And after I read your post, I was thinking your plan wasn't extreme ENOUGH....

For many of us, you leave that door open a crack, and eventually it swings wide open. The *everything in moderation* route doesn't work for many people. Just ask any alcoholic.

And I am another who is certain that 1200- 1300 calories is more than enough calories for many in the population. Just as it isn't enough for others.

I also believe that body-bugg thing a ma-jig is quite extreme, though others wouldn't agree.

So yes, we all must determine what our extreme is - and isn't.

And sometimes, there's just no explanation for re-gain that is directly related to someones plan - sometimes we just lose focus. We have a lapse.

Anyway, I'm glad to hear you've re-assessed and I greatly look forward to hearing of your once again success! Welcome back. :)

Hey kelly315! :wave: I remember you.

You can expect that some posters will get defensive because of what you're saying. They are doing something they find works for them, and they feel threatened by alternative ideas. Don't let them bother you. We have room for all points of view here on 3FC, as long as they are not extreme themselves.

I'm really glad that you went to see some professionals about your situation.

You might want to read the book The End of Overeating by David Kessler. It has a lot to do with the physiology behind overeating and how some foods have been purposely designed to make us want to eat more of them. Among these are junk foods, fast food, certain restaurant foods.

Some people feel quite comfortable eating at a certain level of calories and tracking everything. They really do feel like they can do it forever--it's not a strain or a burden. That's good for them!

I'm not one of them. I've been struggling now for some time with a slow weight gain that began about a year and half after I reached goal. I have tried numerous times to go back to my old weight loss plan, but I simply can't stay with it for very long. This is not because I'm a weak person who gives up easily. It's because the old way doesn't do it anymore.

It just goes to show that losing weight is only part of the battle--keeping the weight off can be just as difficult.

Good luck, kelly. I hope you can get those 70 pounds back off again! :hug:

Jay

Thank you for your post Kelly. I am similar to you in that I cannot and will not go down to 1200 calories. I feel weak, lethargic and starving when I have done that. It wasn't something I could do long term.

I having been losing an average of 2.4 pounds per week eating between 1600-1900 calories a day. In the last 4 weeks or so I have been very consistent with exercise and the weight loss has not increased. I am doing the exercise for toning and hoping to burn fat, but I don't need rapid weight loss. I am happy knowing that I can undo 14 years of abuse in 1 year.

I am one of those who is happy and capable of "moderation" as I cannot imagine living without certain foods. For those that works for, great for them, but it isn't for me. I dieted my way to 258 pounds by trying to be extreme and restrict certain things. The problem with restriction for me is that I mentally become obsessed until the binge happens and then there is the whole guilt cycle and restriction started again. I am convinced that my obsession with food was because I had forbidden foods. Now I don't have forbidden foods and I am on my way to a healthy weight range again.

I appreciate your post because I do have the personality that can go to extremes in just about everything! Thank you for sharing what works for you.

i think the key is what is considered x-treme. Let's face it. Our society is about healthy, tan , high-school looking bodies. What is NOT popular is THE HARD WORK and effort it takes to get there.

that is why i like reading things about the stars that shows how completely crazy their exercise routines and diet restrictions are--if you want to see extreme read about how a model is expected to eat or NOT eat.

xtreme measures get x-treme results. The biggest loser is a good indicator of this.
Do they do a follow up on these people? have they kept if off?

What is extreme is what is NOT comfortable to you. This is a LIFELONG journey. Losing weight is only part of the battle like pp said. It is keeping it off and maintaining that is the REAL battle.

So do you FEEL LIKE you could live forever with a body bug. At 60 years old, will you rely on a body bug to keep your weight in check. Will you always have a point system? Will you be 62 and writing down your food in a journal before dinner to see what you can or can't eat.

I have seen what losing weight fast makes a body look like, and I am PROUD of those people that can do it, but it is not for me! if you look at some of the people that lost it slow and steady over time their RESULTS are much more pleasing to the eye--in a bathing suit.

we each have our own MO. Kelly i think you found that slower and steadier is more acceptable, but some people have an event they are working towards. Or they feel they need more push to get to where they are going. I don't think there is anything wrong with it, if it works for you.

