I aim for 1550 calories a day, eat whole foods, and try to avoid "the whites". I take fish oil capsules, a multi-vitamin, a glass of dark chocolate milk, and a small glass of red wine (nearly) every day. I don't "work-out" except for a 22 minute routine on the Wii I do every day (stretching and strength but it's the Wii so it's not like a serious work-out) but I do have a pretty active job and life.

I was losing about 8 pounds a month and was fine with that. I'd love all this weight gone gone gone but I'm in this for the long haul not the sprint.

This month, due to one thing or another, I've tended to only get 1300 a day. All healthy calories, no junk food (except for cinco de Mayo where I went up to 2000 that day). The pounds have just flown off. I mean flown. I got on the scale when I got up this afternoon (I work nights so 5pm is morning for me) and it read 239. I moved it and tried again and I'm not putting it on my ticker because I still don't believe it. That's like 16 pounds this month. 16 pounds! Like, Wow! I can't say I'm not totally psyched.

But here's my question. I've still got 100 pounds to lose. I plan on still keeping my target calories at 1550 a day but should I worry if I tend to dip down into the 1300 range for long periods. I'm never hungry, I'm eating well, I feel great, I never feel deprived. But I worry when I get down to 180, 170 that I'm going to have to cut back even more just to lose even a few pounds a month. I can handle the slower weight loss but I don't want to suddenly have to cut back on food so that I'm feeling "dang, I wish I could have more...". I think 1300 is very do-able for me most days. I suspect forcing myself into 1200 will result in binges and unhappiness.

I keep reading about how as you get closer to goal you'll need to cut back on calories just to keep losing anything at all but is that always true? Should I work hard to get my whole 1550 every day now so I have the easy 1300's to fall back on later or should I just eat healthy now, not fuss about the lower calorie days, and expect that with only 20 pounds to go I might only be losing a couple pounds a month?

Like I said, I can handle slow - at a couple pounds a month I'll look back fondly (oh so fondly) at my one 16 pound month but I can keep on keeping on. But if I have to "deprive" myself to lose even a single pound it's going to be very very tough going and I know it. So am I not-eating myself into a dieting corner right now?

Thanks in advance for the input. You guys all rock!

I've eaten more, actually, as I've lost weight, because my capacity for exercise has gone up tremendously. You might try to slowly, so, so slowly increase your exercise routine so that the calorie burn that you are currently getting now continues. This will also keep you from burning off any muscle. But don't fear keeping those increases TINY--like adding 5 minutes every couple of weeks. It adds up over time.

My other caution (and I repeat this all the time) is to make sure you aren't hungry. If you stay at 1300 but start dreaming of junk food and breaking down and eating junk food, that's a sign that you need more good stuff, not more magic will power. It's much, much better to eat an extra 100 calories of popcorn or carrots or broccoli every day than to snap and eat 1000 calories of ice cream once a week.

I've been dealing with the same kind of issue lately too. I weigh myself every other week and was very surprised this last Sunday to discover I had lost 8 lbs. in two weeks. I keep myself at 1650 calories a day, but I've had a few days at 1400, and a few at 1800. The weight is melting off. I didn't believe it either, and had to weigh myself three different times

Anyway, it may be possible that we are losing the weight rather quickly now, but it may slow down a bit as our bodies get used to this (well, in my case, I've only been at this for seven weeks). I worry about dropping my calories later too, as I exercise 60 minutes/6 days a week already.

I'm another one that has increased cals as I've lost. To this day I'm still losing at 1600-1700. I'm not losing as quickly as I did when I was in the high hundreds and 200s but still losing and I'm happy with that. I even plan to increase a smidge more when I hit 150 and allow my body to naturally find it's maintenance point. So my point is you won't necessarily have to go to 1200, but it is a risk. Just keep in mind the excersie factor. Do you plan on adding more exercise? If not then the chances are higher that you'll need to lower your cals to continue to lose.