The panic of the first day of maintenance

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  • WendyTerry420
    WendyTerry420 Posts: 13,274 Member
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    Usually, the people who freak over transitioning to maintenance are those who didn't periodically increase the calories they eat as they lost fat. Instead, they maintained the same static intake all the way to goal weight and, as a result, see this massive difference in what they are presently eating and what their adjusted TDEE may be and go full paranoid.

    That makes sense. I have kept my deficit at roughly 300 calories so it's nothing to eat at maintenance or to have a slight cut. One thing I never do is sit around feeling hungry.
  • iechick
    iechick Posts: 352 Member
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    I don't get it.

    I can't relate. Why is maintenance so scary to everyone. I couldn't wait to increase my calories to something more normal and reasonable.

    There's a 95% FAILURE rate for long term weight loss success. Only 5% of the people here will actually succeed at maintenance. That's why it's so darn scary. No one loses the weight and goes into maintenance thinking they're going to fail, but yet MOST people do exactly that. How do you figure out how to best do maintenance, so you're a part of that very small percentage of people that don't regain the weight/become a yo-yo dieter?

    Losing the weight took me less than a year. Maintaining is for the rest of my life-hopefully over 50 years. That's very overwhelming to me right now, especially when everyone in my family is a yo-yo dieter that really struggle with their weight, in spite of 'knowing' how to maintain. What's going to make me any different from them? Why am I'm going to be the special snowflake that somehow manages to be part of that small percentage that succeeds? That's where the stress comes in :grumble:
  • JoRocka
    JoRocka Posts: 17,525 Member
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    I don't get it.

    I can't relate. Why is maintenance so scary to everyone. I couldn't wait to increase my calories to something more normal and reasonable.

    it's a mental fear- it isn't about the actual calories you're eating- it's about the effect- you spend all this time cutting- I was getting good abs- seeing great cuts... upping it by an entire other meal just felt wrong. And on top of that.. you get SO used to being hungry (least I did - but I was eating below my BMR)... feeling NOT hungry makes you 'feel fat'

    you aren't. but it's a mental thing. purely mental.

    I guess I really really really really hate being in a deficit. When I went to maintenance I was ecstatic. I even went into a bulk and was so happy, I was completely elated. Deficits suck butts.

    then you didn't succeed- you did exactly what I did and started over eating and called it a bulk0 I did 2 weeks of that to come back to earth- I'm absolutely adjusted to maintenance calories now and feel very comfortable adding in an extra few hundred calories- but that starts in November- because I like starting at the beginning of a month. you know- because it's even that way. LOL

    call it want- but you didn't go to maintenance. And that's the point. You just labelled it something else and are saying you don't get it- but you absolutely 100% are in the same boat- you just don't see it.

    I purposefully went maintenance for at least a month before I transitioned to a bulk- and it'll be over a month- 1.5 actually. I have no purpose to not go directly from cut to bulk other than stability- sustainability- mental health.
  • JoRocka
    JoRocka Posts: 17,525 Member
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    The implication was most certainly there. and just because you don't understand it- doesn't mean it's not a thing.
  • skyekeeper
    skyekeeper Posts: 286 Member
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    Welcome to maintenance.... I'm a week in and it IS terrifying! Losing the weight has been my life and now that I'm there, it is very daunting. Previously I have re-gained and yo'yo'd.... but this year I changed my lifestyle and eating habits for the first time in my life so I'm really determined NOT to gain this time. But I have to admit, the thought terrifies me.....

    THIS ^^^ I am very close to maintenance and though very proud and happy....scared out of my mind. So appreciate these threads!
  • KIMBAILEYWILLIAMSON
    KIMBAILEYWILLIAMSON Posts: 258 Member
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    I don't get it.

    I can't relate. Why is maintenance so scary to everyone. I couldn't wait to increase my calories to something more normal and reasonable.

    There's a 95% FAILURE rate for long term weight loss success. Only 5% of the people here will actually succeed at maintenance. That's why it's so darn scary. No one loses the weight and goes into maintenance thinking they're going to fail, but yet MOST people do exactly that. How do you figure out how to best do maintenance, so you're a part of that very small percentage of people that don't regain the weight/become a yo-yo dieter?

    Losing the weight took me less than a year. Maintaining is for the rest of my life-hopefully over 50 years. That's very overwhelming to me right now, especially when everyone in my family is a yo-yo dieter that really struggle with their weight, in spite of 'knowing' how to maintain. What's going to make me any different from them? Why am I'm going to be the special snowflake that somehow manages to be part of that small percentage that succeeds? That's where the stress comes in :grumble:




    AGREE with this ^^^
  • 55in13
    55in13 Posts: 1,091 Member
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    I don't get it.

    I can't relate. Why is maintenance so scary to everyone. I couldn't wait to increase my calories to something more normal and reasonable.

