We used to have a monthly Maintenance thread, Since many of us have gained during the last 2 3/4 yrs. I thought it was time to revive it.
Anyone at maintenance or within 10-15 lbs of it, is most welcome. Share your successes, failures, hopes, dreams, or whatever about keeping the weight loss managed.
KCKO
I find it harder and harder to lose the lbs. I have put on since the “pandamnit” started. I lose a few, then start an upwards climb again, eating pretty much the exact things I ate to lose and IFing stayed the same. I have kept up my 2x a day walking and for the last few months, I am back to my 2 fitness classes, one is Zumba, the other strength training. In fact, I had my biggest bounce up after adding those classes back in. My body hasn’t changed all that much, I still fit well into all my clothes I was wearing at the lower weight.
I have decided to use Dr. Westman’s page 4 protocol to see if that will help. I am having a hard time eating 3 meals a day, but my husband is all for me cutting back on IFing. He feels changing things up can be helpful.
On a cheerier note, my 6 year anniversary is coming up the last week of July. I have really stuck with this WOE and this is just a bump in the road as I see it.
I’d love to hear others experiences with their maintenance.
I’m trying to gain healthy weight. Eating loads of protein and fat (red meat and dairy, the OG hypertrophy superfoods), lifting, napping, keeping stress low and long night’s sleep. It’s slow going because COPD cachexia, but this year I’m more than halfway to my arbitrarily chosen goal weight of 72 kg (starting weight was 57 kg)
Lucky you. I read your profile info. Sounds like keto have been very good for you. Awesome results on your health issues.
All the best on making those gains.
Heh, yeah… It’s no exaggeration to say that eating this way saved my life. Not only do I survive, I thrive. Hours on my feet doing volunteer work while I used to be unable to even shower standing up
I’m only in for 2 years, but already the word Maintenance has new meaning for me. It’s not work but it’s not letting go of the reins either.
I like to say that I am on auto pilot. But I realize how a tiny deviance from course can lead to a drastic change in direction.
So, I’m thankful for my trusty old inner addict who learned the hard way. No means no. Stay the course. Live. Breathe. Enjoy. Repeat.
Am I the only one who has lost weight while gaining strength and muscle mass during the pandemic?
I’m not at what I consider goal weight, but I would have been a lot closer had I not tried The Croissant Diet and gained 20+ pounds. Took me the length of the pandemic to lose that.
Well done Bob. The Croissant Diet just always sounded too good to be true. I love them, but won’t be eating any ever again. Wheat just does me no favors, so all wheat bread don’t exist in my world anymore.
I wanted to join this thread in advance. I don’t weigh, but I’m within a size of goal, so it’s probably no more than 12 pounds (basing on what a size meant back when I did weigh, last century.) So I qualify.
I’ve been LC off and on for 22 years. Sometimes “off” means 60 g of carbs, all veg and dairy, which worked for maintenance for me. And sometimes it means “screwing up.” 99% of the problem: I’m a sugar addict. And my slippery slope on that is steep. Fruit starts it. Artificial sugars do it. Whoosh, right back to saying yes to some idiotic sweet thing I don’t even much like three weeks later. It’s the drug. It’s definitely the drug that is my primary problem. Pure, white and deadly or encased in a pretty berry–doesn’t really make a difference to my addicted self.
I’m on a trial month of carnivore, and I suspect I will dip in and out of it in the future because I like how I feel on it, and otherwise I plan to keep my carbs below 10 this year. 10 is all I need to have that feeling of a bit of variety to the food–ways of prep, or a bit of salsa on my eggs, or eating my own homegrown tomatoes, organic and in season, which I’ve been giving away this month while ZC.
My big worry is…I have the data. Six months is a historically delicate moment for me. I have eight years of recording food, and that pattern is clear. At six months, I often slide off keto. (Not always. I’ve gone one year and two years as well getting it right.) I get complacent, maybe? I grow resentful that this is the metabolic hand I got dealt? I convince myself “this one won’t hurt me” when it always does? (addiction is clever that way.) I’m not entirely sure, but I’d like to become sure and figure out an intervention.
So I’m good for now, sailing along, on track, life is good, food tastes great, no cravings, and all that. But I’ll bear watching around the end of October. I’ll need help at that point, accountability. Encouragement.
