My original goal weight was 180 lbs. Over the past 2 years, I've revised that goal & set it at 160 lbs.

I'm 7 lbs away from my original goal weight. Over the weekend, I was looking at some pictures of our recent vacation. We travelled with a group of friends. I had an 'ah-ah' moment when looking at the pictures - I looked like the rest of my friends. I don't mean I looked identical to them but I fit in with the group in terms of weight. I was no longer the biggest girl in the group. In fact, I wasn't even the bigger girl in the group.

It got me to thinking about goal. I'm not sure where I'll set my end goal weight. What I do know is that I look like I hoped I would when I started this process. I have arrived! So, now, I need to start tackling maintenance. I need to educate myself & learn what I need to know to be successful in maintenance.

So, what does maintenance look like for a Bandster? Do we continue to eat 1000-1200 calories a day? That doesn't seem right to me. The average intake for a sedentary female is 1600-2000 calories a day. Do we increase our caloric intake?

So happy for you, Steph....I will be watching this thread -- good question!

Have you ever read Lap Band Gal's blog? She's been in maintenance for about four years. I do believe that she still watches her portions, but doesn't count calories as much. She weighs and if she's up a little, she goes back to basics for a bit. And of course, keeps up on her exercise. Google her. I went back and read her whole blog. All five years. It took me quite a while, but she was very inspiring.

And so are you! Congrats on your achievement. I started out at about your same weight and originally my goal was 180/185 but I changed mine to 165. I think it is achievable!

I've recently read a study that compared the daily calorie BMR of a woman at 150 pounds and had never weighed more than that to a woman who weighed 250 pounds and lost down to 150. The woman who weighed 150 her entire adult life could eat between 300-400 calories more per day to maintain that weight than the woman who lost down to 150 needed to maintain that weight. Something about the fat cells, that are now depleted, are constantly searching to fill again because that is their homeostasis mode. This made sense to me. So, although a sedentary 150 pound woman may need 1600-2000 calories a day to maintain, I will probably need 1200-1600 calories a day for maintenance. Very interesting study!

Healthy New Me and Bandista! Both so close to Onederland!

As strange as it sounds, maintenance is...(drum roll) nothing. You'll figure out how calories work with your body once you've "bottomed out", pretty quickly. I'll say within a week you will know if you are consuming too many. For me, I haven't done anything different, same fill level, same diet...still planning on starting to work out and it seems that my body is telling me we are where we need to be. I'm not hungry, I eat what I want but I've stopped losing weight. There are 1-2 lb. fluctuations here and there, but for the most part it was my body that made the decision on what to do with what I give it. I will say, it's nice not to feel like I have the band anymore but still have the control that it gives me.

Prettythick1....you said your still planning on starting to work out ...did you lose without working out?.. Just curious...

I'm doing the same thing. Eating same as I was while dropping the weight. It's pretty much stopped at this point. I haven't lost anything in the last couple of weeks (I weigh weekly) I plan to eat as I have been and I know I won't gain....and will likely not lose either.

What HealthyNewMe said is what my dietitian said too unfortunately...Steph you and I probably had very similar journeys since we had the same starting weight. My goal though has always been to be 145, which is the 'normal' weight for my height.

I work out about 5 times a week, intensive workouts and I can maintain my weight even with eating garbage. My husband and I usually lose about 1-2 lbs a week (we're both bandsters btw), but that's while eating healthily throughout the week, cheating a bit on the weekends (maybe 2-3 meals) here and there and sticking to our workouts. This past month we ate garbage non stop because he was going through midterms, and I was having a pretty stressful time at work so we were eating out almost everynight. I'm glad to say that within those 3+ weeks we were eating garbage, we maintained our weight. And I'm talking pizza hut, doughnuts, you name it. We ate it LOL. I mean, obviously our portions were much smaller than pre surgery, but still, it's pretty bad for us. I think I had like 4 slices of thin crust pizza in a sitting and he had 6. I still have no idea how we did it. We usually eat organic, raw foods LOL so we were pretty ashamed. Been back on the bandwagon for 8 days now! Hope to go back to losing instead of maintaining

I can't say I'm not disappointed. I was thinking a small defill to allow for higher caloric intake and then exercise 'willpower' like a normal person to maintain (say 1600-1800 calories/day). I didn't realize when I signed up for this procedure that I was committing to a lifetime of child sized portions. I want to be normal and eat off a normal sized plate (she says in a whining voice as she stomps away, LOL). I don't want to have to be fearful of getting something 'stuck' when eating in public.

Am I playing with fire?!

HealthyNewMe, Do you have a link for that study? Was it posted online?

Steph, unfortunately we will NEVER be thin and enjoy that many calories a day unless you're working out like a horse. On my workout days, I can assure you that I will easily intake 1600 calories a day, but my workouts are very intense. If I didn't have a band, I'm sure I wouldn't be maintaining, even WITH the workouts. It doesn't matter if you have a band or lost the weight naturally, we will still have this issue where it will be harder to to lose and maintain weight than someone else our own size, weight and height. I know how unfair it is, and I struggled with this after my nutritionist told me, but I've come to terms with it. I'd rather eat smaller portions and be where I am now than where I was before.

You can always have the band taken out, or unfill it completely, but at this point, I know if I did I would sky rocket to the way I was before. I've made the lifestyle changes, but being able to realize I'm full after eating a normal portion of food was something I had never experienced before. I would worry less about eating large amounts of food compared to just having good quality food. Believe it or not, what you are eating probably is a NORMAL amount of food. You shouldn't strive to overeat like everyone else does in a restaurant. What you're doing is great, and you should be proud of yourself!

BTW, if you're comfortable with your current fill, I don't think you should have a problem with choking in public. I've never had that sensation in public, but I always chew, chew, chew. I know sometimes it's hard when you're with friends and they want to talk to you, but I've grown a custom to it. Even my friends who don't know I'm banded know that I take a long time to chew, and respect that. I'm not going to hurt myself as to not be rude. I either cover my mouth and say what I have to say, or put up my finger in a 'one moment' gesture. They get it. No one has changed how they interact with me. I take a while to eat, and I chew a lot. I say that it's part of my weight loss strategy (not a lie!), and no one questions me about it They're all cool with it.

Edited April 30, 201412 yr by Veronica.N

My doctor says it's a lifelong journey and there should be no goal weight set technically. In your mind you can have a goal weight but you have to eat healthy for a lifetime. It doesn't mean deprivation but you've gotten the band to lose weight and that means controlled portions forever.

Well said dawalsh!

I mean, honestly, if you think about it, most 'normal' people really do watch what they eat. There are those few exceptions of people who can eat whatever they want and don't gain a pound, but most of them struggle with health issues, body image issues, etc, just like we do/did. Weight is all about a balance, and unfortunately at one point in our lives we lost that balance. We just have to do what everyone else does and focus on our balance of food, exercise, etc.