized that my glass has never been half empty or half full, it has either been filled to the brim, or washed and put away. All or none, no middle ground. If I can get that working properly, it think I'll be successful at maintenance.

Hi Pennie...

First off and hello.

Secondly, I am also an emotional eater as well as using food for comfort, which are sort of two different issues for me. Emotionally eating is what it is, but sometimes I find that I use food for just basic comforting needs. Like a hug = a carb packed meal, which I crave when I'm hormonal mostly. Does that make sense? It isn't the same as when I'm feeling depressed or extremely negative and crave huge amounts of unhealthy foods.

I've made a promise to myself and to my man to stop emotionally eating, which is hard. I'm making a commitment, but it is because I'm at a place emotionally that I can try to work on and move forward with positive things. So far i've been struggling, but trucking along. There is no easy answer and I think for that sort of issue it is a very personal thing. Meaning what I am doing probably wouldn't create a supportive environment for everyone else. I know there are tricks like not having those foods in the house, or taking a pill, or whatever...but at the end of the day, for me personally, it is about really facing my emotional issue and working on them.

Gaining weight back does happen, probably to a lot more people than we think. I started to gain some weight back recently and woke myself up because I have goals, big ones, that I want to meet. Those goals keep me going and I have a purpose. While I'm on this journey I am learning how to take care of myself inside and out. That means that I cannot go through my life dieting. I want to change my lifestyle and have been taking steps to do make progress, but you know I will always struggle with food. It is embedded in me and I'll always have issue. I guess learning how to take care of myself also means learning how to cope in a way that works for me.

I guess I don't have an answer either about your weight gain. Maybe you are in a better place now and are ready to move forward. You know I always start something and fail lol. Always...then I jump right back in and actually succeed a lot of the time. If I fail again, I keep on trying! lol

I think part of it also is we stop taking care of ourselves to take care of others.

I was never a huge person, but I wasn't thin either. In high school, at 15-18 I ate whatever I wanted because I was doing sports at school- so basically I'd swim 2 hours a day, and so on. Then I hit college and kept eating that way cuz I was taking care of everything ELSE except my health. When I got married I wanted to please my husband so I'd make friend and fattening things he liked- while my weight kept creeping up. Then when I hit 230 I was like woah what the HECK am I doing? I'm killing myself to make others happy!

I was yo-yo dieting and the weight would go and come cuz for some reason I'd feel guilty that I was making my hubby eat food he didn't really enjoy- and the whole time I should have been worried more about myself! I forgot that I am important to me too!

I also would eat emotionally, when I was happy, sad, angry, upset, it didn't matter! I have slowly taught myself to not eat to stuff my face, but to eat to nourish my body and I also ask myself what food is WORTHY of going into my mouth- if it's not nutrient rich and what I need- then it's not good enough. One day it will be, but for now overall I have made better and better choices and am happy with how my body is changing

I hope that this time is the last time I ever let myself forget that I am important too!

I don't know if this is comforting or not, but there's a lot of research that suggests that once we become obese we are changed and our body "wants" to gain back the weight to some extent.

Someone who never had more than 20 pounds to lose seems to be different than someone who has 100 pounds or more to lose. Our metabolism is different, and different hormones -- like leptin -- that affect appetite.

There's a book called "Rethinking Thin" by Gina Kolata which discusses a lot of this research. It is somewhat controversial, but it's fascinating. Here's a link to the 3fc discussion about the book.

http://www.3fatchicks.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=220

So, it's VERY common for people to gain back weight!

I cant say enough about OA.I have read 3 book that I purchased on line and I feel like a different person.I am working up the courage to go to an actual meeting.I really think food for me is an adiction and needs to be treated like any other disease.I have learned that for me I will never get better unless I truly work the 12 step program.I had no idea that my weight issue was so much deeper than I thought.I always told myself it was because I liked to eat or had a sweet tooth.It was so much more.

