Will you ever stop tracking your calories?

When I realized that tracking intake had a negative effect on my eating habits and how I thought about food I stopped tracking.

I do think there are plenty of people who do not have any ill effects from tracking intake and for those people it's a great method.

If tracking DOES lead to some obsessive thoughts about food, or if it damages your relationship with food then I'd consider alternative options to weight management.

I've been at my goal weight for two years and I still track my calories. But I do not lose any sleep over maintaining. Keep a calorie count is just part of my daily routine and it helps me stay accountable to myself. If you are obsessing over the numbers and losing sleep, you have NOT developed healthier eating habits.

After 10months of very, very precicsly weighing and logging everything, I've gotten really sick of it - it did start to take more control, I would choose food and amount for the sake of logging, rather than how much I actually wanted/needed, or what made sense in the context. Situations where I could not keep up my precise logging became less enjoyable, and I would stress about it a lot.

So I decided that my '10 month anniversay' would be the last day to use the food-scale, and then I would continue to log the 11th month, and then I planned to enter december log-free and at my goal weight - however, loosening up on my logging techniques for this 11th month has really proven to take pretty much all the stress out of it - I've missed a day, which I didn't care about, and I've estimated that the calories I might have under-logged at one meal, probably even out with others I've over-logged. So I might continue logging this way through maintance, until it sort of naturally phases out.

I don't log generally...actually, today is the first day I logged anything because I just wanted to do a spot check...but really, I've only logged a handful of times in the past 18 months plus.

I have developed a wealth of healthful habits and I have a healthy relationship with food and fitness...I don't need to log to maintain my weight or health...I just need to follow through with leading a healthful lifestyle and the rest pretty much takes care of itself.

For you, I'd say you just really need to get into the weight room and start re-comping...put on some muscle and stop trying to drop weight.

I started out years ago, and would obsessively weigh/measure/count every single thing I consumed so I could be accurate in my calorie counting. I developed a disordered relationship with food, and have been struggling ever since.

Recently, I finally found the motivation to get back on track with losing weight and promised myself I wouldn't go crazy with calories again. I do track my food sometimes, but my food scale is gone and I don't freak out over how many calories are in something.

I totally get that calorie counting is a great tool for weight loss, but it can also become a problem. I definitely don't want to be counting calories for the rest of my life. Eventually you'll have to learn moderation and balance

For me, the defining habit for weight loss/maintenance is daily weighing and recording. On the other hand, if I log too much, I get disordered eating habits. So I don't ever log for more than about 2 weeks at a time. If I'm having a problem, I'll log for a bit, get it straightened out and go back to not logging.

I'll occasionally pop a recipe in for analysis, or a meal/snack - just to see if it's reasonable/what a good portion is, but 90% of the time, that's all that shows up in my log.

I'm a very eclectic dieter these days though. Some days I do intermittent fasting (16/8, ADF), others I'm low carb, or low calorie, or two/three shakes and a sensible dinner (or a big dessert). It works for me and is sustainable, and that's really all I care about.

I think I would, once I'm at a my goal weight. I would keep weighing myself though, and if I notice I'm gaining weight or feel wrong, I'd go through my diet of the passed weeks and perhaps start logging again if I don't know where it's coming from.

I like tracking it makes me feel more in control