Am I Premaintenance? What should I be doing?

[tammay]

Hi all,

I've just been surfing the Premain/Main board (the first time I felt I had a right to be here :D) and the support here is amazing!

I have set my goal to 120-115 and I am now 124 so I am 4 pounds away from my higher goal (which I will probably stay with - I do find I have some tummy fat still hanging around but I figure continuing to exercise will help me shape that up). Am I considered pre-maintenance? I know most places say pre-main is "a few pounds away from goal" but what's a "few pounds"?

Also, I'd like to start planning for maintenance. Once about 10 years ago I did hit my weight goal (low fat, of course, not low carbing) at 116 (I was in my 20's so that was reasonable) and basically blew it because I was on a plan that did not prepare me for maintenance so I just went back to eating regular. I don't want to make the same mistake this time. Technically I'm on the Protein Power plan but neither of the PP books say much about maintenance so I'm a little in the dark about how many carbs to start adding, which carbs to add, what to do about calories, etc. Are there any other low carb books out there that go a little more in depth about maintenance?

I'm a student so right now I'm still in summer vacation but I'm starting the fall semester at the end of this month. I'm praying I get to 120 by then (and I've been doing everything right, so hopefully I should!) and maybe even a bit sooner so I can start on maintenance before school begins and get into it a little so that I don't have the pressure of trying to juggle my eating with other things. I imagine that maintenance can be very stressful for the first few weeks/months until you get over the fear of gaining everything back :D.

Any advice on how to begin to look in to this would be great.

Tam

[mammac-5]

Sounds like premaintenance to me, although I'm not as familiar with PP as I am with Atkins. You are smart to be planning ahead toward maintaining your loss so you won't have to lose the same weight all over again a few years down the line. Good for you!

Not knowing what amount of carbs you're currently eating, I'd say it's safe to add 5 -10 grams/day over the next week and see how you feel and how your weight does. Obviously, healthy carbs only...extra veggies, berries, low-carb dairy options, etc.

I personally have a great fear of regaining my weight. I don't want to go there! That makes me tend to continue eating TOO low carb, though, and that's probably not good either. I've got to work on that balance myself.

[BKM]

My suggestion would be to start adding some good carbs (cantalope, apples, sweet potatoes, heavy whole-grained bread....) then carefully observing how your body handles it.

For example, get a super-good cantalope and eat it -- then the next 3 mornings weigh yourself -- if no gain, then you're probably safe with occasionally eating it. But if you immediately put on a couple of pounds and have to cut back to get your weight back under control, likely you can't handle that food (or that amount of the particular food!).

I have found that I can eat many fruits (but not an entire cantalope or watermelon (both of which I did! -- hey, the watermelon wasn't all that huge, and it took me grazing all day to do that, but still.....). However, cashews trigger overeating and weight gain -- so I'm avoiding them.

I think the idea of maintenance is to get comfortable with your eating, let it become a habit -- occasional indulgences but basically sticking to a reasonably low-carb WOE.

[tammay]

Thank you all for the responses. What you're saying makes a lot of sense to me. I have a few books that talk about the GI index in depth and I'm thinking it might be good to get familiar with lower GI foods so that I can make good choices.

As far as carbs go, I'm roughly around 20-22 carbs a day right now - doing about 1200-1250 calories a day with 60% fat/35% protein/5% carbs. I know it's a little high on the fat but I find I stay fuller longer with these ratios.

This may sound absurd, but I'm not even sure how to add carbs anymore! Seriously, I was doing around 13-15 carbs a day before I switched to PP and I made an effort to up the carbs mainly because for PP, the weight loss phase suggests 30-40/day. And I did up them (mainly with some berries in a fruit smoothie in the morning and some almond meal and PB) but not even close to 30. I'm not even sure I want to start adding grainy foods again (like rice, couscous, bread, etc.) and I'm not a huge fruit fan at all. I've weaned myself off of all dariy products (except coconut milk, which isn't really a dairy) as well as low carb products (other than artificial sweeteners and SF syrups) and processed foods (such as ham, bacon, and the like). So I'm pretty much at a loss of what I could add. And truthfully, also I'm a little scared that adding even a little rice, say (like 1/2 cup whole grain cooked to dinner) or beans (like 1/3 cup in my salad, although I love kidney beans) will throw my weight completely off.

But I like the suggestion of starting to add 5-10 carbs worth of good carbs per day (in maintenance, I'm assuming - not now) and weighing myself every day (although I prefer every week, but I can see how it makes sense every day) and seeing how my body reacts. Maybe I'll hit the GI books and make a list of the good (low GI too) carbs and foods and just take it from there...

Tam

[Kristine]

Howdy and welcome. :wave:

Am I considered pre-maintenance?

I'd say yes - you're practically at goal. :thup:

I'm not even sure I want to start adding grainy foods again (like rice, couscous, bread, etc.) and I'm not a huge fruit fan at all.

Don't feel pressured to add those foods back in if you don't want to. There's really no particular reason to eat them unless you're comfortable with it. I rarely eat grains or sweet fruit besides berries. Go with what appeals to you. Perhaps more nuts and starchier veggies. YMMV, but I can handle beans in reasonable quantities. They're so fibrous, the carb absorption is very slow. Maybe give 'em a try next time you make chili. :idea:

Good luck!

[kathleen24]

Even though you're not doing Atkins, you might want to read his chapters on pre-maintenance and maintenance--they have a lot of common-sense stuff in them.

One of the things he suggests is losing the last ten pounds very, very slowly (I understand your reasons for wanting to do otherwise.) He says that helps with the transition to `new normal' eating, and helps keep the weight off. This approach makes sense to me--I'm not there yet, but will probably go this route when I get there.

One more thing--I've seen several posters who say that when they reached goal weight, they really didn't have to change the way they were eating to stay at that weight--their body just kind of bumped into the dock, and quit losing there. Some of it is kind of mysterious.

Congrats on your success, and good luck with school in the fall. . .