Maintenance Motivation

At 5'5" tall, how did you come up with a goal weight of 120? Have you had a dexascan to measure your bodyfat? Sometimes our bodies seem to know when we have gone too low and it fights us.

Are you worried the creep will keep going up? Are you worried it sounds like an "excuse"? I do think some people (like Mama June) claim regain was necessary even though they are just being too lazy to follow the rules but I do not think this applies to you.

Don't be too hard on yourself!!

I went through this also and had it in my mind I wanted to weigh 115 at 5-6. with extra skin on top of that. it was waaay under. I intentionally went way under because everyone told me there would be 'bounce back' once you stop losing and the body redistributes and fights.

5'5" and 120 is a BMI of 20. At 130 your BMI is 21.6. Both are quite low in the normal range.

I am 5'3" and have liked to be 115-118, but my body has seemed to want about 1-1.5 pounds more over the last 6 months (eating the same calories as the prior 6 months). I know it is hard to readjust our heads, but maybe our bodies are actually finding the correct setpoint?

Just a suggestion as I haven't wrapped my head around that yet either.

Less back and knees/feet pain

Avoiding dumping and RH

Going to the doc in a middle of the day and not worry about the scale

Overeating or eating wrong foods cause pain...I hate hurting

Closet full of cute clothes

Karma - being fit and looking great and meeting "The person" who used to call me fat, or a cow and seeing her getting pissed off since she gained weight and I look fabulous.

I take several approaches to keep myself focused or motivated.

1) Therapy. I started going to therapy as I transitioned to maintenance (about 1.5 years ago). I spend little time in therapy dealing with food/eating, but when issues arise, I always have an appointment on the calendar that I can use to discuss them.

2) Food. I have re-discovered my love of cooking (my wife has stayed home for 13 years, so I abandoned cooking long ago). By focusing on this "new found" (not so new anymore I guess) love of cooking, I am able to stock my house with incredibly delicious, low-calorie dense foods that I absolutely love. This keeps me from "cheating". I quoted that, as I really never cheat. As I don't consider myself "on a diet", so there is nothing to "cheat" on. I am really only interested in wholesome and nutritious foods, so even if I over eat from time to time, I am overeating on low caloric foods with high nutrient content so it has little impact on my overall weight. I mean, sitting down and eating 25 sweet cherries even if I'm really not technically hungry has a pretty minimal effect on my overall weight.

3) Education. I have spent the last 2.5 years reading and researching everything about the nutritional approach I've adopted. Dozens of books, 100s of research papers and literally thousands of articles, blogs, videos and podcasts. Not only do I thoroughly enjoy it, but it keeps me focused every single day as I am always reading/listening to something that is relevant to the choices I make every time I open my mouth.

I'm well aware that my choice of diet/lifestyle is outside the mainstream of the bariatric community, but if you are ever interested in resources about a Whole Foods, Plant Based diet, let me know as I would be happy to share some of the books, websites and podcasts I find most helpful/entertaining/enjoyable/educational.

I also try to eat only unprocessed foods and lots of vegetables and would love to hear about your favorite books and resources.

Probably the top of my list are:

Books:
"The China Study" by T Colin Campbell
"How Not to Die" by Dr. Michael Greger (also runs nutritionfacts.org, which is an data backed excellent site)
"The Cheese Trap" by Dr. Neal Barnard
"Sugar Salt Fat" by Michael Moss
"Fast Food Genocide" by Dr. Joel Fuhrman
"Proteinaholic" by Dr. Garth Davis
"Omnivore's Dillema" by Michael Pollan (this is not a nutrition book per se, but was a really fascinating look at the various food chains - from factory farming, to factory organic farming, to local farms to hunting/gathering. I also think Michael Pollan is an excellent writer IMHO)

Podcasts:
The Rich Roll Podcast
Plant Yourself Podcast - Howard Jacobson
Dr. Laurie Marbas Podcast

Websites/Blogs:
http://nutritionfacts.org - Dr. Greger's website
https://nutritionstudies.org/articles/ - Articles about nutrition from T Colin Campbell's website
https://www.foodpolitics.com/ - Food Politics by Marion Nestle
https://www.healthscience.org/health-science-magazine/health-science-interviews - I have just recently discovered the NHA organization. This link has interviews with a lot of the "who's who" of the WFPB community - Chef AJ, Dr Neal Barnard, Dr Joel Kahn, Dr. John McDougall, T Colin Campbell, Dr Goldhamer, Dr. Fuhrman, and many many more. They also have a quarterly newsletter if you join the organization for $35/yr, whi*****ludes access to all back issues as well.

These resources could probably keep you occupied for many years ;-) Dr. Greger's website alone has like 3,000+ videos on nutrition (each about 4-6 min in length, all of them based on peer reviewed studies, which are cited and the primary source of information in the videos)

When breaking the rules makes one feel like death warmed over, it gets easier to avoid the offending foods.

My lifestyle change began a long time ago, more than 2 decades. I have had some ups and downs with compliance, eating a thing not tolerated well...and My body let me know... dumping, blood sugar yo-yo. weakness..cravings. Avoiding being sick all the time is a good motivational factor for me. .. for you it can be to get into the size pants you want and not to feel like a stuffed sausage...ie to be able to bend over in them in comfort.

You alone can know where your correct number needs to be, but at 125-135 there is a lot of difference in the way clothing fits... I did not understand that at 220-250...and setting a goal really depends on how we feel about our appearance and they way our clothing fits. I would urge you to continue to get to where you think you want to be... then chill and see if you can maintain it by doing what others have done, ...ie increase protein and decrease carbs.