How I Went from Sustainable to Unsustainable

psychod787 wrote: »

NovusDies wrote: »

psychod787 wrote: »

NovusDies wrote: »

At the first of July I scheduled a time restrained surgery that meant I would be doing a "hurry-up" weight loss to hit a deadline that is now soon approaching.

To accomplish this I cut my calories down to 1500-1600 per day (after exercise). To be a little extra careful I had my plan reviewed by a RD who examined the way I normally eat and said that my nutritional habits could easily support being near the minimum nutrition line for men for the 3 months. So the technical stuff was out of the way.

Going into this I had 17 months of losing weight under my belt. I lost 200 pounds and I was pretty happy most of the time doing it. I banked calories each week and ate maintenance nearly every Sunday. It was great. I was confident I could handle this hurry-up mode of aggressive weight loss and I was close to right. I built a very solid foundation for myself to stand on during a harsher time.

But this isn't sustainable. Since cutting 200ish calories a day I have been:

1) Much less patient
2) Much less happy
3) Much more focused on scale results
4) Much less able to moderate things like potato chips
5) Much closer to cracking and going into an overfeed

Now I am adulting right now and so I have sucked it up and I have stayed disciplined but I could not have done this for over a year. One night I grabbed the PB jar and before I weighed it or anything I had eaten a fair number of calories. I stopped myself but I felt a very old urge from previous strict diets to go nuts on that jar. I have felt that way a few more times since then. I had to return to basics of getting rid of treat food I no longer trust myself around. All because of 200 calories... all because what I am doing now is not sustainable.

So I typed all of this up to hopefully help guide someone else. Going FAST is not my key to going LONG and weight loss is LONG. Some people can handle it. I think most people can't.

Oh and deadlines suck!

Would love to know your starting stats and current stats! what was funny, I had some hunger issues at first, then after eliminating my well "junk" food, I hate that word, but it just disappeared! Until I got lean that is. I think, well supported by some research, is one can rewrite what we crave. Closet thing I came to a binge at 10% bf was a bag of fresh peaches! Just could not stop myself. Didn't do much damage. Like 300 cals in the whole bag. Had that been a bag of chips, it could have been 1000 or more. Agreed that fast is not sustainable at all, but when its for health, sometimes necessary. Best wishes on you surgery!

One of these days I might actually post my stats. I still find it a little embarrassing.

I am more than 2/3s through. I am approximately the same weight I was in 1992 so I am now 27 years lighter. In 30 more pounds I will be back to 1990, and then 30 more after that I will be all the way back to 1986.

No shame in where we come from. I was 400+, going back to 200 and ???? There is no embarrassment, but knowing there is a problem and doing nothing about it. Its not about where we come from, but where we are going. People say this is a journey. Not IMHO. Its more like an adventure. A journey denotes a destination and an end. An adventure never stops!