Alternating WL plans every few months?
 

Hey all, I am just wondering if anyone out there is alternating between a few different plans? In August or so I became very committed to losing weight, using a low-carb, high-protein calorie counting plan (of my own) combined with approx 45-60 minutes of intense cardio each day. It really worked well for the most part (when I was faithful) and I lost weight. I was able to keep it up until about mid february this year when I was working out of town in Montana (I'm in Cali). I was shooting a film in super-cold weather (average 10 degree weather) and I was very lax about my food. I ate all sorts of random food and drank lots of beer, but I did a LOT of hiking and moving around each day that I worked. I actually lost about 10 lbs while there.
Then after that trip I got to go work on a film in Ghana, West Africa, and let me tell you, it is almost impossible to maintain a low-carb diet in Ghana. Most of the staple dishes that were fed to us were high carb-rice, doughs, plaintains, yams. Very very little meat and veggies. Again, I did a LOT of moving and hiking around, I made a big point of continually moving throughout my 12 hour days. I lost weight again, and this time people were really commenting and praising.
So now I'm home again and I don't know which way to go. I am definitely not doing as much exercise as I did on those trips, and I am sure my intake has gone up. I am thinking of going back to counting, but I'm not sure where to put my calories at, especially considering I have no clue how much I ate on the trips. It seems like the change of diet helped to spike my loss, or do I just try to keep to one thing?

I know exactly what you mean - I spent a month in North Africa and despite pitas/grains galore, I ended up losing 5lbs. Active, active, active ~ healthy food (despite being carb heavy).

I found that staying very active and eating healthy foods in moderation is really the key. Nothing fancy, just lots of activity and no crap food. "High carb" in Africa is not really high carb like North America. A batch of millet with some lemon juice is a lot healthier than a glucose-laden "whole wheat" diet bread, and much tastier & filling. I can guarantee you ate less calories in Africa.

All I can say is to do what works. Lots of activity and eating natural whole foods seems to work for you.

I can't speak to changing plans, but if want to go back to calorie counting, there are plenty of sources to help you figure out what your calorie intake should be. I use fitday.com. Once you go through your current weight and goal weight and time frame, it will tell you what your target intake should be. It's not perfect. It can't really know how many calories you burn in a day. But it's a starting place and you can tweak it from there.