I'd say I'm living proof of what Heather said. I lost 100 lbs. The first 70 took me about 10 months. Then I hit the 250's. The next 30 took me literally a year. When I hit 228 I was pretty pleased with myself and I relaxed and went back, not to all the old habits, but enough that I wasn't vigilent about my food and exercise at all and in about 4 to 6 months, I'd regained 30 lbs. Back to the 250's.

My body LIKES being in the 250's. It's the range I've been in most of my adult life and for some reason I have a very hard time getting away from that weight. I have to fight for every ounce of lost and one or two bad days can cause me to stall or even gain. It's become apparent that I will have to be vigilent for the rest of my life if I don't want to be obese.

I gain back weight partly from tiring out, after being vigilant for a long period of time, but mostly because of life changes & distraction.

I can lose or maintain weight when my life is reasonably stable, that is, when I follow pretty much the same routines. I start creating a structure of exercising at certain times or attending exercise classes. I go grocery shopping & I cook at the same time. My life runs like a well-wound watch.

But when life becomes unstable -- when I changed jobs or entered graduate school or had to cope with my father's terminal illness -- then I have a lot of trouble being flexible & rethinking my routines. In the midst of the mayhem, sometimes I just put exercising or cooking on hold. And then never get back around to re-establishing routines in those areas.

Also I'm afraid that I'm a person who pursues enthusiasms, burns out on them, and then lets them slide. I'm not flighty. My enthusiasms can last two or three years, or even longer. But eventually, they fall by the wayside.

I'm trying very hard not to let exercising & eating healthily become one of my laid-aside enthusiasms. After all, I don't give up showering or brushing my teeth or styling my hair every day. I want it to become part of hygiene & an "automatic pilot" routine. I am committed to making this happen. But I don't know what life has waiting for me, either.

I think that one of the issues I have is that the "weight issue" will always be a struggle for me. I know that and accept it. I mean you hear these stories of these people who lose weight and they "never go back" and just love their new lifestyle and blah blah. I think for the majority of people the new lifestyle is something they really struggle with. I guess from my perspective I see more people dieting rather than living a new lifestyle. They measure things, they eat foods and such that can make them feel like they are dieting, and I think it becomes exhausting and they take a break. Only the break lasts and lasts. You know that "i'll start back on on Monday," which I still do! lol

I think part of my journey is letting go of dieting and moving toward a lifestyle change. Meaning, I'm not going to be measuring out things and what not or depriving myself. Right now I'm not there yet, but getting there. I'm learning how to eyeball things like how much is a tablespoon of something really? Surprisingly, I didn't realize how much that really is lol. Learning what exactly is in what I'm eating. Appreciating it, and learning to cope without food. A lot of baby steps, but it is a journey so I'm embracing it.

Saying that, I'm going to have to embrace the fact that I will gain weight back from time to time. That is okay. It isn't a bad thing, it just is something that can and will happen to many of us. Recently I said "oh no! 4 pound gain! I'll get back on track on plan," but that = dieting to me. I want to get away from dieting and onward to just living my life.

I truly believe that as Heather alluded to, the fault lies not so much with our heads as with our biology. We're creatures (like all) built to weather famine, but we live in a world where famine never comes. In the "natural world" overpopulation tends to occur before obesity. Sedentary lives don't exist in the natural world either. Before technology, all critters (even man) needed to move to get their food and to avoid becoming some other critter's food. Just in the last 50 years (a blip in human history) we've eliminated most of the work involved in obtaining, preparing, and eating food - and we've decreased the cost and nutrition in that food while raising the caloric level. it's a recipe for obesity.

Another reason, I believe gaining is easier than losing, is that we have a culture of weight loss, but we have no culture of weight maintenance. I think the culture of weight loss encourages us to lose weight, for the most part, by means that aren't sustainable for life. At some point we need to go "off" the diet. Many times popular diets have a different strategy for weight loss than maintenance, being successful at the first doesn't guarantee success at the second.

