Maintaining My Weight "Questions?"

decotterell

On July 7th, 2014, I decided to start using My Fitness Pal. I was 47 years old, 5'7" and 219.5 pounds. I am a Type 1 diabetic and had just gotten home from a Doctors appointment and my A1C was almost 8.0. To make matters worse, I am a Paramedic and knew that I was increasing my risk of many bad things in my future. (Heart Disease, Neuropathy, Kidney Failure, etc.) My thinking was that best way to avoid wide swings in my daily glucose checks was to be more consistant in what I was eating. Counting calories seemed the way.
I weighed in 3 days ago and had lost a total of 55 pounds. I weighed in at 164.5. I am not certain how to know my optimal weight, but that seems about right. I had my weight loss set at 1.5 pounds per week and figured I needed to change it. I had been allowed 1560 calories per day for several months and am comfortable eating that amount. I changed the setting to .5 pounds a week and it is allowing me 1950 calories. So far, I am finding it hard to reach that because I don't want to start eating foods that aren't healthy again. My doctor appointment last week had my A1C at 6.5, my total cholesterol at 124, and my LDL at 66. All really good for a diabetic.
I am nervous about putting weight back on. 1950 seems like a lot. I don't even want to look at what it would be if I changed it to "Maintain Current Weight". I do exercise most days when I'm not working and don't consume the extra calories I burn. We work 24 hours on shift and then off for 2 days. I do a lot of running and usually burn 400-500 calories at the gym. Like I said, I don't want to put weight back on.
I guess I was wondering if anyone had suggestions about eating enough to maintain without going back to old habits, and maybe a way to figure out my ideal weight. (I would like to to a blog in another several months and be maintaining what I should.) I don't want to fall off the wagon.

mrengineer001

hello
I feel your pain and I hear the dilemma.
When I lost the weight I followed a simple rule.
I had 5 to 6 small meals a day averaging 300 calories a meal and I logged every meal. It came out to 2 meals for the breakfast, lunch and diner. I think this might help you to keep your super level up. I hade fruit in between meals.
As far as figuring your ideal weight, I would talk to your DR. Because of the diabetic issue you might have a different " ideal weight" then I would
Hope that was helpful