Dieting and social life

How many calories are you eating/drinking on weekends? To gain 6 lbs, you'd need to be taking in 21,000 beyond your current maintenance level. My assumption is, it's sodium intake - and that you have the ability to drink water instead of wine, so if it's causing you that much stress, do so.

Have a look at the 5:2 diet. It doesn't suit everyone as you eat just 500 calories on 2 separated days in the week (Mondays and Thursdays are popular, but you can choose days that suit you). For the rest of the week you eat at or close to mainenance. As you get your weekly deficit in just 2 (very) restricted days it works well for people with an active social life. If you wanted to save even more calories for booze at the week-end you could eat a bit below maintenance on weekdays when you're not fasting.

You need to make very careful choices of what to eat on "fasting" days and I find that I AM hungry in the afternoon and while I cook dinner, so you need to plan and have food ready to cook and eat, or snacking you didn't mean to do will happen!

You could try it out for a week or two & if it's not for you, move on. Lots of people use it for its health benefits and lose weight as well. I find it's very useful to remind myself what hunger feels like, and that it's not fatal, and that it goes after a short time (and comes back in waves, but they're not BAD!!).

Congrats on your progress! Losing 57 pounds in 6 months isn't slow progress, that's fantastic! So don't stress, you're doing really well. I struggle with the same issue. Sometimes I can go out have some drinks and I've stayed within my cal goals if Ive compensated for it by exercising during the day and I lose weight and all is good. Other times, I do I well during the week, lose a pound or two bit then blow it at the weekend because of drinking, eating junk when drunk or hungover and general laziness from the hangover and my weight is back to square one! But you can't be a social hermit or you'll just find this lifestyle change a negative thing. Got to get the balance between staying focussed and enjoying yourself. I try to a) go out and try to drink a bit less, then I'm not hungover next day to exercise and the weekend isn't a right off (sometimes easier said than done!) and b) sometimes avoid booze if a week or two to shift some pounds then treat myself to a night out say if I've lost 5 pounds. Good luck!

I'm at university, and I'll admit a regular drinker...
On the days that I know I'm going out I preplan my meals, and often my drinks (also usually make sure I have spare for extra)
I try to keep track of everything, and usually make sure that I jog/ workout in the morning of that day to boost what I have burnt.
If you track what you're drinking and workout before you might be able to stay in calories.
Also, for eating out you can find A LOT of popular chain restaurant's calories on mfp and preplan.
good luck!

I might look into the 5:2 diet thanks!

It's a very neat plan, that gives you a lot of freedom It's laid out in Dr. Michael Mosley's book, The Fast Diet. He also has a BBC and PBS documentary/special out, that you can watch online for free. There's also a 5:2 group here on mfp.

Hi Jessica - I really don't understand it - my BMR is approx 2500 and MFP is set at 1460. Last weekend I didn't drink but made a few iffy choice but I still only went slightly over my cals but put on the 6lbs. You can see my diary. I record everything apart from walking and water. I drink a lot and walk every day. Am really feeling low about this because I can't find a happy medium and sticking to 1400 is tough long term. I'm always just so hungry!

FYI 2500 BMR is high for woman. your TDEE may be 2500 but not your BMR

I don't know about a TDEE but 2690 is my my BMR after applying the Harris Benedict formula.

that still seems high but ok.

I know the feeling - I get to the point where I don't want to do things with my friends because I know it will involve excessive eating/drinking. I let myself have big nights occasionally which involve eating or drinking too much (eg, tonight, Eurovision!). The thing I find frustrating is I know that some of my friends will get all weird with me if I don't eat or drink too much, they'll tell me I HAVE to have another glass of wine or get nachos to share or stuff like that - try and stick to my guns but sometimes it's hard because I don't want it to look like I'm making a point of turning things down.

I know this is *****y but the worst are friends who are bigger than me or have tried to lose weight and not been successful. I just try and keep my weight loss to myself and not make a big deal of it in but I think sometimes they can have a bit of an attitude of 'well if I can't be thin I'll try and make her fat too'. (That might be an awful thing to say and maybe I've completely misread it but I know girls can be like this sometimes!!)