And if I do slide off, then or ever, I want to get right back on, the very day, the next meal. No more of this “three months of screwing around and regaining two sizes” business before I do self-correct. That’s just not the way to do it. (better than gaining four sizes, but still, I’d like to learn to forgive, correct, and move on that very day.)
So here I am introducing myself and getting to know you too.
For the record, I lost a size during the pandemic. I only went to the store every 3 weeks, at its least crowded hour, and all the willpower i needed was for a half-hour at the store. I also had most of a deer in the freezer and had randomly just stocked up with two cases of my fave toilet paper before it began. (Who Gives a Crap bamboo, great stuff.) The kitchen was clean and I ate cleanly too. I dealt with stress other ways.
Welcome @Keto_Lou
Sounds like you are doing very well so far.
Good that you are planning ahead for Oct. Hoping all goes well for you.
Today is my 6th yr. ketoversary… I hit my goal two months before my first one. So 5 yrs. of maintaining.
I’m currently a few lbs. over my goal weight, due to the stress of the last 2.75 yrs. The good news is all the clothes still fit well enough to be worn out in public. It could be much worse.
So today, I am back to basics, cooling it with the nuts and limiting the almond flour too. I want to reach that goal weight again. I’ve slacked off on fasting, I really want to make that a consistent thing again.
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That’s very inspirational. After that much time maintaining, it will be easy to get back on track. Good for you. happy 6th!
I’m doing OMAD, so far so good. They are getting easier each day, so I will do a 3 day fast next week.
I had let my fasting muscle get very weak. I feel like I am getting back on track.
I am obviously still 75kg, oh I said 2022 will be my year, I still think so but I should take things seriously now. I am mentally in a good place now for it.
I had 2 fruity months (it’s impossible for me to avoid, it was June and July!) but tomorrow I go back to carnivore(-ish, at least, the difference is insignificant to me as far as I know) and try to do my best to skip lunch (that’s at 3pm, super early for my first meal under normal circumstances). I probably can’t do OMAD but it would be nice not to have more than 2 meals a day. Just because I start eating after 4-5pm, I easily can have too many (less easily than starting earlier but still)… And I eat too much if I have many meals, almost always at least.
It’s time to show it’s possible to lose fat on keto even if one is me. I should lose maybe 40lbs.
I am sure I have the method and maybe even some determination to lose a bit? We will see.
I want more muscles too. And improving at life in general.
Nice to see y’all.
I’m still dropping in regularly, mostly reading, sometimes commenting. It has been a suck-o year here, as one of our cats has been going through some rough times. Yeah, he’s a senior citizen like his peeps, but it started with an odd result from a blood test in February, and has been a stressful six months since then. He’s on a steroid, prednisolone, and I don’t think I’ve slept a full night since February. He wakes me up for food at some time between 2AM and I think the latest was 3:30. For the first couple of months, that would be followed by walking the halls or sitting just out of reach singing opera. La Traviata. Or something that isn’t the Barber of Seville. For maybe the last month he has come back to bed instead of singing almost every night. There have been one or two that he repeated that.
Yeah, I’m retired and I’d sleep in if I didn’t set an alarm a few times a week to go ride the bike for an hour before Spontaneous Human Combustion is a real risk. A couple of times a week, I’ve fallen back asleep and gotten enough hours, but the interruption doesn’t feel good. Makes me think of all that talk about cortisol levels.
I think I gained around a pound a month since February. I’ve been doing one day/week fasting and holding steady, I think. As BobM, @ctviggen said somewhere else, once you start fasting you’ll never know what you weigh (sorry if that’s a misquote, Bob). Sometimes I think all my weight changes are water weight. When I fast I dump so much water that on one fasted ride - the same distance I ride every other day - I bonked and had to call my wife to come get me! I’ve tried increasing salt intake, adding a big cup of chicken bullion at dinner time. It helps but it hasn’t eliminated getting up a few times a night. This week instead of a 40 hour fast from Wednesday night till Friday noon, I just did OMAD on Thursday.
Well, sorry to gripe. Rough spots come for everyone. KCKO/KCFO and all that.
Hey Maintenance Crew, sorry for the late posting but I did get a new one up for August.