What has been your biggest struggle at maintenance?
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Like some have said, I had the similar experience of feeling hungry at the pit of my stomach about 3 days out of the week while trying to maintain my weight. I've been trying things I've tried before, though inconsistently then, like increasing fat and protein intake. For instance, instead of brown rice with skinless chicken breast for dinner, I have the brown rice with chicken whole leg (skin included). This makes for more satiety.
Breakfast is also a key target for me these days in controlling feelings of hunger. Rather than making it a high sugar meal, I cook a half cup of oatmeal and have it with 2 tablespoons of peanut butter and a dash of cinnamon instead. Far more satisfying than most breakfasts I've had in a while.
Incidentally, my weight still fluctuates, going from about 3 pounds over to 2 pounds under my target weight.0 -
rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
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rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
Something I have experienced before is that when I don't eat enough I don't lose weight - if I do that constantly my body adapts to the low intake and I stop losing. I found that out going for recomp and trying eat more 2 weigh less0 -
rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
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It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
Yeah I agree - I think the biggest lesson I had was when trying to bulk. I was eating SO much and still could hardly put on any weight. I took me about 4 months to gain 2 kg and I was constantly worrying that I'd balloon and wake up with all my weight loss efforts lost the next day. It ends up that I got frustrated with it and gave up. It takes too much and I constantly felt like I was binging.0 -
rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...0 -
I really enjoy regularly eating large quantities of certain high calorie foods - far more than I could fit into my calorie / macro goals.
I had to accept that if I am going to maintain my weight loss then I can't eat like that any more.
I didn't mind watching what I ate whilst I was losing weight, because it was a temporary change - I thought once I had more calories I would be able to eat more. But its not enough calories for what i want.
It was a big step for me to accept that I cannot eat the foods that I want to eat, in the quantities that I want, as regularly as I want to, ever again.
It is a constant effort to control what I eat because what I would like to eat is way above my maintenance calories (not from hunger or because I miss any particular foods, just because I want to eat a lot).
I didn't expect maintaining to require so much effort. Or at least I found it hard to realistically see myself putting in that much effort for the rest of my life. It took me a while to deeply accept that this is what I will have to do in order to maintain my weight loss.
Controlling myself is still really hard. I am hoping it will get easier.
My determination not to gain the weight back is very strong, though.0 -
Menopause.
I lost weight, and kept doing what I was doing. (I didn't stop my "diet" when I hit my goal.) I just kept doing what I was doing...Maintaining was relatively easy for me until peri-menopause and then I found that the pounds crept on a little. I joined here, and watched things for a while... Now menopause has hit and I'm formulating a plan for that as well.
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totaldetermination wrote: »I really enjoy regularly eating large quantities of certain high calorie foods - far more than I could fit into my calorie / macro goals.
I had to accept that if I am going to maintain my weight loss then I can't eat like that any more.
I didn't mind watching what I ate whilst I was losing weight, because it was a temporary change - I thought once I had more calories I would be able to eat more. But its not enough calories for what i want.
It was a big step for me to accept that I cannot eat the foods that I want to eat, in the quantities that I want, as regularly as I want to, ever again.
It is a constant effort to control what I eat because what I would like to eat is way above my maintenance calories (not from hunger or because I miss any particular foods, just because I want to eat a lot).
I didn't expect maintaining to require so much effort. Or at least I found it hard to realistically see myself putting in that much effort for the rest of my life. It took me a while to deeply accept that this is what I will have to do in order to maintain my weight loss.
Controlling myself is still really hard. I am hoping it will get easier.
My determination not to gain the weight back is very strong, though.
I think it's about finding out what kind of a dieter you are. I'm a volume eater...I LIKE eating and I eat loads.
So I stick to vegetables because it'd harder to gain weight from vegetables than it'd be from eating rice and pasta. Being in maintenance however, means having room for maneuver. So if I spoil myself one day I just remember that I need 3500 calories extra to put a pound. Also, it took me months to slim down so it'd take months eating that badly to go back to the original stage. So, as long as you keep an eye on your weight you'll be fine. You're prepared now!
