How long have you kept the weight off?

[nancyahayden]

This is very encouraging for me. I expect to be banded in mid Jan and one of the scariest things for me is fear I will gain all my weight back after I loose it. I guess I am thinking positive in one sense, since I seem to be expecting to loose. However, ALWAYS in the past I gain it all back and some people seem to think I will with the band as well. We are poor farmers and I am doing this on self pay and just cannot stand the thoughts of wasting my hubby's hard earned money or another disappointment with gaining lost weight back. A huge CONGRATULATIONS

[nancyahayden]

to each and everyone of you that have done so very well!
God Bless,
Nancy

[Jachut]

I'd have to agree with the slow is better theory.

What I've found with myself was this:

The first year is the really heady, amazing part of the journey. You are full of enthusiasm and commitment. You're ON A DIET, your last one ever. You follow your instructions. You make tons of posts telling everyone how great this band is. You comply with your program willlingly and with great enthusiasm. The weight pours off week after week. Many people get to goal, losing 100lb or more in this time.

The second year, the old habits creep back in until you stabilise at a more happy medium between your old obese eating habits and your ridiculous, impossible to maintain evangelical fervour. You start to be realistic when you are eating out and at other people's homes, you eat what's put in front of you, you get tired of spending your life journalling and counting, and if you dont naturally love exercise, life creeps back in and you do less of that.

For some, this equals plateau out at the 60 to 70% excess weight lost, for others it means maintaining at a healthy weight and for others still, it means pounds sneaking back on. You get your wake up call and need to recommit but at a more do-able, life friendly level.

I escaped this to a degree because as my eating habits normalised, my love for running grew, I was getting to super levels of fitness and easily burning 800 calories in a session and recovering easily to do it again the next day. That bought me a LOT of leeway, and the time to learn to re-enter life, to view it as a normal weight person and to eat like a normal person. That first year, its just NOT the long term lifestyle that you will maintain forever for most people, its too extreme, fuelled by excitement and weight loss that simply doesnt last forever. If you get to goal in this time, I think you're at a high risk of regain (not that this cant be rectified of course!). If you're a slower loser, you do tend to weather this a bit better with less backsliding.

of course Im generalising and this doesnt apply to everyone. There's always people who lose fast and keep it off. But I've found it to be a fairly common pattern, common enough that I've noticed it time and time again.

for myself, I eat NOTHING like I did that first year. I'm way less perfect. I eat like a normal person now - I eat carbs, I eat junk food occasionally, I drink wine nearly every day. I'm not eating that perfect, I'm gonna live till 110 years old diet. My bloods and stats are all within normal limits, usually well and truly on the good side of normal (iron's a bit low). That's good enough for me - I consider myself "in remission" from obesity becuase I eat what I want, what I want is reasonable and I dont think about my next meal all the time AND I maintain a steady, normal weight. If I were maintaining through journalling, counting, avoiding certain foods and having to force myself to exercise, constantly fighting cravings because I denied myself everything, them I would consider myself still "sick". I think slow weight loss (over 2 years to lose 100lb) gave me time to develop those skills.

[brwneyedbeauty]

greatly said Jachut!

[ilostit]

I had my surgery January 13th , 2005. I have reached my goal weight on November 2006 and have kept it off since. I am having a lttle more of a hard time since I moved from Massachusettes to florida and do not have the support here like I had in Mass. I hope to be able to start a support group here in Ft. Myers. Let me know if anyone would be interested
Thanks

[MoOrLess]

Jachut - I love what you said about "remission from obesity" - I'm going to quote you in my siggy if you don't mind - great motivation!

I love your realistic outlook - you were completely honest and on point with everything you just said.