I want to maintain a normal consistent weight

[katiesname]

I'm sick of it. I gain and lose on average around 3 stone a year... (Lose a stone and a half over 6 months then sopend six months gaining it again)

I'm not even dieting, I know that dieting isn't the way to go. I just can't eat healthily for a long enough period of time to stop yo-yoing.

Anyone else have this problem? Last year I lost 2 stones from April - August... then kept it off until December, started binging and have spent the last 3 months piling it back on again. I hate how I look, I am embarrassed that my failure is so evident for all to see!

I have friends who just remain the smae weight all the time. Not particularly slim or fat. Just a nice, normal continuous weight!

YANBU to want to, but unless you have some rather strange undiagnosed illness it's only you who can make it happen.

OK - you've been to the GP I take it?

What do you eat in a normal day? And how tall are you?

Would a weight loss club (e.g. WW or Slimming World) help? Not to just lose the weight, but to help you stay on the straight and narrow afterwards. If you continued to go to be weighed every couple of weeks once you were at a weight you were happy with, you would know when you'd put on a couple of lbs and would possibly be less likely to binge eat.

Good luck, I know how difficult it is.

Why did you start binge eating?

Is it because you were fed up of eating healthily all the time?

If so, try mixing it up and remember that in moderation, unhealthy foods are fine if you eat healthily anyway.

Hi, we've moved this thread into Big/Slim/Whatever Weight Loss Club.

I thought 'stooge' was some sort of diet shake

Try hypnotherapy. It makes you aware of the triggers for your over eating and how to handle them.

Thanks all - I'm 5"10 and weigh anything between 10 and 13 stone at any given point! Although usually between 11.5 and 13. So it's always roughly within the healthy range.

I haven't been to the doctor - I imagine they would give me a government hand out on healthy eating, five a day and excercise - yawn.

I know how to eat healthily and in moderation. I just can't resist binging as soon as I have been at a lower weight for a while. I think the problem is that I forget what was motivating me to lose it in the first place. I forget how miserable I am when I'm bigger and so I think "sod it" one day of binging won't hurt - then it becomes 2, 3 4 - then i think I'll eat healthily again next month... then it drags on until I am so unhappy eith my weight - and summer is coming and I start to eat healthily again.

To the poster who asked what i eat... where do I start - When i am losing weight or maintaining a lower weight I eat banana and yogurt, mueseli, porridge with honey, peanut butter on toast etc for breakfast. A salad or chicken salad or tuna sarnie and an apple for lunch and veggie chilli, spag bol, pesto an veg pasta etc for dinner with lots of water and fruit throughout the day, also hummous and crudittes etc.

But when i am putting on weight i eat the same breakfast and lunch but all before 10am (!) then various chocs, crisps, ciabattas, pasta dishes, cakes, sweets, sausage rolls throughout the day and then a healthy dinner followed by biscuits and 1 - 3 glasses of wine. Shocking!!

Is it expensive sqoosh?

Katie, have you tried Paul McKenna? There's loads of threads. What jumps out at me is that you say you eat your lunch before 10 am. Is this because you are actually hungry then?

I am always starving in the morning so couldnt stick to any kind of diet because breakfasts are always tiny portions of cereal etc. PM teaches you to eat when you are hungry and stop when you are full and eat what you want rather than what you think you should eat so are more satisfied by what you eat. It also tries to help with the boredom/comfort eating, which you seem to be doing with the cakes sweets and snacks

I now have massive breakfasts (think full english or similar every day 600-800 calories), then mid morning snack, normal lunch and a small dinner - I am usually not that hungry in the evening so am full after a small portion. My weight is now much more stable and I feel a lot better about food and eating because I am ?allowed? to eat in the morning when hungry.

Thanks Lizzie, I am more hungry in the morning. But I don't always eat because I am hungry, no. Maybe I should try Paul - I guess I've always thought it to be mumbojumbo

I used Marisa Peer's You Can Be Thin and dropped 4 stone. This was over the course of approx 14 months.

Read the book, do the exercises and then listen to the hypnotherapy CD every day for at least three weeks. It makes you so much more aware of why you overeat and that shedding pounds is completely within your power. Vivid visualisation is recommended too, picture really hard exactly how you want to look, what you'll wear etc. It does sound a bit hokumy but if you suspend your cycnicism and give it a shot it can be really helpful.

A useful thing I learnt is that it takes three weeks of doing something repeatedly to create a neural pathway in your brain i.e. a habit. Three weeks to create a good habit and three weeks to create a bad one. After the three weeks of eating consciously (not filling your face whilst watching tv etc.) everything just feels so much easier.

Thanks - i'll give it a whirl. I don't think I'll be able to do the exercises though. Exercising just makes me hungrier, and if it's exercise for weightloss sake I just wont keep it up.

I'm not sure about the habit thing - I can go a good 4/5 months eating healthily and making good choices and only eating when I'm hungry etc... that should be long enough to build up a habit, shouldn't it?

Exercise wise find something you enjoy & don't do it for weight loss sake do it for the health benefits. Food wise - write everything you eat down. Even if you are eating a lot writing it down may make you think twice

I can't be careful all the time, so eat a lot more at weekends but am careful all week. Also eat more on holiday. But I have a weight that I like to maintain so I weigh myself on Monday morning (or after holiday) and am careful until I am back there again. Usually get there by Thursday morning so less careful Thurs- Sun. Would take maybe 10-14 days after holiday. So always gaining and losing same 4-8lbs but at least I maintain roughly the same weight.

I use myfitness pal to write everything down also paul mckenna for motivation and I like the strictness of dukan, very all or nothing.