After 100 days of calorie tracking, I'm down 31 lbs (40 lbs total)

41F 5'10 SW 227 CW 187 GW 165

TLDR; Knowing myself better and consistency have been the keys to a 40-lb weight loss in 4.5 months

In June, I was at my highest weight of 227. After my last baby was born 7 years ago, I lost most of the "baby weight", then stopped paying attention, had a stressful few years, and started gaining, to the tune of about 45 lbs (WARNING: this is only about a half lb a month!). When I started trying to lose weight, for the first two weeks, I didn't track anything, just cut out all snacks and all alcohol. 10 lbs dropped off. Then I started tracking calories every day. Some stats:

daily calories: started tracking at 1400, slowly increased to 1600-1700

daily steps: started at 8000, increased to 13,000

monthly weight loss:

• June - 11
• July - 8
• August - 7
• Sept - 7
• Oct (so far) - 7

# of days out of 100 that I was at my lowest weight: 53

Things I've learned:

1. Knowing myself and working WITH myself is the most important thing. The best piece of info I learned for weight loss actually came from the book "The Four Tendencies" by Gretchen Rubin. According to that book, I'm a "rebel", which means no one can tell me what to do, and also I can't tell MYSELF what to do. I will rebel against strict plans and plans that "make" me eat certain things or workout a certain way or on a certain schedule. CICO and tracking has worked so well because I eat what I want, and I have continued to have a drink most nights. (I still have to "rebel" a little bit by not tracking most veggies.)
2. Another concept from Gretchen Rubin is whether you are an "abstainer" or a "moderator": do you do best avoiding certain foods altogether, or can you pour yourself a small bowl of chips and not go back for more? I have needed to be honest about which foods lead to me staring at an empty family-size bag in physical pain. Some sweet things just stay out of my house. Then if I really want something, I pre-track it, put on pants, leave the house, and purchase a single-serving size.
3. I eat when I'm bored, so I have to have something to replace it. Now that it's cold out, it's usually a cup of tea. Before, it was drinking water/diet soda/Bubly, eating carrots or cherry tomatoes, or just getting out of the house.
4. NEAT (Non-activity thermogenesis) is my friend. I've been able to bump up my calories AND continue to lose weight because I'm getting in more steps, both from more/longer walks AND playing "the couch is lava". Bonus: my house is cleaner because of all my puttering.
5. I'm still working on the timing of my eating so I stay within my calorie budget and don't feel restricted/hungry. Right now, that's typically a protein-heavy breakfast, a mid-morning snack, an early lunch, and then saving about half my calories for dinner and an after-dinner drink/treat. Weird, but it seems to be working for me.
6. Consistency is more important than accuracy, and more important than intensity. I need to set up habits that I can do every day forever. It likely will be challenging over the holidays to keep tracking and weighing myself, even if I'm going over my calorie goal and my weight loss stalls. But the habits I can definitely stick to are tracking and weighing, and, if necessary, switching to a maintenance calorie goal for a few weeks so I don't feel restricted and throw the other habits out the window.

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