Failure Rant.

Lose weight for good does not exist. There is no finish line. I’ve been maintaining for years but if I go back to my old ways, eventually I’ll go back to my old weight. It’s a fact, no one can weigh 150 lbs living a 200 lb life.

Do you count calories? Keep a food journal? I lost about the last 35 lbs of 100 on Weight Watchers. WW is really just calorie counting dressed up for copyright protection so they can sell it. But WW has a revolving door. People constantly hitting their goal, leaving, regaining and coming back. I vowed not to do that.

So I made goal and what WW calls Lifetime. So then I was in WW for free. So I never quit. Didn’t quit tracking, didn’t quit the meetings. After 5 years I quit tracking. I was running on habit by then. I eventually quit the meeting when we moved away.

But this. Then I moved to MFP. I weigh myself regularly. If I find myself gaining more than 2-3 lbs I go back to logging calories. It works. Part of the reason I stay on these boards is to remind myself that maintaining a healthy weight requires effort for me. I’m not going back to the old me.

If you don’t have a lot to lose you can probably diet your way to your goal weight. But if the changes aren’t long term, the weight comes right back. Just how it is.

Maybe this- my approach has been different than a lot of people. One thing I like about calorie counting is it tells me what indulgences I can have without wrecking my plan. I get comfort food and treats. But I control when and how much to make it fit in my plan. It can be done. Make a plan to start losing again and this time pay attention to how you are living. Keep asking yourself if the changes you are making to lose weight are something you can live with long term. If you wait for the world to get fixed you will wait a long long time.

I can relate to what you’re saying. I only have my own experience to share but maybe it will help. I felt really overwhelmed at the beginning of the pandemic (like many) and said to my partner that I felt a sense of rising panic and anxiety. He simply said ‘narrow your focus. Concentrate only on the things you can do something about’. It helped me immensely at the time and over the past few months I’ve applied it to my health. I’m getting older, I’m peri menopausal, and I have various symptoms associated with that (none of them severe but enough for me to notice). So I’m narrowing my focus and concentrating on what I can control - the food I put into my body and how much activity I get. I’m focussing on a few steps which enable me to manage my calories - logging everything (not lying to myself), weighing myself (not hiding from my weight) and writing in a journal every day (helps me unpick my actions, plan, talk myself into a positive place). I’m not setting a weight target or a deadline. Just looking for losses as the weeks go by with a general goal of getting into a healthy range. I can’t control/predict exactly when that will be so I’m not thinking about timeframes (it demotivates me). I’m keeping my focus narrow (a few steps each day and week) and not getting overwhelmed by the bigger picture.