I also think there's still enormous social pressure to eat foods that are worst for us. Even if you're very obese, turning down birthday cake often offends people. Doing so when you don't have an obvious weight problem makes the social "sin" that much worse. It's obviously only one exagerated example, but there is generally more social pressure to eat than to not eat, especially the worst foods (I'm not sure anyone has ever been offended that I didn't finish my salad).

There are thousands of factors, and I think to have continued success, you have to be aware of most of them. Every way in which you're unprepared is a window to relapse.

I think I fear relapse less now than before, because I look at weight loss differently now. I don't focus on how I'm going to lose what I still have to lose, as much as I focus on maintaining the loss I have acheived so far. I've begun practicing maintenance since that first accidental 20 lb loss. So, from the start, I've made maintenance more important than loss. It's more important to me to maintain the 63 lbs I've lost than it is for me to to lose even one more lb. And when I have lost 64 lbs, it will be more important for me to maintain those lbs than to lose another lb.

For me, I believe the secret to keeping it off will be to always look at my weight this way. I will have to weigh myself every day for the rest of my life, and will always need to be vigilant. If I lose my vigilance, there will always be the opportunity for relapse.

Welcome out of lurk mode, Pennie! As you can see from all the responses, you're certainly not alone with respect to regaining.

That describes my regain very, very well. The only thing I would add is that I also stopped exercising - which also is really a matter of enjoyment. Although I don't mind exercise when I'm in the habit of doing it, I enjoy doing many other things much more.

For me, the bottom line is that my natural tendencies result in morbid obesity. If I want to reach and maintain a healthy weight (and I most emphatically DO want that), I have to discipline those tendencies every day.

I know it is difficult for me. I lost 40 lbs then in 2008 I gained 30 lbs back! It was like I have started all overs again. I think stress has a lot to do with it. Have faith you can overcome any obstacle. =D

Hi Pennie it is because we are all genetically predispositioned as to what body type we will have ie; ectomorph, mesomorph, endomorph, or a combination.

And after maturity we all have a set number of fat cells. When we lose weight the fat cells do not disappear as many people believe but rather they just deflate for lack of a better word.

So if you are an endomorph like me and tend to have a round body and you lose weight by diet and exercise and get smaller and the minute you stop your body will want to revert back to what your genetic make up wants it to be.

Read all the posts of people who have lost a lot of weight and gained back part if not all of it and then some. Every one of them to some degree will show that the person reached their goal and stopped being as focused on weight loss as they were when they were actively dieting.

And likewise for all the people who were dieting and somehow got off track and didn't get back on for the myriad of reasons we all have.

The weight comes back VERY QUICKLY if you do not pay attention.

So it would seem to me, and I haven't been there yet but I am just speculating, that once you reach your goal by dieting or exercise whatever the means you HAVE to keep weighing yourself and keep a careful watch on the pounds that will want to creep back on.

Lori Bell is a perfect example she lost all her weight and she keeps a careful watch and when she sees she is gaining a few pounds she does something about it right then and there. If you DON"T keep a careful watch and weeks or months go by that is when people wake up and go "OMG I gain 40lbs! HOW???)

This I believe is the ONLY way I think you can lose it and keep it off.

But I am not saying anything new.. this is just "maintaining" and there is a whole section on 3FC for Maintenance which I hope to be a part of one day.

Now I understand why my Weight Watcher's group has Lifetime members. I remember seeing skinny people in my group and I used to wonder who they are? They don't need to lose weight! But what they are doing is they have lost their weight and they come in once a month for the rest of their lives and weigh in and if they are a pound or two heavier they do something about it.

I think it is so cool that WW does that... if you meet your goal weight and as long as you never go over 2 pounds over that goal weight you can come for support for free for the rest of your life.

I agree with all that has been said about emotional eating and the lowered metabolism of the reduced obese, but one practical thing I have found is to simply get rid of your "fat jeans". I've had a couple of slides on my latest journey (about the same time of the year-maybe not a coincidence) and all that stopped me in my tracks was the refusal to buy larger jeans. I can avoid the scales but I have to have something to put on my body to go outside in.