I think what I struggle the most is that some days...I could REALLY do with eating a packet of biscuits out of comfort. But here I am, eating a huge bowl of soup because...volume!0 -
rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...
What cal target did you eat to lose weight?
What was your goal or end weight?
What cal target do you average now?
What is your current average weight?
Answer those and I'll be able to guess if you have gained your glycogen weight.0 -
rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...
What cal target did you eat to lose weight?
What was your goal or end weight?
What cal target do you average now?
What is your current average weight?
Answer those and I'll be able to guess if you have gained your glycogen weight.
Oh man we're derailing the thread, lol.
My goal is still 130 pounds. Lowest I reached was 131.5 in June 2014. I ate 1650-1750 a day to lose (using TDEE, so no eating back exercise calories). Increased to 1800-2000 a few months after I reached that low weight (basically when I lost 2 of the 3 pounds I gained during the vacation that followed).
Current low weight is 133 pounds (go up to 136-137 before my period). I was 135 pounds when I came back from my vacation in July.
My average calories for the last few weeks (going backwards starting with this one) is 1913, 2098, 2100, 1910, 1831, 2447 (that was PMS week, my period is late this month)... My TDEE is supposedly 2200, but I haven't weighed myself since that 1831 week, as I only weigh myself the week after my period, so I have no idea if I actually lost weight since or not... As I said though, I zig zag calories, in those weeks my calories went from 1650 to 4600 and I had 8 days over maintenance.
It's pretty much the way I've been eating for the last 1.5 year.0 -
Gosh...im relatively new to maintenance. Some days, all I want to do is eat. And I do. I've tried to loosen the reigns a bit with my food choices but I really have very little self control. Accordingly I probably should keep my reigns a bit tighter at all times.0
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So your lowest weight was 131.5 which means till you hit and keep at least 135 you haven't filled your glycogen storage. Instead of dieting after your vacation you should have just ate to maintain and watched. I am willing to bet you can eat the 2200 cals daily and have your period binges for 2 days and it will all even out with the days you happen to eat less the rest of the month.rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...
What cal target did you eat to lose weight?
What was your goal or end weight?
What cal target do you average now?
What is your current average weight?
Answer those and I'll be able to guess if you have gained your glycogen weight.
Oh man we're derailing the thread, lol.
My goal is still 130 pounds. Lowest I reached was 131.5 in June 2014. I ate 1650-1750 a day to lose (using TDEE, so no eating back exercise calories). Increased to 1800-2000 a few months after I reached that low weight (basically when I lost 2 of the 3 pounds I gained during the vacation that followed).
Current low weight is 133 pounds (go up to 136-137 before my period). I was 135 pounds when I came back from my vacation in July.
My average calories for the last few weeks (going backwards starting with this one) is 1913, 2098, 2100, 1910, 1831, 2447 (that was PMS week, my period is late this month)... My TDEE is supposedly 2200, but I haven't weighed myself since that 1831 week, as I only weigh myself the week after my period, so I have no idea if I actually lost weight since or not... As I said though, I zig zag calories, in those weeks my calories went from 1650 to 4600 and I had 8 days over maintenance.
It's pretty much the way I've been eating for the last 1.5 year.
You keep teasing your body with enough food to "turn on all the power" and it revs up to be a fuel burning machine, but then you knock it back into energy saving mode when you drop back to ~1800 a week. This is when it kicks and screams that it is soo hungry.0 -
rtp_slg52181 wrote: »
So your lowest weight was 131.5 which means till you hit and keep at least 135 you haven't filled your glycogen storage. Instead of dieting after your vacation you should have just ate to maintain and watched. I am willing to bet you can eat the 2200 cals daily and have your period binges for 2 days and it will all even out with the days you happen to eat less the rest of the month.rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...
What cal target did you eat to lose weight?
What was your goal or end weight?
What cal target do you average now?
What is your current average weight?
Answer those and I'll be able to guess if you have gained your glycogen weight.
Oh man we're derailing the thread, lol.
My goal is still 130 pounds. Lowest I reached was 131.5 in June 2014. I ate 1650-1750 a day to lose (using TDEE, so no eating back exercise calories). Increased to 1800-2000 a few months after I reached that low weight (basically when I lost 2 of the 3 pounds I gained during the vacation that followed).
