Maintenance Club

Hi Kirsty & fellow maintainers. I think the last few kgs are, by far, the hardest to shake. I'm starting to wonder if I should totally change what I am eating & wonder if perhaps I need to eat more. How much fruit does anyone eat? Also by adding exercise 3 months ago (incl. doing weights ) how much extra weight would that account for do you think- 1=1.5kg max? I love seeing some muscle & feeling strong.
I can see a few kgs sitting on my hips & thighs still which will improve with walking I'm sure. I am still about 5kgs more than I would like to be but overall very happy with where I am. Cheers fellow maintainers, Cate
PS Well done Margaret on reaching your perfect goal weight. That is not at all easy & you have raised the bar!
 
Weighed in this morning and still 117! Woohoo!
Sundays are the day I'm most likely to slip up, so I'm really proud of myself for yesterday. I didn't binge at all :D
Motivation baby!!!
I hear you on the last little bit! I've been trying to loose the last 2 pounds for ageees but I kind of put it on hold as summer was just to hectic - loads of holidays, festivals etc.
I've found that walking has really helped me tone up and loose weight. And this is walking because I have to not because I've chosen to so if we all made the extra effort I'm sure it would do wonders :) Walking is probably my favorite exercise because it doesn't feel like exercise. I don't really no what advice to give about how much it would help so I'll leave that to the others. But good luck!
 
Kirsty,
Sounds like you are pumped up and motivated to get that last 2 pounds off. Way to go! I just know you will be posting 115 VERY soon...
Have a great day!
Di
 
Hi Fellow Maintainers...

I am sorry that I havent been around so much these last few days. If you check carefully through my postings here from the 24th you might be able to guess what I have been up to (I certainly hope that you do ALL guess!)... I know that Di has guessed... Unfortunately it is something that I cannot really talk about here...

LOL - I guess that I am just as mysterious as Kara was a couple of weeks ago.....

Cate - Hopefully the aches and pains from your walk have eased away by now. It is great to hear that the exercise is helping your mood patterns as well as helping to keep off those pounds that we worked so hard to lose. I swear by my walking for exactly that same reason. I know that my exercise is skewed because I would benefit physically from doing less walking and more other exercise instead. The thing is that the walking gives me an opportunity to think things through. Often - I have a problem at the start of a walk - and a solution at the end... Also - my moods have been so much more tranquil - and you really appreciate that after living life on an emotional knife edge. LOL - it is not like I have no muscles - I actually seem to have pretty decent leg muscles...

You ask about fruit... I currently eat next to no fruit - but was eating a lot of fruit until a few weeks ago when I decided to go for a new food plan. I think that it does our body no harm to mess things about every now and again. I certainly needed to - to get back into zone...

I do not know how comfortable you are in messing about your food plan. I know that you lost your weight on Cohens - and that healthy restrictive diet worked very well for you. If you are being tempted to mess things about - you may be wondering where to start doing it in a controlled way.

The way that most of us come up with our food plans is that we get a free account in
We set up our profile info (age, weight, gender, how active a lifestyle) and we log both our food and exercise.
You could do all this with your current food and activity to get the hang of how it worked if you like...
There are calorie balance reports which show how the exercise you do goes towards burning up the food that you eat.
After we have spent too long eating in the same pattern (maybe having the same thing for breakfast every day) our bodies get a bit too used to things - and we stop losing weight when doing the same things - even though the calorie balance suggests that we should lose weight.
Then we mess things about.
We try to hit a number of nutritional targets which tend to be derived from RDAs and medical research.
The nutritional targets tend to be:
fibre - 25g minimum
calcium - 1000mg minimum
protein - 1g for every 2 pounds of weight minimum (more if you do a lot of weight exercise)
sodium - 2400mg maximum
water - 1 oz for every 2 pounds of weight

I also try to have some healthy fats despite being low fat because of my gallstones (which I know that you have too) - I get this by using olive spread if baking fish or needing a butter substitute for anything else and by having a decent amount of fish - especially salmon... I also take omega 3 oil capsules and some other oil capsules every day.