TX, i am the same as you. I have to have moderation. Because "forbidden" drives me nuts. Maybe it is my "Eve" nature. I don't know. But i did forbidden. It worked. I got great results. It lasted 2 years and I snapped.

Thanks for sharing, Kelly!

I've been on so many restrictive diets that my mind won't let me do it anymore. It's almost like I have two brains. One that says: Okay, 1200-1300 calories, 30 minutes of exercise, cut out sugar and processed foods. The other one says: That sounds like prison, go eat a pizza!

The only way I've been successful is to do the tiniest of changes so that it doesn't even feel like I'm dieting. I make exercise goals, challenging myself rather than MAKING myself do it. I try to keep fruit and veggies on hand and make them as appetizing as I can. When I banish junk food or beat myself for not going running first thing in the morning -- that's when I head to Arby's.

Good luck this time around and I think it was great for you to share. Lots of people here are going through their first big weight loss and it's helpful to think that what works now might not work forever.

To each their own, I guess. I can understand the "lifestyle change" mentality, but I don't lose weight unless I am regimented in my food counting and exercise. Believe me, I tried the "I'll just cut back on my food and move a bit more" plan without holding myself accountable with food logs and the bodybugg and, while I stopped gaining, I didn't lose because I was still eating too much and not moving enough. The food log and bodybugg holds me accountable, and these are the only things that do.

That said, I am not starving by any means. I still eat mac and cheese and a bit of ice cream or some other treat just about every day. I work it into my calorie allowance. I am also never hungry because I eat satisfying food. I don't exercise like a mad woman - most days I walk for about an hour and that's enough to give me my calorie burn.

Can I keep it up forever? Well, probably, if I make the food logs a part of life. The bodybugg is kinda a pain, so I don't know if I will wear it after I lose the weight, unless I start to gain again.

Anyhow, good luck to all of you, no matter what plan you follow. :hug:

Thank you for posting this. I think we all need to hear these type of stories. We get so caught up in the excitement of losing as much as possible as quickly as possible, that we often forget to learn moderation and temperance. I think posting a message like this must have been very hard - it may feel like admitting your own failure. But I hope you think of it as a huge favor you're doing for everyone here on 3fc - you are giving us a gift of learning from your mistakes.
Thank You! And I wish you health and happiness in your new balanced approach to weight loss. Hugs.

This is the OA approach that you're referring to. If you consider yourself a food addict/have binge eating disorder, then an all-or-nothing approach might be the only thing that's available to you.

However, all-or-nothing most likely isn't going to work for the rest of most people's lives. If you treat certain foods like a no-no, or like a drug, then they gain a lot of power. It's giving these foods the power to sit on your shoulder- while you're strong, it's probably no problem to say "I'm not going to indulge you." But when a tragedy hits your life, or you become depressed, etc, there is this powerful force waiting to sneak back in to your life.

This "eating junk food like a normal person does" takes away some of that power. It's a technique commonly used by nutritionists.

Also, I'd like to add that these extremes are unique for everyone. People use bodybuggs differently, and require different number of calories depending on height/weight.

I agree with this, but to state that a 160 lb. woman needs 2,400 calories a day to maintain her weight is not right. Maybe if she were working out a lot, every single day - that is what I burn when I walk for like an hour and a half to two hours. But on sedentary days, the calories needed to maintain are much less for a 160 lb woman. Trust me on this.

I'm sorry you went through that, Kelly. I've been down that same path, with a diet that felt over restrictive for me, losing lots of weight, then ending up with binge behavior that resulted in me gaining it back plus some. You're not alone with that experience.

I've read your posts. Please have total faith that you'll get a handle on this the way you want to, just keep plugging at it, from whatever direction you need to. Follow your own brain, it's formidable!

What is extreme for one person, can be moderate (or extreme in the opposite direction) for someone else - and I don't think anyone is arguing otherwise.


I'm currently working with an 1800 - 2000 calorie food budget - that's my perfect range. That's way to high for some people, and it's way too low for others. There were times in my life (at the same weight I am now, but also a much higher actity level) when the same 1800 - 2000 calorie diet was far too low (I'd get light headed and even passed out a couple times).

