At Goal & Successfully Maintaining. So Why Am I Doing This All Over Again?

springlering62 wrote: »

From 139 on Sunday to 135 on Wednesday, simply by going back to plan and doing and eating same stuff as usual- which included a carefully recorded CookOut burger and onion rings meal for dinner last night.

Spending last week at an average 3600+ per day didn’t kill me. I didn’t fall off the wagon, I didn’t wake up fat, my clothes still fit.

Our bodies are very accommodating and resilient. I sometimes think they’re just so darn happy to have any love and attention after so many years of dietary abuse, that it’s their way of rewarding us. 🤔

Life happens.

Sometimes, ya just gotta enjoy the whole bag of Beaver Nuggets and then get over and past it. 🤷🏻‍♀️

This gives me a great deal of hope, thank you.

Also- yay Buc-ee’s!!

I've never heard of Buc-ee's. It's been months since I've traveled south (from MN here). Are they like "Corn Nuts"?

ggeise14 wrote: »

I've never heard of Buc-ee's. It's been months since I've traveled south (from MN here). Are they like "Corn Nuts"?

I'm from the West Coast and have never heard of the store or snack either. Just googled Beaver Nuggets: "A delectable puffy yet crunchy corn nugget with a brown sugar caramel coating"

Maybe sort-of a Cracker Jack version of Corn Nuts? Or maybe like the cereal, Sugar Smacks?

@springlering62 help us out!

Have a wonderful trip!

@springlering62 @AnnPT77 and anyone else who has lost a significant amount of weight and maintained it:

What is the difference in your maintenance calories compared to what it was when you started? How much strength training do you do vs. cardio vs. nothing?

I am trying to gauge what my maintenance calories may be once I’m at goal. I’m 22 lbs down and have noted that it takes more time and/or effort to burn the same calories I did when I started. (Expected of course.) With how active I am, I’ve averaged around 2300 kcal daily for maintenance. (I did the math based on my rate of loss.) I’m guessing that will decrease over the last 20 lbs.

EliseTK1 wrote: »

@springlering62 @AnnPT77 and anyone else who has lost a significant amount of weight and maintained it:

What is the difference in your maintenance calories compared to what it was when you started? How much strength training do you do vs. cardio vs. nothing?

I am trying to gauge what my maintenance calories may be once I’m at goal. I’m 22 lbs down and have noted that it takes more time and/or effort to burn the same calories I did when I started. (Expected of course.) With how active I am, I’ve averaged around 2300 kcal daily for maintenance. (I did the math based on my rate of loss.) I’m guessing that will decrease over the last 20 lbs.

Curses: I started a reply, was almost done, lost the whole long thing! I'll try again.

I don't know what my maintenance calories were when I started losing: About the first half of weight loss, the first maybe 25-30 pounds, was rough-estimated calorie reductions. I didn't join MFP until after that, so I don't know what I was eating exactly enough to be useful. It was after logging in MFP that I found out (by losing too (bleep) fast) that MFP and a lot of other so-called calorie calculators materially underestimate my calorie needs (as does my good brand/model tracker), because apparently I'm some kind of non-average weirdo.

I doubt that your maintenance calories will be much lower than what you're seeing now, with only 20 pounds to go, for a variety of reasons. Some thoughts about that:

* TDEE calculator (Sailrabbit) estimates that my sedentary maintenance calories at my maintenance weight vs. 20 pounds above would only differ by around 100 calories. My actual maintenance wasn't much lower (if any) than what I'd estimated during the last month or two of loss (but I did intentionally slow loss down in the last stage, so the weight change over a couple of months was maybe less than 10 pounds?).

* Some people find that as they get lighter, they feel livelier and naturally move more (spontaneous movement, slightly higher exercise intensity), because moving is easier and more fun for a lighter person. They then burn a few more calories through movement.

* You don't say how long you've been active, or what exercise you do. It's common, as fitness increases, to gradually increase exercise intensity (keeping the same perceived exertion level), so burn a few more exercise calories kind of automagically that way.

* You mention exercise calories dropping as one gets lighter. Well, sort of. If one uses MFP to estimate exercise the research-based methods it uses do vary the estimate linearly with changes in body weight (at constant intensity/type of exercise). That's a reasonable methodology for some exercises, and less valid for others, depending on how much body weight per se influences the intensity of the particular exercise. So, the estimates may go down more than the actuals do. Or less. Or whatever. (These are not big numbers, probably, in any case . . . but it's a wild card.)