Obviously multivitamins can contribute towards these numbers and some people take powders to improve their protein or fibre numbers. I dont.

We try to do such things as 5-a-day and varying the colours of fruit and veg...

I want to emphasise that this posting is not in any way trying to convert you away from Cohens - just to give you a framework if you were planning on messing things around within Cohens... I know how much I hate messing things around. We fear getting it wrong and seeing a gain.

I am no good at judging about the weight of muscle that we add through exercise. I think that we know when we do not have any surplus fat on us - and we should go by that in lots of ways over a number that happens to come up on the scales.

Thanks for the congratulations on getting back to my goal weight... LOL - it did not last long. I went away at the weekend - but am only up to 9st0.8 - so that is less than a pound up from my perfect goal weight. Not bad for after a weekend away though so I cannot complain. I did try to be good whenever possible...

By the way - while I remember. You asked a couple of weeks ago what make of pedometer I use... I didnt like to reply there in case anyone thought that I was trying to be inappropriate. The best pedometers that I have had have come from Weight Watchers. I got them before I actually joined WW because a friend who was a member recommended them to me. I since joined as part of my maintenance strategy. I actually stuck to my own food plan after joining - but wanted to know what advice they gave for maintenance. I also liked the notion of free membership if you maintain goal weight. It means that I get to pop along to their meeting every week and chat to other people who are interested in controlling their weight and it costs me nothing. I also get all sorts of free handouts with recipes and hear of new weight loss ideas and products on the market. In addition I get weighed by an independant organisation - which keeps me accountable and provides evidence of weight patterns for my applications for surgery. All in all - my joining both WW and their main competitor in the UK - Slimming World has been both a brainwave and a bargain.

Di - It is brilliant that your son works so hard and is such a credit to you. No wonder you are brimming over with pride. I am sure that your labrador will adore the "more active" you. He will have seen some major changes on the walking front over the past 11 years - especially this past year LOL.

One of my friends is a devotee of labradors. She had two black labs that sadly both died over the last couple of years - they were both very elderly - yours is a youngster in comparison. Anyway - she recently got a black lab puppy who is very sweet.

Kirsty - It is great that you have made it down to your maintenance zone and have come to join us. Unfortunately maintenance is an area where this forum lacks information - so we found that people tended "go it alone" either by still coming to the forum or they simply drifted away. That is why I started the maintenance club - so that we could at least all make friends and try to compare our personal maintenance strategies.
 
Hi Omega & fellow maintainers. Thanks for replying to my questions Omega. I will see if I can get a WW pedometer. I have checked out Fitday before but might have another go. I'm open to anything regarding good nutrition but thank you for showing me such respect re the choice that I made to get me to this stage. I do think that my body has got used to what I eat & I do have to shake it up. I, too use olive oil & eat quite a bit of fish & also take Omega 3 every day. I think I may be eating too much fruit & will cut it down to the 2 per day that I was recommended for maintenance & see what happens. I have been thinking it may be holding me back a little. I will also up my protein a little more I think.
I just checked out your photos from your link. It's about time we both took more photos of ourselves Omega! It's hard to overcome that camera allergy but I do think it's time. Now that I have said that to you I'll have to start working on myself.
Cheers all, Cate.
 
I have a pedometer that I bought at Brookstone. I really like it. It shows steps taken, miles walked, calories burned, and something else I can't remember right now. It also keeps a cumulative total, so you can check and see how far you've gone over a long period of time. It comes with a lanyard, so you can just wear it around your neck, or you can unattach it, and stick it in your pocket. So easy and convienent. I wear it to school in my pocket many days, just to see how far I go during a typical day at school. Today it was almost 7000 steps by the time I got home. Not too bad!