The issue is not on how to identify where the line is (at least not for anyone other than ourselves), but how to recognize the signs that you're pushing yourself beyond reasonable limits. Learning to recognize when "working harder" becomes counterproductive.

We're a society who sees more as better. Work harder, acheive more, sleep less, multi-task.... The more you do, the more you acheive/succeed/accomplish/aquire, the more value you have.

That mentality can backfire. In the business environment, you're told "work smarter, not harder," and it can apply to weight loss too. Working harder doesn't always get you the results you want.

I've always been an overacheiver in many aspects of my life. Until my mid-thirty's I always had two jobs (or job and school), and I burnt the candle at both ends to graduate highschool and college early. I went at weight loss the same way. I know how to exceed and excel, and I know how to fail. I don't know how to maintain a moderate or a balanced lifestyle.

My husband says I have two speeds - Energizer Bunny and comatose, and to a degree it's true. I know how to starve myself, and I know how to eat everything in sight. The middle ground is very difficult for me.

I do best with my weight loss when I don't focus on the weight loss at all. Yes, I weigh myself every morning, and I try to follow my 1800 calorie exchange plan, but I make a lot of mistakes, but when I don't go bug-crazy about the mistakes I do pretty well. Slow, but consistent weight loss.

When I get impatient with my progress or my imperfection, I tend to gravitate toward extreme methods to "catch up." That's dangerous thinking - that sense that I'm in a race and I'm falling behind and need to put every bit of my energy into weight loss (and siphon it away from every other aspect in my life).

It doesn't matter that my "full speed" today is slower than my "reasonable pace" of two decades ago. What matters is that I learn to recognize the signs that I'm being unreasonable with my goals. Learning about myself enough to know where productive ends and counterproductive begins.

That point is going to be different for every person. And even for any one person, that point is probably not going to be a constant - it's going to change depending on what else is going on in your life too.

The perfect amount of effort, attention, and time today may be too much, or too little tomorrow.

It's why I can't stress enough (not only to others, but to my stubborn self, when the stubborn part of me is disagreeing with the smarter part of me) how important food/health/lifestyle journals can be. You can notice patterns if you keep the journals and keep your eyes open (hey when I ______, I tend to ______).

The important thing to keep in perspective is that faster/harder isn't always better, and slower/easier isn't always inferior, either. If eating 1800 calories works for you - it doesn't mean that 800 will work better. It doesn't even mean that 2400 calories will not work as well.

I also think that it is probably easier for people who are heavier to adopt a more moderate lifestyle and still lose weight, simply because the heavier you are, the more you burn just doing daily activities. So, if you weigh, say, 240 lbs, you will burn around 1,800 just by maintaining basic functions, therefore if you are at all active, you will burn 2,400 calories a day easily.

I am somewhat close to a healthy weight -well, within 20 lbs of a healthy weight. Therefore it is harder for me to lose weight unless I do the rather drastic measures of slashing my food intake and upping my exercise by a lot.

Believe me, I wish that I could take a more lackadaisical approach to it all, but I have found that I simply can't. If I am not diligent, I don't lose. I can maintain, but not lose. :(

It's not easier ;) You have to be diligent no matter the size you start at lol

It's definitely not easy for a typical larger person to begin a moderate eating plan. No way!

I am an extremist as well. I've been down that road in all walks of my life, and it has brought me great triumphs and terrible consequences (from graduating with honors to drug rehab). I know how hard it can be to combat the black-or-white thinking, but now that you are aware of your pitfalls, you can work to avoid them.

"Extreme" is only a subjective word; what will/won't work for one may/may not work for others. If anything, 3FC is a great place to experiment, find and share ideas, and bicker about modes of change. That's what I love about this forum, that it is filled with people who really want to change (and quickly weeds out the ones who don't) by a number of different means. People here have all kinds of ideas about how to change their lives in a positive manner and no one's idea has more value because they lost more weight, worked harder, etc. We're all different and we've found different things that will help. People will bristle when labeled "extreme" but that's a nearly meaningless word. We all have great ideas and we can all learn from each other.