Hi friends,

Quick question for ya'll....does anyone have suggestions about how I can give up my magic goal number on the scale? Last year in the fall, I got down to 134. Since about Dec. 2011, I have gained up to 140, and stayed there for the past 5 months. I don't really have to watch very carefully what I eat to stay at 140. That doesn't mean I can just eat cake and cookies and I'm good. I still almost never eat those things. What I mean, is that I don't have to diligently count every calorie. However, I do still have to exercise almost every day for an hour or more (which I don't mind), to keep my weight at 140.

How do you get past the feeling of failure if you can't or don't want to maintain your original goal weight? I set it at 135 because then I would have lost 100 lbs., and 135 seemed like a reasonable goal for 5'6" tall. Now it just seems ridiculously difficult for me. I will be 49 this year, and I'm formerly obese, so I have quite a bit of leftover loose skin, which I think probably weighs a pretty good amount. I can't afford surgery, so it's not going anywhere.

I have maintained at least at 140 for over a year now, so why am I still psychologically beating myself up over 5 lbs.? I don't want this silly little insignificant amount to be my undoing. I just know that you wonderful people will have some solid advice.

Thanks-
Rhonda

Well, theoretically it shouldn't be THAT much more difficult to maintain at 135 than at 140. I just entered your stats in a calorie calculator. Assuming you exercise 5 times a week, the calculator said you could eat 1,869 calories to maintain at 140 lbs and 1,836 to maintain at 135 lbs. That's a difference of just 33 calories!

Of course, there's no need for you to maintain at 135 if your body and mind feel right at 140. Goal weights are always subject to revision. And there's no earthly reason for you to beat yourself up for adjusting your goal.

F.

The number you chose was arbitrary. You just thought a nice round 100 sounded good. So you made up a story, and now the story seems carved in stone, like the Ten Commandments.

But it's not! You can un-choose that number at any time. In fact, it sounds like your body un-chose it for you.

Maybe when you find yourself fretting because you weigh 140 instead of 135, you could consciously turn your thoughts to something else--not to fret over something new, but just to get out of that "thought rut" and move on.

As for the idea that 135 isn't that much harder to maintain, my experience has been that calorie calculators lie all the time. You think you're on solid scientific ground, but you're only dealing with estimates and averages at best.

Jay

I think some of us pulled a number out of our *ss as our goal weight. I did, based on what I saw as others goal weights at my height.

But we are all very different and what is easy to maintain for one is not so easy for another.

From your post it seems your body has decided 140 is your final comfortable weight. Now your mind has to catch up and accept that, rather than continuing to fight with your body.

Like you my body decided what my final goal weight was going to be. And it's not any one number but a range of 3 lbs. It took me a long time to accept this and I can't really offer any one solid thing that led to that acceptance. But it did happen.

Hope this piece of non-advice was helpful.

Dagmar :

You are right in the middle of the healthy weight range for your height. There is no real reason to lose anymore weight unless you have a burning desire to lose more. If you have a healthy balance with your diet and exercise and have successfully maintained that, I say "Welcome to Goal!"

I'm 5'6" too, and I also set a goal of 135 (great minds!).

I am currently at 154, and I am looking at myself in the mirror and thinking 135 is way too low. I also felt bad at changing my goal upwards, as if I was cheating, but have decided that 140 is probably a better place for me to be. I am going t try and loose the last stone to get to 140, and then see what happens. If it settles at 138 or 142 or even 147, I'll be happy as long as it stabilises and remains steady in a healthy range.

Getting past the "cheating" idea took a few weeks, but common sense kicked in eventually when I realised 135 was a totally arbitary number I picked from the air to give me something to aim at.

If you are happy at 140 and it is relatively easy to maintain, I would go with the flow.

Well done on your amazing achievement!

I don't know why we do this to ourselves, but I agree with the others: 140 sounds like a great weight for you in that you can maintain it without having to be so rigorous.

