IF, low carb, counting calories, fasting once or twice a week.

If you continue to believe there is a “code” to “break” you will yo-yo forever. Lifetime maintainers never stop counting calories, getting regular cardio, and weighing themselves frequently. And there is actually good long term data on this.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unlimited fruits and veggies
4-8 oz of meat

no dairy, no carbs, no processed food.

Forever? For maintenance? Or weight loss?

I'm 50 so ... for life... but I won't over holidays, and I will gain 10lbs.

BTW, I do eat potatoes and sweet potatoes.
I will eat sushi during maintenance but only once a week.

no bread ever!

I also do yoga 3 times a week, lift weights twice a week and do cardio 3 times a week.

What do you mean broken the code? For never gaining a lot of weight or for losing the weight after the significant weight gain?

Anonymous wrote:Unlimited fruits and veggies
4-8 oz of meat

no dairy, no carbs, no processed food.

Forever? For maintenance? Or weight loss?

Unlimited fruits and veggies
4-8 oz of meat

no dairy, no carbs, no processed food.

I’ve been doing Noom with some success and I have had to make peace with the fact that I will probably never be able to eat big portions again. I still eat pizza, but I have 1 slice with a small salad instead of 2 slices.

I am satisfied in that I am not physically hungry but sometimes I am mentally hungry if that makes sense. I have been insatiable in the past and it happens when I have lost weight. I think it’s my body trying to trick my mind into gaining weight back.
It is similar feeling to the insatiable need to eat when I was pregnant or nursing. Weaning from nursing was really hard for me because I wasn’t burning tons of calories any more, but it took 2-3 months for my appetite to ramp down. The same thing happened when I weaned off of my ADHD meds to get pregnant- I wanted to eat everything in sight.

For me it was all about not giving into cravings. I learned how to not act on the impulse, and preoccupy myself until that tidal wave of cravings passed, and it always - usually 10-15 mins. And it was so hard sometimes!

Also, go to bed on an empty stomach. Amazing how much better you sleep, and you wake up with so much energy. This naturally translates into a better mood and a stronger willpower the next day.

Count calories. You will be hungry at first. But then it gets pretty easy.

I've had the most success with 16:8 intermittent fasting. For some reason, I do better knowing that I can eat what I want, as long as I eat it in the eating window. I could probably lose another 5-10 pounds if I ate only healthy foods, but that just isn't realistic for me. I was able to loose 17 pounds initially with IF, when I was fasting and eating healthier. I can pretty easily maintain 13 pounds of that weight-loss with just IF and being more flexible with what I eat.

For reference, I am 42 and started IF after I turned 40 and nothing else was working for me anymore.

Honestly, I weigh myself every day. If I go up a pound, I super extra watch what I eat the next several days until it goes back down. I eat a ton of veggies and really limit carbs. Meal planning helps. Allowing a treat a couple times a week so I don’t feel deprived. I find it fairly easy to skip dinner and breakfast the next day if I have a really full lunch. I’ve maintained my weight loss for about and a half this way.

Stress can contribute to an insatiable appetite. Look into ways to reduce stress.
Put some thought into where the insatiable appetite is coming from. I am carb-sensitive. Eating a lot of carbs at once makes me hungrier, so I avoid that situation as much as possible.

If you look at studies of people who maintain weight loss over years and years you find that there is no one thing they do. There are sets of practices that people engage in, not one thing. But the thing that is consistent is that it is a never ending struggle, weight regain happens, and the people who are successful with maintaining loss have a sort of trip wire weight where if they gain a few pounds they go into weight loss mode again. I am one of those long-time weight loss maintainers (50 lbs 7 years ago, have maintained 40 of that) and I find that nothing - NOTHING - works forever. There are some methods that I don't like or don't work for me, but in general if I try hard enough anything can work - Noom, Weight Watchers, IF, low carb. You find that being dogmatic about this stuff is useless. What works this year won't work next, either because I have changed or just because I am too bored with it to stick to it anymore.

With the issue of insatiable appetite, I have come to terms with hunger. I stopped thinking of hunger as the enemy, or something to be appeased or prevented. Its just a feeling in my body, and just like I don't give too much thought to a headache or stiff back, I'm not going to give too much thought to hunger when it is inconvenient. My hunger got me to 50 lbs overweight - clearly my hunger is not a reliable partner in telling me how much food I need, so I've stopped letting it control me. Hot tea, cut up veggies, and pickles (all sorts) are my go-to when I know it isn't time to eat but I am ravenous.

- Limited carbs, focusing on healthy carbs
- Avoid processed food
- Avoid emotional eating. Listen to my body regarding hunger. Often I have not much for dinner. If I am hungry I have a more typical dinner.
- Consume some high volume low cal foods daily -- vegetables, non-caloric liquids
- A variety of exercise that I enjoy. For me it helps to do high intensity exercise. I

How did you do it? What changes did you make? What are your secrets? What style of eating do you subscribe to? How are your portions? Do they satisfy you? I’m so frustrated with yo-yo dieting. I seem to have an insatiable appetite. So frustrating.