Need to find something that works..

Have you tried making a plan beforehand?

If you look at my food diary, I plan a week's worth of food ahead of time. I also make my grocery list from that plan.

When you plan ahead, you can tweak your food and portions until you get it just right. Then, make sure that you are eating ONLY what you have planned out. Nothing more, nothing less. If you do eat more or less, then go back and log that in later to see how it will affect you.

For me, this works MUCH better than simply logging in my food after I eat it and trying to count everything in my head all day long.

I know how you feel. I have been trying to lose 20 pesky pounds since New Years and have yet to do it. I do not work out as often as I should so I think if I do that it would help. I do log all my foods and try to watch what I eat and I have been eating alot better. I try to get my 8 glasses of water in a day as well. This helps me control my appetite. I also have been wondering about what it is that I am doing wrong and not being able to lose those lbs in all this time. But my lack of exercise I think is my issue. I am just not consistant and have a hard time staying motivated. I know how you feel & wish you luck on your journey!

Pinksgirlfriend just deactivated her account so ignore her comments.

the only thing that i find that works for me is pre planning!

everyday i sit down and put my food diary in for the next day... that way i get to eat foods that i love!

i pre plan what portion size i need to eat of certain foods to fit all my fav foods into my calorie limit, this means there is no stressing out at work because the canteen food is dripping with fat or the sandwiches are filled with more mayo than proper meat and veg because ive made my lunch the night before and brought it with me!
there is no stressing about getting to work on time and fitting in a healthy filling breakfast because i have it all sitting out the night before and all i have to do is put the porridge in the microwave to cook while im putting on my make-up!
and then when i get home at night all tired from my day at work i know exactly what im making for dinner and can whip it up and scarf it down without having to work out if im eating too much or not because i know im not as i planned it all out the night before! stress free eating, obsessing over food in a good way and then looking forward to eating everything i planned out!

of course some days aren't the norm and you go shopping with friends and end up in starbucks or your wonderful boyfriend surprises you with a fancy dinner out or you have a day (like mine yest) that you just want to eat everything in sight! but if you stick with the pre planning 6 days out of 7 its no sweat to forget about it a little one day a week and relax knowing that all the other days you did pretty well!

hope this helps a little but if i didn't pre plan my meals and snacks for the day and logged then all in at the end of the day after id eaten everything i know id be way over and feeling very sorry for myself!

Pinksgirlfriend

Wow! For the first time at MFP I am truly saddened. I'm sure it exists, but I have not seem that kinda degredation and ugliness on these boards before. Funny thing, it comes the morning after I made the decision to write my first blog. One that will begin with an apology, not for spewing the poison that you have, but for not taking the time to understand that struggles, low self esteem, and the quest to be healthy can not be weighed. It affects many different people in may different ways.

As for the poster, keep at it! I have seem so many inspiring success stories here. Find an excerise you really enjoy and go for the gusto! I'm still looking for one myself, but determined to like to excercise one day soon

Pinksgirlfriend just deactivated her account so ignore her comments.

Good. Reporting posts works. I hope people like that don't post too often around here, because that was very upsetting. I weigh 143, but I want to drop body fat and size to get to 129 before Christmas. I sometimes get scoffed at by co-workers and family members who don't understand what I want to do with my body saying that I already look OK (even though I want to drop body fat and lean out to 17% body fat)...but we don't need that kind of thing here where we are supposed to help, support, and motivate each other to overcome our pitfalls and reach our goals.

That Last 10 Pounds thing looks kind of like what I am doing now...I haven't gone real low on carbs, but they are always under my goal...I do 1500 calories a day...I do really hard workouts 6 days a week...

Hmmm...maybe I'm on to something.

