Tracey's Maintenance Journal - Year One

tlblanksfit

Today is my first day of maintenance. I am starting my maintenance journey at a weight of 150.7 pounds. This journey to maintenance has been long coming as I have always been a yo-yoer when it comes to my weight. I would lose and gain and lose and gain. But this time I know is different and I will not be gaining again. I have lost weight and been even smaller than my current weight but the weight loss was not done in the most healthy way and was totally unsustainable once the diet was over and I never had the mindset that I would keep the weight off all of those other times. This time is different, I have declared that this is my last time losing weight (which I never did before) and I am determined to stay at this weight if not go a few pounds lower. OMAD is a critical part of that because it is a WOE that suits me perfectly, I maintained my lean muscle while losing on OMAD and I feel good about where I am and being able to maintain.

With this final weight loss journey I have reached some major milestones:

Highest weight 211 pounds to current weight 150.7 pounds (60 pounds lost)
Clothing Sizes XL/1X to Medium and some small
Pant size 20W to 10 some 8
Bust size 40DDD to 36D

My current maintenance range is 145 to 155 pounds with the ultimate goal of 140 to 150 pounds. I will be following the Bear Maintenance plan consisting of 4 OMAD days and 3 Feast days per week. My maintenance week will run from Friday to Thursday with Friday being my official weigh in/report day. Saturdays and Sundays will always be feast days with the addition of 1 week day to make the third. The default week day will alternate between Fridays and Mondays and may change according to what is going on that week. I believe this schedule best fits my lifestyle and will afford me the most flexibility if the need arises.

I have changed my fitness goals in myfitnesspal for maintenance and it calculates my daily calories to consume at 1680 if I am sedentary.

So here it goes. Maintenance. I will report my Friday weights and my monthly average only.

November 10
Maintenance Day 1
150.7 pounds

Brendalea69

Welcome to Maintenance, you've done great and I love your plan

tlblanksfit

Thanks Brenda, I hope I do as good as you. You are a true maintenance genius!

Jim_fbr

Quite the inspiring transition that you've made Tracey.
welcome to maintenance.
*thunderous applause*

minigrrll

Congratulations!! Good luck with the bear plan...

blambo61

You have done very well! Congrats. I know I say it a lot but I believe it, low carbs were key for me for lunches to maintain weight (salads and meat worked for me). I do recommend weighing often so that if you need to adjust you can without gaining much weight back. Good luck!

Brendalea69

tlblanksfit wrote: »

Thanks Brenda, I hope I do as good as you. You are a true maintenance genius!

You will do great and I agree with Bob about the carbs and weighing often

tlblanksfit

Day one of maintenance went well. Since it was a feast day I ate a small breakfast and ate dinner. I believe I was under my MFP set calories for the day. I did not weigh this morning as it is my plan to only weigh Mon-Fri. So far today at around 11:00 I had some crab vegetable soup and wheatgrass juice and I will probably eat leftovers of last night's dinner. for dinner today.

tlblanksfit

Yesterday's meals.


Breakfast casserole and coffee


Lasagna Roll, Salad, Cheesy Garlic Bread, 100 calorie Snicker

No photos of today's meal but I had crab vegetable soup for lunch and Olive Garden Chicken Parmagiana, Chicken Gnocci Soup, salad, and 2 breadsticks. Today was a true feast day at Olive Garden so I know I will have to reduce meal calories during the week to stay within TDEE calories for the week

blambo61

Be aware that your Monday weight may be a 2-3lbs heavier due to the weekend eating than it will be on Friday. That is ok and expected. Just observe if it is going up or down or staying even on each Friday!

tlblanksfit

I am aware thanks to Brenda sharing her numbers. My OMAD days will have to be strict to ensure I lose the feast gains.

tlblanksfit

Monday morning weight after 3 feast days...154.2 a gain of 3.5 pounds which was to be expected. Now I have 4 days to shed it. Not worried one bit I just have to stick to the plan. OMAD is awesome and I know it will work.

Brendalea69

3.5 is not bad at all for 3 days, it will be gone before you know it

tlblanksfit

Today's OMAD meal Salad and Cornish Hen half with grapefruit juice and ACV. Didn't take a picture, but it was delicious.

minigrrll

Looking forward to following your maintenance.

blambo61

Just stick to it. It's good to know what to expect!

tlblanksfit

Was back down a pound this morning. Everything is looking good for maintaining so far. I am in this for the long haul.

Brendalea69

This is great

tlblanksfit

Weight today the same as yesterday. My OMAD yesterday wasn't the healthiest of meals. I had a chicken cheese steak and a half order of curly fries. I had been craving the sandwich for a while and finally got it. I will post a picture of it later.

sammygold2015

Yummo Curlies!

tlblanksfit

Ended up eating lunch today so today will be a 2MAD day. I had cream of broccoli soup.


I am not sure what I plan for dinner. I was thinking of just having my chocolate kale shake or a small meal.