To ask those of you who've lost weight and kept it off...

[Notplannedforthis]

do you feel constantly deprived/hungry?

I've found whenever I've had periods of weightloss, in order to maintain that loss I end up thinking about food all the time and never fully satisfied. Are those my choices? Be fat, but feel satisfied or be slimmer and healthier, but never fully satisfied?

I also find if I try to eat certain foods 'in moderation' as people recommend, I just don't stop or I feel like I'm depriving myself if I do stop. To feel 'full' I have to have eaten enough to feel sick/uncomfortable.

Please tell me it's possible to lose weight, maintain the loss and not feel constantly hungry. If so, how?

Please be gentle, I'm feeling quite delicate about the whole situation at the moment.

Bariatric surgery. NHS . Never feel hungry. 5'8 and 10st 11... maintained for 4 years.. eat what I like .. just small amount.

Tried every died going until 2016.. so happy to be off the diet Merry go round ...

Fast 800 recipe book is great. Simple advice that really helps at the start of the book about full fat yoghurt, olive oil, protein, lots of greens and avoiding white starchy foods and sugar. I did 800 calories a day for three months, lost a stone and a half and no pangs of hunger and had a lot more energy. Now doing intermittent fasting and losing weight more slowly.

Do you find you're hungry during the fasting time or that you binge in the eating time?

Well, you can binge in the eating time as you're fitting in a whole day's calories into a few hours.

What I found was that I was less hungry only having a coffee and banana than a hearty breakfast. Felt less sluggish and didn't have a big crash like when I'd eaten loads of toast or cereal. Quite often I'd fill up really quickly in the evening having not eaten much all day, and I'd have to force myself to eat more, which is preferable to me to wanting more after each meal.

I now train before work though so need to eat a solid meal first.

I lost 8 stones (put 2 back on in lockdown and lost 1 of them so far) doing slimming world.

Since I lost I’ve maintained it by calorie counting. I also fit my favourite treats into the calories. I find I binge much less if I know I’m having crisps today and chocolate tomorrow or a takeaway on Friday.

I also find that knowing the calories in things makes me stingy with them. I love bread, for example, but I also love Coca Cola and the bread I love is more calories for 3 slices than it is for a can of coke and a couple of celebrations chocolates.

I find meal planning my main meals and having treats in that I know the calorie count of mean I don’t go over.

I’m also strict with myself that if I’m thinking of eating then I have a drink and watch something on tv or read a book or something for half an hour. Often I was in the habit of boredom eating and that helps with that as I’ll get engrossed in something and forget about the food.

Weight training is the way here IMO. I'll not infrequently have a massive pig out of up to 5-6000 cals in a day and I still have visible abs (admittedly not as visible as before lockdown).

Read this book or at least watch the TED talk

www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2016/06/07/481094825/a-neuroscientist-tackles-why-diets-make-us-fat

To see if people keep it off you need to be looking for people who've kept it off for 5 years plus. Fewer than 5% of slimming world/weight watchers/any diet plan keep it off over 5 years. Most regain some, often all and more after that time. When she was researching the book she couldn't find a single example of someone who'd managed it, worldwide. From all the slimmers of the year and magazine examples.

Dieting changes the hormones responses in our body (leptin and grehlin) it also means our body compensates when we finally fall off the wagon.

She also talks about that difficulty in maintaining and the emotional and psychological attachment with food.

breathless commotion that's not very promising! Does the book suggest how to be one of the few that keep the weight off?

Fasting I eat from 11/12 until 7 pm daily. I’m hardly ever hungry and have to remind myself to eat.

@LordLancington

Exercise helped me a lot too, specifically weight lifting. Allows me to eat heartily without getting fat. I 100% don't have the discipline or desire to do it just by diet.

Agree with this. The more muscle I have in my body, the easier I find it to maintain my weight. I am small, but eat a surprising amount of food!

@BreathlessCommotion makes a great point.

Once you get to target, or lose a large amount, on slimming world it's very difficult to maintain on it. Especially SW as their "free" foods don't really help create healthy eating habits (I also found my SW consultant was completely unhelpful, bordering on rude as well as I got closer to target).

