Moderation

Of course I agree with you, for me.  I post often about how poorly I can do moderation (though not always in those terms).  I talk about my struggles with particular foods precisely because it is important to share my truth, and put it out there that giving some foods up is just easier than the hopeless attempts to control them.  I'm all about honesty being important for my own recovery, and it's important others see that I struggle too, especially when I forget that I can't eat like a normal person.

But sometimes I have to remember that part of not being as smart as I think I am is accepting that my truth isn't true for everyone and that others have their own paths to follow.  I salute folks that can do moderation.  I just want to be a cautionary voice saying, moderation is a *lot* easier when you have minimum capacity and minimal hunger.  Managing moderation - like all our food behaviors - gets a lot harder the further out you get. 
 

honestly i compare certain foods to alcohol.
just as there are alcoholics, there are foodaholics. and i am one.

sometimes you just gotta cut the stuff that you can't control (much like alcohol to some) out of your life. 

 i think the key to your statement is using moderation is a learned (and learnable) skill.  if you tried something and couldn't exercise restraint then you are not adept in that skill yet. balance is the key to life, i believe, but it's not an inherent gift. like any other skill we lack, but desire to obtain, we have to approach it with wisdom and a plan. recognize your limitations until you've mastered it and in some cases accept the fact this is a skill that may ellude you.  and accepting and embracing that may be your moderation or balance in life.

for me, setting goals and reaching them is my priority. of course losing weight is number one today. but a sub-goal is to develop a healthy relationship with food that will promote balance in my life.  i'm not there yet. the first step in my plan is developing a discipline lifestyle regarding my eating, excercise and spiritual life. so while i'm working on dicipline i have little room for exceptions.  but i will say this - eventually i will have to deal with those deeper issues that trigger excessive eating followed by self-loathing that is the root of my unsuccessful self-control in the past. so my ultimate goal is to be able to live a life in balance.

my last thought on this post is this... i'm a veteran  - i've been fit for many years of my life. i understand discipline - i know what it looks like, how it feels and the results it can produce. when i read this post i thought way back (many years back -lol) to basic training. for those of you who have served or even seen a good military movie you know the trmendous, continuous and consistant pressure drill sgts apply to new recruits.  it's done, not to be cruel or hurtful - it's done to tear down past ways of thinking and doing - to create the type of soldier youNEED to be in order to be successful. everyone have to go this way - doesn't matter what you're issues are or aren't. but  once you finish BASIC TRAINING you move to permanent party - or normal life. there aren't any drill sgts yelling at you, no one telling you what to do, etc. but what tey know is, after we teach you how to live a disciplined life, balance will fall into place as you mature. 

i hope this helps anyone strugling with this issue. 

For me moderation and head hunger go together. I struggle with controlling and ignoring my head hunger which means that I can't moderate during those times.

I really really *want* it even though I feel no hunger and I can guarantee that a few bites won't be enough when the head hunger starts.

Then there are times when I do fine. Last night was my 17th anniversary dinner and I shared a meal with my hubby. I didn't eat the potatoes, the steak medallions with crab meat were heaven. I did have 5 bites of the chocolate lava cake.

Here's what scares me about those five bites - how in the hell did I have room for them?

Oh and unlike others who can eat like **** and lose weight the next day, I gained a 1/2 lb this am.

 I am not sure that I would say that moderation and head hunger go together.  What scares me is the driver behind the bahvoir.  As I tried to explain in the other "saga" threads yesterday, was what is driving the need to both eat unwisely and try to explain it away.

The danger there is you start a habit of explaining away your unwise choices rather than looking at them and dealing with the emotions.

moderation, as defined in doggz post, is a healthy behaior.  Healthy, when applied correctly and honestly and at the right time.Honesty is the key.  I really dont believe that the OP in the other threads was being honest with herself about what she was doing and why.   I don't think she was applying moderation.  I think that was a word to make her feel like she was doing the right thing rather than taking responsibility for doing something she knew she shouldn't do.  

In freudian terms, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar - but sometimes its not.

The other dangerous assumption is that eating something will show up on the scane exactly the next morning.  Or exercising hard will immediately show a drop the next morning.  Its part of that magical thinking that we engage in - cause = effect.  Weight loss or weight gain is not that linear, theres a lot more to it than that.  Those 5 bites of red velvet cake or the other posters bagel might show up on the scale the day after tomorrow, or maybe never.  It really depends on a lot of things.  Thats why I always repeat what I have been told over and over.  Focus on meeting your nutrition goals and exercise goals.  Just read the scale and move on.  Its the trend you look for, not the exact number.

Saying I ate a bag of french fries today, and lost 1lb doesn't mean that you can eat a bag of fries every day and lose a lb every day.

I wouldn't be scared of why you had room for 5 bites of cake.  The restriction does lessen over time.  The sleeve will develop a little more capacity.  You get a little more used to the feeling of being full.  YOu may have just been preocupied with your anniversary dinner and missed the full cues your sleeve sent you.  Whats important is that you learn from the experience and don't make excuses to let it become a habit.

I think you should be proud of how far you've come and how much you've learned.

Me? I am still getting to know this new me - it's a journey.

Thanks!   It is a journey.  I love OH because it's such a gret place to lern from so many others journeys - if you have an open mind to.

I think this is a very important post, and I hope people will consider it with an open mind because there is a great deal of wisdom here.

For me, moderation is like one of those optical illusions you might have seen, where the picture only comes into focus if you focus to the side of it rather than dead on.  Here is what I mean. 
I never looked specifically for moderation.  I was focused on 1) losing the weight, 2) learning what my triggers, issues are with food, 3) coming up with workable strategies for dealing with the food issues, 4) learning to apply my strategies and refine them over a period of time ( 2 years) 5) learning to maintain my weight.  Those were my goals and somewhere along the way, I think between 3-4, I found moderation, or more specifically, it found me.  I can now eat in moderation where I know I could not safely do it before because I had worded on and achieved success in the earlier goals.  Moderation for many of us is the end result of a long journey, it does not work well in the early stages.  Or I should say, it would not have worked for me.

I love the game plan concept and I use it all the time. The 5 bites of chocolate lava cake at anniversary dinner with my awesomesauce hubby was planned - I told him I was going to have no more than 5 bites in the car and we planned to share a meal even though we were going to a nice resaurant. I don't drink, so that wasn't an issue. The restaurant is known for mostly meat dishes, so I wasn't worried about that.

The process you go through works well for me too.

I believe in moderation wholeheartedly if you have the discipline and mindset.  At the same time I also believe in avoidance.

For ME in MY journey thus far I've been abstaining from "my dangerous foods" because I know and feel at this point I can not handle them responsibly.

I would love to someday in the future be able to think that I will be able to enjoy some of those things in moderation (meaning small servings once in a while).