I am much shorter than you (5 ft 3), and my original goal was around 145. I didn't weigh myself while losing, and when I did, I was 140. Then, in the process of figuring out my maintenance calories, I got down to 135. Just a month or so ago, I saw 133.6 on the scale. For some reason, 135 has become my "goal" weight now, so if I'm up even a couple of pounds from that (as I was this morning --137), I worry about it. Why???

I sometimes think the formally overweight often set higher standards than those who have always been a "normal" weight. My husband is one of those rare "naturally thin" people. Sometimes for kicks, he hops on the scale (usu. after eating, fully-clothed!) sometimes to see how much he weighs. If he's ever up a few pounds, he just laughs it off. He couldn't care less.

Maybe pick another number to shoot for - one that isn't on a scale. Like biking 25 miles, running a 5K, doing 100 pushups (or 1!) , lifting 100 pounds. Shoot for something else!

Try to focus on how you feel at 140, especially the fact that 95 pounds lost is a major accomplishment and whatever helps you maintain (even if it is ending up 5to pounds heavier than you originally planned) is what iz best for you. I would say give yourself a range goal at the very least of 135-145 so you won't feel like a failure as long as you're in the range.

Did you ever weigh just 5 pounds more (240) even on a heavy day? That way you could still have your magic 100.

Either way, I truly believe if you make it too hard, it will eventually bite you in the butt and you (or most people anyway) will decide it is too hard to continue. Revel in your success and your maintenance. You deserve it.

I think a lot of pain and stress can be avoided by choosing the right weight range. I'm not willing to go to a weight that means it will be very difficult to maintain. It's not worth it. I don't want to spend my whole life consumed with my weight. Not that I think I can just ignore it, but I know just what you mean about it being relatively easy to maintain. I feel that way about the goal weight that chose me.

Of course, you could just throw your scale away, buy a pair of non-stretchy jeans, and use those as your gauge of how you're doing. The scale is a tool that should work FOR you, if it's working AGAINST you, get rid of it.

JayEll-you are so right! It would seem that the calorie difference between 135 and 140 would be so minimal that it wouldn't be worth worrying about. But for me, it's huge. To stay at 135, I have to micromanage every calorie. I know that the science says that's not true, but believe me, for me, it is.

I think that saying I lost 100 lbs. seemed so monumental, where saying that I lost 95 lbs. just doesn't seem as significant. Believe me, I know how ridiculous all of this sounds. That's why I was hoping that I could write about it here and not be made fun of for asking about it.

Heck, even when I weighed 150, I would go to the doctor and they would say that I was "thin", even though that's only 5 lbs. below overweight for my height. Instead of hearing "thin", I would think, if I gain 5 lbs., I'll be over the limit into overweight again.

If I could just get out of my own head and enjoy this, everything would be wonderful. Being overweight for so long sure has done a number on my psyche. I realize that I need to get a handle on this now so that I don't gain it all back. I appreciate all of your advice, you girls always come through for me!

I agree with everything already said, that you should feel good about the 140 number. However, if you REALLY can't let go of it, this is what i would do...forget about trying to lose weight for a while, BUT try to build more muscle. This will do two things: 1) make you look better without losing weight, and 2) give you more muscle; muscle burns more calories; so eventually, you might have an easier time creating a calorie deficit to get to 135 since you're burning more calories each day. I mean muscle doesn't burn THAT much more, but if what was said above is true, that you only need to eat 33 calories less, then you could probably get there by adding a couple pounds of muscle.

I fall into the "build muscle" camp. I lose a lot more weight, and maintain the loss more easily, through resistance training than cardio. Resistance training burns calories while you do it, for up to 1 day after you do it (as the muscles burn calories repairing themselves), and later you will burn more calories maintaining your new muscle.

I don't know. This is something so many people, myself included, struggle with! It's so incredibly easy to think "I used to weigh less, therefore I am worth less now than when I weighed less." I still want to weigh under 120 even though maintaining 127-129 is super easy and looks OK and 120 wouldn't be THAT different.