    There's a 95% FAILURE rate for long term weight loss success. Only 5% of the people here will actually succeed at maintenance. That's why it's so darn scary. No one loses the weight and goes into maintenance thinking they're going to fail, but yet MOST people do exactly that. How do you figure out how to best do maintenance, so you're a part of that very small percentage of people that don't regain the weight/become a yo-yo dieter?

    Losing the weight took me less than a year. Maintaining is for the rest of my life-hopefully over 50 years. That's very overwhelming to me right now, especially when everyone in my family is a yo-yo dieter that really struggle with their weight, in spite of 'knowing' how to maintain. What's going to make me any different from them? Why am I'm going to be the special snowflake that somehow manages to be part of that small percentage that succeeds? That's where the stress comes in :grumble:
    The 95% figure is suspect at best:
    http://www.nytimes.com/1999/05/25/health/95-regain-lost-weight-or-do-they.html
    It came from a study over 50 years ago of 100 atypical people. Obese patients who lost the weight on a VLC diet in a hospital setting and then were sent home with a printed diet to follow. I am not saying the failure rate is a lot lower than that, but there is a lot of evidence to support the idea that people who manage their own loss can manage their own maintenance better.

    from the article:
    They are compiling detailed histories of successful long-term dieters -- people who had maintained a weight loss of at least 30 pounds for at least one year. Most of the volunteers were solicited through articles in newspapers and magazines. ''It was really to convince ourselves and convince the world that there are people who are successful, and then to learn from them,'' Dr. Wing said.

    To their surprise, Dr. Wing and Dr. Hill found that on average the respondents had maintained a 67-pound weight loss for five years. Between 12 and 14 percent had maintained a loss of more than 100 pounds.
    I have also seen a few studies that make me feel better but don't apply to everyone. I am in my fifties and did not have a weight problem until my forties. I have returned to the form I spent most of my adult life in. The failure rate for people who are maintaining a new weight after decades of being large seems to be higher. I felt like the person I saw in the mirror for 8+ years was not me and now I see me again (I have lost over 50 pounds; I look very different). It is harder for people who see a new person in the mirror.

    It is not easy, but it is not gloom and doom.
  • NGFive
    NGFive Posts: 125 Member
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    I look forward to having this problem LMAO! Losing the last five pounds is slow going. Call me the Little Engine That Could
  • corgicake
    corgicake Posts: 846 Member
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    It's scary in part because weight loss means acknowledging that things weren't working right because they weren't ending well, and maintenance means acknowledging that things are working right and will end well. If you know that you have developed better habits and things work differently now, you'll be fine.
  • Domane1963
    Domane1963 Posts: 85 Member
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    I reached my target a fortnight ago and I spent a couple of days telling everyone that my journey was over. It took a while for it to dawn on me that only the first leg of my journey is over and that my continuing one will be as I strive to maintain. Some days are a battle of the sugar and starch demons and some I sail through, eating under my target calories. My body is now used to smaller portions and I truly enjoy the new healthy eating regime that I'd never adopted before.

    The euphoria I get from my newly-discovered love of running 5km plus FAR exceeds the high I'd get from stuffing a doughnut - and the subsequent hatred of myself for being so weak.

    My brain hasn't caught down yet and I still sit down to my meal thinking "Is that all?" yet when I have eaten it all I now feel surprisingly full and realise that I don't need any more. I still hold up a pair of size 8 (UK) jeans and look at the bum and think "No WAY will they ever fit my ample derriere" and then they slide effortlessly into place. It is going to take me a while to adjust and I'm just going to take it a day at a time. I'm a lifer now and I'm fairly confident that as time passes, things will get easier and I won't feel the blind panic that switching to maintenance has brought on. I read again and again that huge percentages of dieters fail to keep the weight off.... indeed I have BEEN a yo-yo dieter, but I never changed my food intake and lifestyle like I have this time around. I won't take my eye off the ball. Ever. I'm going to need to be vigilant, I accept that.
  • Skrib69
    Skrib69 Posts: 687 Member
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    I know what you mean by maintenance being scary. I have been slowly tapering for the past 4 months and think I have hit the spot. My weight is reasonably steady and I still weigh once a week. Like others, I have my lines in the sand that have been mentioned, and for the most part it seems to be working! Having done this once before, I have no intention of not being in the 5% that maintain it!! Good luck on your journey's end!
  • arlenem1974
    arlenem1974 Posts: 437 Member
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    I don't eat clean by any means I have managed to lose 65 lbs. on this site since Sept 2012. I don't plan on changing my eating habits when I go into maintenance. I will continue to log but I wont go crazy if I eat a little more or less then mfp tells me.
  • pkw58
    pkw58 Posts: 2,039 Member
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    No panic for me. I just kept logging and set new goals for fitness. However, I did panic when the scale moves up a pound or two. 16 months into maintenance, I am ok with the scale moving up and down a few pounds. I just keep logging.

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