Does tracking calories etc ever end?

I think it may be different for certain people. Some may need to always (or will make them feel better) tracking everything they eat and their exercise. Others could have changed their life style to the point that when all the weight is gone, tracking is not needed, they have an idea, but it will be here if needed. I personally dont want to be "tied down" to counting calories for the rest of my life, so that is why I am changing my lifestyle and I have been able to do pretty good at guessing my calories. I went off track for about a week or so, no weight loss (:grumble: ) but no weight gain either (:bigsmile: ).

A a yo yo dieter, this was awesome for me because if I was on a "diet" I would have gained something the week I slacked. Do what works for you I say.

Nope....unless you want it to and just stop haha

Once I've achieved my intended goals, I plan to swap MFP to maintenance and track that for a while. Once I'm happy that it's working, I plan to stop using MFP for a while and just weigh and measure every other month or so. Any problems and I'm going straight back to tracking everything again :ohwell:

I think the only way to know the answer to that is to, after hitting your goal, *experiment very cautiously*. I lost 80 pounds over a period of a year at a good clip of 2 pounds per week. As I neared a goal (Ok, one of my series of goals) I began to "ease off". I experimented with not tracking my calories thinking I had learned enough to get away with that.

However, I found it WAY too easy to cheat myself when not tracking calories. Bit by bit, I would increase the quantity and richness of food I was eating. The one thing I insisted on all along, and that I believe I will be doing for the rest of my life is to weigh my self *every morning* (not recommended for most people). This daily weighing gave me very quick feedback as to how I was doing (though there can be big natural variations you have to get used to). I set a 10 pound range that I would allow my weight to fluxuate within. If it hit the top of that 10 pounds, I would force myself to be more disciplined at eating less, and see the weight go down through that range, though in a more psychologically painful way than when I was tracking the calories.

Now, after a couple months of not tracking calories, I've decided I need to go back to it. Otherwise I drift to the upper limit of that range and yet always feel "cheated" that I'm not able to eat more.

The year of steady loss proved how important tracking calories is for me. It seems to be essential that I see where I am during the course of the day and feel the difficulty of what I am doing has a short term purpose (not overeating today!). I am guessing I may need to track calories on a daily basis for the rest of my life. Not a great prospect, but certainly better than slowly putting the weight back on. At least using a tool like MFP on a cell phone makes it easier than it's ever been.

What I do is track my calories/exercise until I reach my goal weight then cut myself a break. If/when the scale creeps up by 2-3 pounds, I start tracking again until I'm back at goal. It's nice to have the break and also see how if what I'm doing on my own (without tracking) is working or not.)

Has anyone lost a ton of weight only to fall back on bad habits? What are your tips?

Raising hand!

I have NO plans to stop recording my caloric/carb/exercise once I get to goal. Its a major part of what is keeping me on track. Not to mention the support from the terrific friends I have made here in such a short time.

Here's my plan:

1. I have about 12 pounds to go until I hit my goal. I intend to overshoot my goal by a few pounds. During that time, I'm tracking beforehand some times and tracking less closely and after-the-fact others so I can slowly gain confidence in my ability to "guess" at decent calorie levels.

2. Once I reach goal, I will switch to maintenance and track fairly closely for a week or two and make sure my weight is fairly steady-state.

3. After that, I will start tracking after-the-fact and intermittently on random days just to make sure I'm in the ballpark.

4. Once I'm pretty confident with that, I'm going to use the lessons I've learned about food, and put a mark on my scale 5 pounds over my goal that says "GO TO MFP". If I hit that mark for more than a couple of days, I'm going to come back and start tracking again, because I've obviously messed something up.

I think of tracking my calories like tracking my money. I keep a register to monitor money in and money out, and I do the same for my food and exercise calories.

I will be tracking forever. Mainly because I am not letting all my hard work go to waste by putting it back on. Tracking to me is a small price to pay in my mind.
:flowerforyou:

i fell back on bad habits.
i would say to keep tracking.