Current low weight is 133 pounds (go up to 136-137 before my period). I was 135 pounds when I came back from my vacation in July.
My average calories for the last few weeks (going backwards starting with this one) is 1913, 2098, 2100, 1910, 1831, 2447 (that was PMS week, my period is late this month)... My TDEE is supposedly 2200, but I haven't weighed myself since that 1831 week, as I only weigh myself the week after my period, so I have no idea if I actually lost weight since or not... As I said though, I zig zag calories, in those weeks my calories went from 1650 to 4600 and I had 8 days over maintenance.
It's pretty much the way I've been eating for the last 1.5 year.
You keep teasing your body with enough food to "turn on all the power" and it revs up to be a fuel burning machine, but then you knock it back into energy saving mode when you drop back to ~1800 a week. This is when it kicks and screams that it is soo hungry.
It's possible. But with Thanksgiving and a wedding and Christmas I'm going to have to try to lose a bit more, then I'll think about it, lol.0 -
I think the main struggle for me is knowing when I'm full.I just don't seem to have that feeling of I'm stuffed that most people get. I can't trust my body for signals. I'd love to do mindful eating but I just don't seem to get that. Last month I had pasta with a friend and he was like wow I'm so stuffed and I just went... really?0
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desiresdestiny wrote: »I was curious as we all can struggle differently at maintenance. Mine so far as been figuring out maintenance and eating at maintenance. I'm sure I've struggled with other things, can't think of anymore right now.
Time. Time and more time. I's so stinking easy to lose focus in maintenance when you're looking at over 40 years of it sigh... The motivation fades and it's very easy to put maintenance into the background. I've been in maintenance for about 2 and a half years now and I'm dealing with some weight creep right now. Just a few pounds over the high end of my maintenance range, but I know I need to address it now before it gets out of hand.
However, I just had some blood work done (with the weight creep in place), and my numbers actually IMPROVED, over this time last year when I was solidly in my maintenance range and around 5lbs lighter. Seriously, what is that?! Sooo, yeah really trying to find the motivation right now to actually lose the creep
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rtp_slg52181 wrote: »
So your lowest weight was 131.5 which means till you hit and keep at least 135 you haven't filled your glycogen storage. Instead of dieting after your vacation you should have just ate to maintain and watched. I am willing to bet you can eat the 2200 cals daily and have your period binges for 2 days and it will all even out with the days you happen to eat less the rest of the month.rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...
What cal target did you eat to lose weight?
What was your goal or end weight?
What cal target do you average now?
What is your current average weight?
Answer those and I'll be able to guess if you have gained your glycogen weight.
Oh man we're derailing the thread, lol.
My goal is still 130 pounds. Lowest I reached was 131.5 in June 2014. I ate 1650-1750 a day to lose (using TDEE, so no eating back exercise calories). Increased to 1800-2000 a few months after I reached that low weight (basically when I lost 2 of the 3 pounds I gained during the vacation that followed).
Current low weight is 133 pounds (go up to 136-137 before my period). I was 135 pounds when I came back from my vacation in July.
My average calories for the last few weeks (going backwards starting with this one) is 1913, 2098, 2100, 1910, 1831, 2447 (that was PMS week, my period is late this month)... My TDEE is supposedly 2200, but I haven't weighed myself since that 1831 week, as I only weigh myself the week after my period, so I have no idea if I actually lost weight since or not... As I said though, I zig zag calories, in those weeks my calories went from 1650 to 4600 and I had 8 days over maintenance.
It's pretty much the way I've been eating for the last 1.5 year.
You keep teasing your body with enough food to "turn on all the power" and it revs up to be a fuel burning machine, but then you knock it back into energy saving mode when you drop back to ~1800 a week. This is when it kicks and screams that it is soo hungry.
Great explanation and very helpful to me too (I am basically @francl27 twin lol)
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Motivation to reach a certain size, look, weight can be more powerful than the motivation to stay. I have played that game before and this time before starting I promised myself that I was not going to do something that I didn't plan on doing for life. My eating habits, exercise routines, choices of food etc....were all decided upon to be things that I knew I could continue.