I think calorie counting and then building a healthy diet is a much better way of doing it. Looking back on it slimming world's habit of "free" foods didn't actually help me much and created bad habits I had to unpick. The only positive from SW for me was that the weekly weigh in kept me on track

Personally when I was overweight I didn’t eat because I was hungry I just like food and was greedy so no, I don’t feel hungry now I’ve addressed that. I do feel cold most of the time though!

Is fasting linked to low carb. Or do you just eat sensibly within that window?

The reason fasting works well alongside low carb/Keto is because your body is already using fat for energy so it’s much easier to tap into your stored fat whilst fasting.

This is interesting! I've just started slimming world. I have about 6/7 stone to lose.

I got off the diet treadmill for all the reasons you mention, OP. I had to think about food all the time, etc. It's ok at the moment because with lockdown I don't have many temptations or distractions!

I'm doing intermittent fasting as well, 16:8. It's helping me to manage hunger in a healthy way, as a few pps say.

Hopefully as my weight goes down, I can build in some muscle building stuff, and that will help manage it long term.

I'm a fellow go-to dieter by several stone at a time unfortunately. If I stick to a diet ( any diet, slimming world , shakes , etc) it comes off, but then as soon as I'm off it , back it comes . I know I'm obviously eating too much or having bad food choices but for me that's the hard part of keeping it off !

The problem is that many people return back to the previous habits.

I am looking very hard at what I did that resulted in me being this size. In my case it was portions. I can honestly now see how ridiculous my portions were.
If i just go back to how I eat before, I will again end up in this situation. It's not dieting for ever. Eating "normally" isn't dieting.

Cutting out sugar has a massive effect on both my appetite and cravings, all cravings not just sweet things. It’s not easy the first time you cut it out, and it took a few weeks the first time I went cold turkey. I’ve lost 9 stone and whenever I realise I am starting to crave things I eliminate it again. I’m not sure if this works for everyone, but might be worth a try.

Intermittent fasting is the only way I can do it. Yes you have periods of being hungry but you also have periods of being full. If I split a reasonable number of calories over the whole day I am hungry 100% of the time. Yes I've tried keto, 'slow-releasing' carbs, mountains of vegetables... everything really. My appetite far exceeds my calorie needs and if I don't actively fight it then I gain weight. Intermittent fasting is the only thing I can stick too.

@Notplannedforthis not dieting at all is the main thing. And mindful eating

Noom is good because unlike a lot of other systems it really addresses the psychology around eating (which it sounds like you need to do).

If you can be moderate most of the time I think exercise is they key to being able to have the odd splurge (a take out / big choc bar - whatever is your treat of choice) now and then without gaining weight. I don't mean directly linked to eating but say you jogged or did a class 3 times a week I think you could have the odd splurge.

I've had to re-educate myself to realise that being hungry isn't bad. It's what we called "having an appetite" when we were children. It's good to be ravenously hungry just before mealtime. So I try to eat an amount at one mealtime that will get me to feeling hungry 15-30 mins before the next mealtime.

Eating slowly is good - gives your body time to catch up with the idea that now it's had some food. I can never totally manage it - I usually wolf the first few mouthfuls, but I slow down after that.

Also not eating anything unless you're positively enjoying it. So if anything on your plate isn't positively delightful, just leave it. Having been brought up post war, when food waste was regarded as sinful, that was a difficult hurdle to get over.

I got a big boost when I started seeing a proper waist again - so looking in the mirror is quite good to stiffen resolve.

Also not eating anything unless you're positively enjoying it.

Absolutely agree with that. I got rid of some foods because the value/satisfaction (calories/happiness) didn't work out. Just wasn't worth the calories. I treat calories like money. And I am naturally stingy so I do look for best value😂

I went from a size 16/14 to a size 6, six years ago then finally settled at a size ten.

For me it was intermittent fasting although I didn't reliase thats what I was doing at the time as I always skipped breakfast anyway, so I just had to be sure to have enough for dinner that I didn't want any supper and going to the gym three times a week.

It was a trade off for me that worked well "eat what you want for dinner provided you go hard at the gym."

I'm currently pregnant and fully enjoying eating for two but I honestly can't wait to get back to the gym so I can feel fitter again.