Dealing with maintenance (long term vets jump in please)

I agree.  I was never given a goal weight.  My doctor said "do your part and your body will stop when it is done".  And it did.  And I've never had "bounce back".  I've stayed within a 5 lb range of my lowest weight.  And I still fit in the smallest clothes I bought.

I never "stopped" eating one way and "began maintenance".  I really just increased my intake as my body needed it.  And when I exceed my 5lb limit, the waist band of my jeans makes it VERY CLEAR that I better tighten up or I'll be cut in half by said jeans!

That is how my doctor's office "rolls".  I think many practices are rigid in their "steps" of WLS.  There is a defined goal weight based on the antiquated and outdated BMI charts.  Then there is this thought that the way you eat/live/behave changes once you are done losing weight.  Well.............if all those changes were made during the loss process, then aren't you already there when you are done losing weight????

Happy New Year!!

 

I, too, was never given a goal weight, never was given calorie or carb limits, but was given specific protein goals and a lot of information on eating a healthy diet.  At 5.5 years out, I have not changed the way I eat from what I was eating when I hit my goal weight and stopped losing other than to allow myself the under-100 calorie snack each day. I, too, have a self-imposed 5-lb weight threshold, and when I hit that, I eliminate all non dairy, non-veggie carbs (and all snacks****il that 5 pounds comes back off.  I hve had to do that 3 times in the 3+ years since I quit losing.

I did have a 5 pound "bounce", but that was after I hit my lowest weight ever after being in the hospital for a week with pancreatitis and gallbladder removal (nothing by mouth for 5 days), so I think that low weight -- and the bounce afterward -- was artificial.  My weight has not changed more than 7 pounds in the 3.5 years since I stopped losing.

Lora

Semantics. Whether we label 'phases' or just do what we are doing without the words attached to them it is pretty much the same process. Regular school vs Monttessori. It is all learning........

Thanks for you input! We all have good information to add.

Martha

That is how it always happened to me in the past, before WLS.  I have lost large amounts of weight many times and managed to keep it off for a period of time, maybe a year at most but eat time I remember just changing how I ate and transitioning into maintenance without any further change.  I pretty much was eating the amount of food that was needed to maintain a normal weight so I lost weight pretty slowly until the amount of calories in matched the amount of calories burned with no real effort on my part.  That even happened with my first WLS where I just stopped losing weight without making any major changes but in that case I bounced almost immediately back up so I never stayed at any weight for any length of time.

I kind of expected the same thing this time, too.  I was gradually eating more as I got further out and I just expected my weight to automatically stop when I got to where I was supposed to be.  It didn't happen that way so I started adding more food and eating more often but my weight still trended downwards.  I dipped to a scary low number.  Finally I was able to stop losing and even put on a few pounds.  I am probably up about 7 or 8 lbs from my lowest but I still wouldn't mind a few more pounds but I am pretty much at the limit of the amount of food I can consume and the frequency that I can eat.  

I still do believe I will most likely bounce up a bit more over time but I refuse to eat badly in order to gain weight.  I have seen too many people feel that they have lost too much so they decide to eat refined carbs in order to gain and it came back to bite them in the ass.  It is a lot easy to start eating junk then it is to stop so I don't want to go down that road. 

I am only two weeks post-op but I appreciate all the posts that were made on here.  Thanks to everyone who posted...at least I have a sense of what to expect when I'm in the maintenance phase.  Special thanks to Martha for starting this discussion. 

I do hope it helps you to gather information that will be in the back of your mind....ya, I remember reading about that.

Martha

Yeah... maintenance.  That's when it really hits people that this really is NOT a quick fix, that it is a lifelong process.

Because I am one of those who is willing to say that the surgery did the majority of the work of getting 75% of my weight off (but boy did I have to work for that last 25%!), and because I have watched people who had surgery both before and after me regain weight, I am far more proud of maintaining my weight at 5 years out than I am of having lost the 190 pounds in the first place.  I realize that might sound strange to those who are still in the losing phase, but I know that other vets will understand (even if they personally feel differently).

I, too, felt a bit of a sense of "what now?" once I was at goal and the joy, encouragement, and reward of seeing the scale go down and getting the compliments was gone.  It can definitely be an adjustment when you have to continue doing ALL of the same things just to stay where you are!  The only reward is intrinsic.  Because of that, the adjustment can be even more difficult for people whose primary focus all along was how fast and how much they were losing, and for whom the numbers changing was the primary (or only) reward.  That is one of the reasons I so strongly encourage people to focus on embracing the new lifestyle and not to focus so much on the numbers.

I always tell clients, both those I have seen for counseling and those I have done psych evals for, that "The surgery will help GET the weight off, but you have to KEEP it off!".

I agree that coming here is one of the things that has enabled me to be so successful.  It was either Laura or Kim who mentioned knowing that there were people secretly (or perhaps not so secretly) waiting in the wings to see if she would regain, and I think we probably have some of those people at least on the periphery of our lives... and part of the reason is that many people do regain.  I do not want to give those people the satisfaction of having something to talk about, and -- more importantly -- I do not want to fail on my commitment to myself that my days of out of control eating, being overweight, and not caring for my body are over.  The only thing that I can point to that is common among all of the people that I know IRL who have experienced regain is that they stopped going to a support group and coming here.  (Not everyone who stopped those things has regained, but more have than not.)  They commonly say that they want to just have a "normal" life.  I get that.  I adopted the "all things in moderation" approach for that very reason.  The fact remains, however, that were are not "normal" people.  We are people who allowed ourselves to become MO (or SMO) and will always have to be vigilant about our food, our physical activity, and our weight.  When people go back to a "normal" life that often translates into eating they way they used to.  Being here -- as frustrating as it can be some days to see the same three questions over and over again for six years (you ALL know the ones I mean) -- helps keep me mindful and accountable.

Lora

 

I too am far more proud of keeping the weight off than losing the weight. THAT was the easy part!

Your part about those that want to go live a "normal" life immediately brought to the tip of my tongue that I feel that my life IS normal. By anyone continuing to come here does not mean that we are not normal. I know that is not the way YOU meant it, but others (the ones that say it) are using that as a cop out IMO.

I agree. I don't see how coming here is any different than someone going out to Facebook, and Facebook won't keep you at a healthy weight!  I think it is code for "I am tired of thinking about it all. I want to eat the way I want to eat... just leave me alone about it."

Lora

I'm sure some people DO think we're weird because we're still here but I would like to share the following.   I have many friends IRL and on FB that I met here who don't come here any more - all of them have regained - not all their weight but enough to notice.   All the friends that I have still here,  are the ones that are maintaining at 4, 5, and 8 years out!!!

I agree with Lora, MY proudest achievements are maintaining at 8.5 years out AND still hanging out here ...