Having said all that, I will admit that to be successful I had to be a little obsessive about tracking, weighing myself, etc....now at maintenance I trust myself a little more and take breaks and do not really log anymore. I jump on the scale every few weeks and allow myself a 5 lb window of weight gain. As soon as I reach the cap of that window....I tighten up my regiment a bit to get back down to my maintenance weight. For me, I didn't want to have to log my food everyday...it isn't terribly difficult to do but just something I was hoping to avoid.0 -
RunRutheeRun wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »
So your lowest weight was 131.5 which means till you hit and keep at least 135 you haven't filled your glycogen storage. Instead of dieting after your vacation you should have just ate to maintain and watched. I am willing to bet you can eat the 2200 cals daily and have your period binges for 2 days and it will all even out with the days you happen to eat less the rest of the month.rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »rtp_slg52181 wrote: »Laughter_Girl wrote: »
I would suggest you haven't found your optimum maintenance cals. There is usually a ~500 cal range that your body can adjust for. If you are at the low end your body will easily get cold your hair and nails won't grow as fast and other non essential fictions your body would normally do are reduced to conserve energy.
Well, I don't know. It took me 2 months to lose the 2 pounds I gained on vacations (assuming it was real weight gain as I ate too much and pee'd every 30 minutes on the way back), so you'd think I would have a deficit, but the scale hasn't gone lower than 133 pounds in 18 months.
I zigzag my calories though so it might have something to do with it, but there are days when I'm actually not that hungry, and some when I'm starving, and I always eat too much during PMS (up to 3500 extra calories sometimes) so I have to make up for that somehow, so I try to keep a 800-2000 calorie deficit the other weeks. But if I was eating too little, I'd still be losing, and I'm definitely not.
It's because you haven't let your body
gain the ~3-5 lbs of glycogen weight it needs to switch out of actively conserving energy
After you let this gain happen you'll be surprised how much you can eat and maintain weight.
But I went on vacations twice since, eating at maintenance or over it for 7-10 days, and I have 3000-4000 calorie days at least every other month. Surely I would have gained that glycogen weight then? I'm not constantly at a deficit and eat at maintenance or over at least twice a week too...
What cal target did you eat to lose weight?
What was your goal or end weight?
What cal target do you average now?
What is your current average weight?
Answer those and I'll be able to guess if you have gained your glycogen weight.
Oh man we're derailing the thread, lol.
My goal is still 130 pounds. Lowest I reached was 131.5 in June 2014. I ate 1650-1750 a day to lose (using TDEE, so no eating back exercise calories). Increased to 1800-2000 a few months after I reached that low weight (basically when I lost 2 of the 3 pounds I gained during the vacation that followed).
Current low weight is 133 pounds (go up to 136-137 before my period). I was 135 pounds when I came back from my vacation in July.
My average calories for the last few weeks (going backwards starting with this one) is 1913, 2098, 2100, 1910, 1831, 2447 (that was PMS week, my period is late this month)... My TDEE is supposedly 2200, but I haven't weighed myself since that 1831 week, as I only weigh myself the week after my period, so I have no idea if I actually lost weight since or not... As I said though, I zig zag calories, in those weeks my calories went from 1650 to 4600 and I had 8 days over maintenance.
It's pretty much the way I've been eating for the last 1.5 year.
You keep teasing your body with enough food to "turn on all the power" and it revs up to be a fuel burning machine, but then you knock it back into energy saving mode when you drop back to ~1800 a week. This is when it kicks and screams that it is soo hungry.
Great explanation and very helpful to me too (I am basically @francl27 twin lol)
Yeah but I don't want to maintain at 135 so I'm going to keep trying to lose... if the scale ever gets under 133.0 -
@francl27 well I'd love to see 130 but I'm stuck at 133 have been for a year...but I don't care enough to try for more loss, I'm not prepared to eat less than 1800.0
I definitely monitor my macros to try to meet my daily targets. Other than that, I just drink plenty of water and try to eat slower.
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