* Some people find that when they go to maintenance calories, they start gradually, slowly losing again after a few weeks/months, at that calorie level, because of adaptive thermogenesis.

I don't know whether it may help, but there's a thread in the Maintaining Weight part of the Community where people talk about methods of estimating maintenance calories.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10638211/how-to-find-your-maintenance-calorie-level/p1

I'm not sure how much it helps to comment on my exercise routine, since we're all so different.

I've continued to use the "MFP method" in maintenance, basically: I set a base calorie goal, carefully estimate and log exercise when I do it, and eat those calories, too. (I use different methods for estimating calories for different types of exercise.) At 5'5", trying to maintain around mid-120s pounds, age 66, sedentary outside of intentional exercise, I have my base calorie goal set at 1850. I think my actual maintenance base is more like 1950-2000, maybe a bit more, but I intentionally "calorie bank" a bit to indulge occasionally.

I nearly always have one weekly rest day, with little or no formal exercise.

In the warm seasons, I row (on water) for around an hour 4 days a week (weather permitting), which involves some incidental boat carrying and such. Often I take an hour or so bike ride (road/paved trail) another couple of days a week, so 10 miles or so. Last summer, I worked my way up to walking about 5 miles on 3 of the rowing days, around 3.2-4mph pace. That's the basic routine, with maybe some random other things thrown in occasionally.

Once it's too cold/snowy for the outdoor activities, I shift into mostly alternating stationary bike and rowing machine. Between US Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve, I do a challenge that requires about 45 minutes of those times 6 days a week, and don't feel like doing much else. After Christmas, I usually back the row/bike volume down to more like 30-35 minutes, and add some strength training (mostly dumbbell lifts, sometimes kettlebell) 3 times a week, usually gradually increasing from 20 minutes to maybe 40-45. That never lasts, because I dislike strength training quite a lot, and have zero self-discipline. This year, I think it lasted until March. Now I'm back at just the rowing/cycling. Sometimes I throw in core workouts (around 30 minutes, lots of stuff on the exercise ball), sometimes I do half an hour of yoga in the morning. I'm a flake, especially in Winter.

Most exercise days, I end up with a calorie goal between 2000 and 2500 calories, toward the lower end in Winter, upper in Summer.

I go through periods where I do less exercise, even none briefly, but I've been working out regularly and often for enough years (decades) that I quickly start feeling moody, stiff, depressive, tense, and other Bad Things when I don't work out. That gets me to start working out again before long. Now, I don't much worry if I slack off, because I'm pretty confident that'll kick in.

FWIW, rowing is one of the strength-y-er forms of cardio (in the lower body push, upper body pull directions), and it can be mildly progressive in strength demand, done properly. I'm not devoid of muscle, and most of it comes from rowing, which I've now been doing for over 20 years (started when obese), and I'm not terrible at it for my demographic, intensity-wise. It's not as simple as "cardio can't build muscle", y'know? It matters what the cardio is. Lifting is a more efficient route, for sure, though.

EliseTK1 wrote: »

@springlering62 @AnnPT77 and anyone else who has lost a significant amount of weight and maintained it:

What is the difference in your maintenance calories compared to what it was when you started? How much strength training do you do vs. cardio vs. nothing?

I am trying to gauge what my maintenance calories may be once I’m at goal. I’m 22 lbs down and have noted that it takes more time and/or effort to burn the same calories I did when I started. (Expected of course.) With how active I am, I’ve averaged around 2300 kcal daily for maintenance. (I did the math based on my rate of loss.) I’m guessing that will decrease over the last 20 lbs.

For the bolded: this observation is based on what? A smaller body burns less calories, yes. But if you're basing your observation on burns given by a HRM or fitness tracker with HRM, beware that this may not reflect your calorie burn accurately. As you get fitter, your heart rate will decrease for the same intensity exercise, which will lead fitness trackers to (incorrectly) give a lower calorie burn.
My Garmin gives me lower burns for running now, disproportionately lower compared to the weight I've lost (I'm losing veeeery slowly at the moment). I think it's one of the reasons the difference between my actual TDEE and the TDEE according to my Garmin is increasing.

Side note: I'm not technically in maintenance yet (I keep reassessing my goal weight) but like several posters above me, my TDEE now is probably higher than it was before (75lbs ago), because my activity level has increased a lot (a gradual thing). My strength training is minimal: I find it boring, I prefer running and walking.