And, good thing. I felt too bad to work out. My knee pain is flaring up again, plus I started coughing quite a bit today, and just don't feel very well. If you are a praying person, please pray that my health will soon be restored. This has been going on too long...3 and a half weeks now...and seems to be getting worse now. Of course, I am exposed to very germ there is at school with all those kids!
 
Omega said:
This is a club for people in maintenance that have to get out of the mindset of striving for weight loss and look in a similar way to the task of staying in zone.

Somewhere where others will cheer you on for staying the same weight week on week - and where people can understand the concerns that you may have about drifting back up or indeed continuing to drift downwards...
Click to expand...

Thank you Omega for inviting me to your maintenance club. It may be a better fit than where I have been posting. I was not getting much support there, but just logging the days events was helping me stay on track.

Speaking of days events today was a total loss. An emergency this morning got in the way of my morning weigh in and I found no time to exercise. However, I did eat properly and should not get in much trouble over it.
 
Welcome, vjyoung!
Are you currently maintaining a weight loss? How much did you lose and how long have you been maintaining? Tell us more about yourself!

I lost a little over 40 pounds, starting this past Feb. I am now in the process of maintaining that loss. It is a daily struggle, and it is very scary. I struggle most with the mental aspect...I fear that 40+ pounds is going to jump right back on me! Irrational, I know...but yet it is one of my biggest fears. Don't know if it will ever go away...

ANyway...glad to have you on board here with us maintainers...we're a tough bunch!

Di
 
Hi Fellow Maintainers

I continue to be fairly busy elsewhere and consequently not spending so much time here. My first set of papers from the National Weight Control Registry arrived in the post today. I suspect that they have been delayed by the postal workers strike that has been severely hitting our mail recently. I am really pleased that they have turned up and excited that I will be able to play a small part in such a worthy project. I would encourage you all to participate if you have lost over 30 pounds and maintained that loss for a year. That does not mean having been at goal for a year. It is quite a long time since I got 30 pounds down from my start weight - but I have not been at goal nearly so long...

If you live in North America - you dont even have to pay postage when sending back the questionaires. I am planning on loading up the papers on another diet forum so that people can see what they are letting themselves in for if they sign up...

Cate - We will have to both take some more photos now that we are sitting at goal. Where do you have your photos? Can you put a link here in the maintenance club to the page so that we can all have a look.

It would actually be great if all the maintainers could link in their before / after photos (we probably all have some secreted away around the forum somewhere) so that we can all celebrate our success and how far we have come. We are the forum's success story - even if they cater much more for the people still reducing than they cater for our needs. We are unusual in that we are still here. So many friends have reached goal and we have never heard from them again - so have no idea whether they are still at goal or have drifted.

Di - I am so sorry to see that your germs are attacking you yet again. I hope that you are winning in the battle against them.

Your pedometer sounds really good. I like the notion that it works in your pocket or on a lanyard. In fairness - I was a much bigger person when I tried other makes of pedometer - and I dont know whether that would make a difference... I am used to what I have and cannot see me changing without good reason. I currently wear jeans all the time and they clip nicely to the waistband...

You are not the only one that has an irrational fear of suddenly finding yourself back at your start weight if things once start slipping. I suspect that we all do. I certainly do. When you consider that this has happened to us in earlier weight loss attempts and happens in a very high proportion of cases - maybe it is not so irrational. Maybe it is just the word suddenly that is the only irrational part of the concept.


VJ - Welcome to our club. I am so pleased that you decided to join us. Am I right in remembering that you lost your weight with Weight Watchers some years ago? I am pleased to hear that you have been staying on track... That is vitally important for us all...

Well done for eating properly. Sometimes life gets in the way of us managing every aspect of our plan. I tend to do my exercise ok - but have an occasional mis-hap with my food... Sodium is my biggest enemy. Often my first indication that I have eaten something that I shouldnt is when I see a 2 pound jump on the scales in my daily weigh-in...
 
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dilynnlew said:
Welcome, vjyoung!
Are you currently maintaining a weight loss? How much did you lose and how long have you been maintaining? Tell us more about yourself! Di
Click to expand...