Something I did a long time ago that I thought was great was a eating plan I found in a Reader's Digest called Change One. The idea is that you change one thing at a time...so for week one you replace your beverages with water. Everything else stays exactly the same...Week two you change your breakfast...the book had tons of great options that were really balanced etc and showed the appropriate portion size...(portion size was my biggie as I seem to like pretty healthy foods). Week three moved to an appropriate choice and portion size for a morning snack etc. The idea is that your body adjusts to the incremental changes more easily...if you are starving during the breakfast week you can still eat a normal for you snack and you won't feel deprived etc..thing s after a week your body should be adjusted to the new breakfast so when you get the next week you have breakfast mastered and can now adjust that snack. I have always done well with breakfast so I only spent a few days on that ...my mom on the other had needed to spend two weeks on each step to really feel ready for the next. I lost enough by just adjusting everything but dinner that I was content. I found MFP when I wanted to break through a plateau and started training for a marathon as I needed to make sure I was eating enough.

The plan might be slow but it doesn't deprive you. You don't give up fried foods for a really long time and there is still a place for them in moderation.....

2 things. One instead of giving up and eating what you want when you go over, try adding extra cardio or even weights to balance. I've been told that you can count lifting as 1 cal/rep. Some are actually more and some are less but it averages out, and if you lift you will build muscle which of course weighs more than fat.

The second thing, if you can do it, get a fat monitoring scale, there are even some small hand held things that will do the same thing. The important thing is the fat % in relation to lean body mass.

Also try interval training, go as hard as you can for as long as you can then slow down to moderate to slow pace until you have your breath back and slowly build back up and do it again for however long your cardio routine lasts... only do this if you have no cardio issues & have had a physical to confirm.

good luck

I strongly encourage you to get a plan. The night before, decide what you're in the mood to eat the next day and LITERALLY carve out what you're going to eat, how much, etc. Put in how much you estimate you'll burn working out (say, use last time's burn minus 10-20 calories). Make sure you're getting at 20-30% protein and 25-30g of fiber everyday. Work hard to get those two things and try not to eat too much sugar. You can have things you love, things that are bad for you, just not OFTEN. You can check my diary for ideas. You'll see yesterday I had 2 tootsie rolls and a twizzler...I had extra calories & my co-worker offered me the Twizzler which I hadn't had in FOREVER so I allowed myself to have it. Normally I would check it before eating it but I didn't...it ended up being about 35 calories so it's a good thing I had extras. Little things like this add up, which is why you gained back what you lost. When you eat stuff before you log it or without looking, you can really underestimate how much you're eating.

You've gotta start having some kind of organization -- drinking a lot of water helps me not to overeat. When I start to get hungry and I know it's not a good time to eat (say, it'll be another 4-5 hours before I can eat again), I'll chug a bunch of water and tell myself if I'm still hungry 20 minutes later (how long it takes your body to actually process hunger), then I'll eat. If I can't stand that long, I'll drink more water or chew gum.

Another thing is... I don't know what work outs you're doing but I have a feeling you're doing the same thing you've always been doing. Arc trainer, Gazelle, etc. To keep from being bored, branch out! Buy a $10 Jillian Michaels DVD. Seriously, she will kick your *kitten*. I just started her No More Trouble Zones on Saturday and did it for the second time last night and I can FEEL it working. I've also been trying to eat a lot cleaner and I can notice a drastic difference in how I feel -- I have more energy; I was depressed & anxious for awhile because of lack of exercise and that's changed now that I've been exercising more as well as eating better (studies have shown high-sugar diets contribue to depression, as well as eating a lot of processed foods in general) -- and how I look, how my clothes fit me.

I remember how eager you were in the beginning and it makes me sad to see you're back where you started. I think you just need to start fresh. New exercises, change your diet (as in, not even just choosing healthier foods but DIFFERENT healthier foods - you could be bored with what you're eating especially if it's the same day in and day out), and make new goals... not weight-related. Say, I want to fit into these jeans by this day, or, I want to have more energy, or I want to only eat one sweet thing a day and a very small portion. Or whatever you want.

thats sure not what happend....im still here....lol....so what ever ...hahahaha

nope...not deleated.....lol....no one with real weight issues wants to hear a skinny person complain about i weigh 130 i need to be anorexic and be 15 pounds lighter....you cant feel my point?