Successful weight loss from yoyo dieters? What did it for you?

@fascha wrote what I was going to say. Once I figured out what to focus on (a calorie deficit), it became much easier.

No need for a plan, no need for a program (although if you find one you like, you can use one). Just consistently meet your calorie goal, pay attention to what types of foods and meal timings help you consistently meet that goal, and enjoy your life.

I'm not yet a success, but am on my longest streak since I got on this yo-yo train three years ago. Six months as of yesterday! The thing that is different this time is location. I moved from a food culture in Las Vegas to an outdoors culture in the suburbs of Reno. Changing my environment made it suddenly easy. I know moving to the mountains is not a practical solution for most people, but looking at what in your life is throwing up barriers to your weight loss could help. For me it was the delicious food everywhere and always an excuse to celebrate anything or to skip cooking dinner. Just because I was surrounded by great food didn't mean I needed to eat out more than once a week or couldn't choose wisely when I did. For me it took moving across the state to realize what my problem was. I hope you can gain some introspection without any major life changes.

I dropped the term I'm going on a diet. Instead, I thought of it more as I am going to set up a healthy eating plan in order to lose weight. Once I lost every lost pound, I added 300-400 calories to my plan to maintain my healthy weight. Whenever I gain a few pounds, I revert to the deficit in my healthy eating plan and I am soon on my way back to where I want to be. I never say, I am on a diet. To me, this is like setting myself up for failure. I tell myself instead that I am eating correctly in order to lose weight and afterwards, to maintain it.

Yo yo dieting taught me that it's tiring, ineffective, time consuming, depressing, expensive in some cases, not sustainable and it doesn't work. Mfp has sincerely been the ONLY weight loss journey im dedicated to and excited about. These forums help me tremendously, thanks to everyone that posts

I think it's about finding what works for you. Counting cals/macros is a good tool, but plenty of other people have had success going vegan, intuitive eating, intermediate fasting, etc. I found the type of workouts I absolutely love to do (even when I fall of the wagon on my diet I still go to the gym and lift cause I love it so much) and for me, counting cals/macros is temporary. I'll use it while cutting and go back to intuitive eating once it's time to bulk. This, for me, is working perfectly and has kept me from that yo yo life.

I am 48 years old, pretty much through my 30's & 40's I was an yo you dieter. I would go on some program, lose the weight then gain it all back if not more. What changed for me was I stopped making excuses for myself, stopped justifying the laziness. Something clicked in me last November, I decided there was no room for a diet in my life and decided to change my life style. My husband had just been put on Cholesterol meds and I was like NO MORE, we are going to eat better and get our bodies moving. We have maintained this lifestyle through the holidays, birthdays, stressful days, sick days and pretty much everything life has thrown our way. We eat in moderation, we chose a primary plant based diet and we work out 6 days a week for a minimum of 45 minutes. I prep/plan our meals for the week and we enjoy our date nights out with friends just the same just with different choices in food and how much we actually eat of it. I like to save my calories for wine and will get on that treadmill for an hour in the morning of a planned night out just to make sure I have room for that wine and meal. (and it always gets logged into MFP) I learned to be patient that I didn't gain weight over night and that I wasn't going to lose it over night. I started on 11/28/16 at 259.9lbs as of last Fridays weigh in I was 216.8lbs I no longer think of food as comfort (I am a huge emotional eater) I now think of it as fuel for my body. Everyone is different when it comes to losing weight, but good habits and being accountable are the keys to my success thus far. I still have some weight to lose before I hit maintenance and I look forward to meeting every small goal I put in place for myself. Slow and steady wins the race... I am not looking to be skinny, just healthy and fit. I have future grandbabies in my future (hopefully not too soon) that I want to be around to spoil rotten and the vision of traveling and enjoying my retirement years with my husband. Best advise given to me was, make a commitment to yourself. Make a plan and stick to it, if you fall dust yourself off and get back at it. Best of luck to you!!!

Stopped trying all the fad diets and learned that moderation was the key for me. I balanced out my diet, focused on nutrition and calories, found a cardio activity I enjoyed, and just did it. It's been easy ever since.

I have overate since February 2 which is different for me than my usual binge. But I continue at my next meal eating ok. Not letting it derail me. I still need to learn a lot of things (like I am banking my calories (like I used to do) if I knew I was going to a restaurant or a friend's house. And recently at a friend's house, she had a lot of snacky foods out and even though I didn't eat breakfast (which maybe not a good thing), I thought I made ok choices but then came home with some snacks and ate those at night. Also I find if the food is there, right in front of me, I will overeat. So I have a lot of questions for the dietician next time I visit.
So you do know how to lose weight but maybe not be so restrictive. I know every time I tried, which was 45 years x 365 days, I was ready, I was determined. But it is that voice inside that says I need the food, I have to have it, I can't stop thinking about it. One meal at a time. Big hugs.

I've slowly regained everything in 3 years after losing for my wedding (which was a year of CICO dieting), my tactic this time is to not see it as a diet and once I'm done leave MFP, I need to stay on here to maintain instead of dieting for a bit than allowing a slow creep back in to old habits (or at least get a handle of what maintenance is). I think the thing I need to get into my head is that its a full lifestyle change and that exercise and a good diet is just as important when you're at the weight you want to be. Also I'm happy to see my goal weight as a long term goal that I might not hit for a long time and not something I'm going to rush to get into a swimsuit for June and burn myself out doing.

So my advice is basically don't burn yourself out being overly restrictive out of impatience to see results, for many people its unsustainable, makes you miserable and you'll just throw in the towel in frustration the first time you don't lose one week or see an unexpected gain (which is usually normal water weight fluctuations).

Good luck x