Hi Di, My ticker indicates how much I have lost, about 40 pounds. I have kept it off 8 or 9 years. In the last few months my weight had started to increase a few pounds so I decided to join this organization to get a little more support and keep my mind on maintaining my goal. As indicated, it has worked and I am close to once again reaching my personal goal of 188 pounds when I get out of bed in the morning before I get dressed. I have maintained my fully dressed goal of 196 pounds when weighing in at Weight Watchers.
 
Hi fellow maintainers. Yes, we are still here & that is really important. My before was in Vietnam in 2005 & my after was Aug 2007. I'm still proud of the change more than 2 years further down the track. I really must stop avoiding the camera though. Old habits die hard! I'm not skinny & don't want to be. What I am is healthy, fit & very happy with where I am at this stage of my life. Cheers, Cate
 
Cate - that is a fantastic difference. No wonder that you are still proud. Anyone would be... Each of us has accomplished so much that we deserve to be proud for the rest of our lives. Our pride helps us to remember how it was and how we do not ever want to be like that again. No wonder that you are an inspiration and natural leader to all the other Cohen's folk. You know that program inside out and spend a lot of time helping them understand their path to good health. I swear you would have a similar influence on the rest of the forum if only they knew you better. You spend so much of your time in your "home" section...

I am really looking forward to seeing all the other maintainers photos. We all have achieved so much.
 
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Wow, Cate! Fabulous...you look so amazing! And healthy and fit.

Omega...I may post my pics sometime...my main problem will be finding a before picture. I hated having my picture taken, so I have very few of them. I will keep looking...

Di
 
dilynnlew said:
Omega...I may post my pics sometime...my main problem will be finding a before picture. I hated having my picture taken, so I have very few of them. I will keep looking...

Di
Click to expand...

I suspect that none of us were too fond of having our photos taken at our biggest...

When you do find one - I know for a fact that there is a section on another diet forum that we both frequent that is waiting for your pictures..........
 
cate said:
What I am is healthy, fit & very happy with where I am at this stage of my life. Cheers, Cate
Click to expand...

Goog for you Cate!

I am very impressed with the weight loss that people on this forum have obtained. My loss is not so impressive but I am still pleased that I have accomplished it and maintaining it. The photos I have are not of good quality, but here they are.
 
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VJ

Your weight loss is great and most definitely very noticeable. In my book any weight loss is impressive - and especially any weight loss that gets you to goal. The fact that you have maintained your goal weight for some time (and only drifted up slightly and successfully taken action to rectify that) impresses me a lot.

Please dont be phased by numbers. My numbers are only so big because I was very big. Most people manage to put a halt to things before getting anywhere near that situation. They are the impressive people.

I am probably more scared by the concept of maintenance than anyone here.

I think that most people in the thread have already seen my pictures (or at least the most recent ones that I have). You probably havent - so I will put the link to another diet forum where I hang out and have a before/after thread.



As Cate and I agreed - we will have to start having our photos taken as it is about time I had a photo taken at goal - and not a little up from there...
 
Vj...I agree with Omega...any loss is an impressive loss. Especially maintaining that loss for a long period of time! I think you have done an amazing job of losing and keeping the weight off!!

Di
 
Cate - you look amazing! :) Congrats on getting to your goal and staying there. I can't wait to join all of you as an official goal-maintainer.

Edited to add, here are my progress photos and my workout photos that I'm just starting to post:
 
I found a couple...not the best of me, but should get the general idea... The first one is at my daughter's college graduation a year and a half ago...prob. at around 153-157 range. The second one is at my son's cross country recognition last month...but I am all bundled up...weight around 115.
 
Kara - I love the two photos that you have just put up since I last looked at your pictures. You really are shaping up well with your exercise routine...

Di - Brilliant photos which really do show your achievement well. You really will have to post a before / after thread as I know that they would inspire many people.
 
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