Agreed, I have a history of being a bit of a shopaholic (and being overweight). I've vacillated between periods of being debt-free and periods of indebtedness, I've vacillated between periods of being in relatively good shape and periods of weight gain. None of these circumstances, good or bad, happened overnight, they were the accumulation of many small daily decisions, often over years.
When I was in the peak shape of my life (178 and stacked), it was following being in the worst condition in my life (315), after more than 7 years of constant careful attention to my calorie intake, every other day exercise, and meticulously recording it all so I could keep myself honest. It didn't evaporate overnight either, I was able to maintain a good state of health without being so controlled while I was traveling, but once the pandemic happened and I became sedentary my loss of control over my eating caught up to me over the next 14 months and I gained nearly 40 pounds back prior to getting myself back under control. Now I'm on that journey again back to a healthier weight.
The things we do every day, the small choices we consistently make, these form the habits of our lives. I have good habits and I have bad habits, and it's a consistent struggle for me (and likely everyone) to overcome our bad habits and turn them into good habits. Some of these habits, including my relationship with food, came from my environment as a child, so the work of a lifetime forming them is often difficult to overcome, but it's never impossible.
I am similar wrt to bodyfat fluctuations, but interestingly enough, it did happen to me overnight. During the pandemic I reached my lowest bf% ever, single digits, despite gyms being closed.
It was after things began to open back up in summer/fall '21 that, as I started to get back into the gym, I allowed myself to "eat instinctively" and went from 160-190 in a month. The weight managed to stabilize but still slowly go up, eventually reaching in the 200's. I was hitting the weight racks but struggling to keep my weekly caloric intake in a deficit.
There's a lot more to the story in terms of what I did and learned, but in short, calorie estimates online were often over-prescribing my TDI which was a lot closer to my BMR. I now eat 600 less than my BMR every week and that's about 1.5 lbs/week lost. I'm still hitting the gym and getting 1g protein /lb of lean body mass so I am still managing to put on muscle despite being in a deficit.
But ultimately, it will have taken me 2 years of meticulous, dedicated calorie and macro tracking and diet modulation to undo that single month of damage, and return to my previous bf%. Although I have dealt with the frustration of impatience, I am finally on track and expect to hit my goals in October/November.
When I was in the peak shape of my life (178 and stacked), it was following being in the worst condition in my life (315), after more than 7 years of constant careful attention to my calorie intake, every other day exercise, and meticulously recording it all so I could keep myself honest. It didn't evaporate overnight either, I was able to maintain a good state of health without being so controlled while I was traveling, but once the pandemic happened and I became sedentary my loss of control over my eating caught up to me over the next 14 months and I gained nearly 40 pounds back prior to getting myself back under control. Now I'm on that journey again back to a healthier weight.
The things we do every day, the small choices we consistently make, these form the habits of our lives. I have good habits and I have bad habits, and it's a consistent struggle for me (and likely everyone) to overcome our bad habits and turn them into good habits. Some of these habits, including my relationship with food, came from my environment as a child, so the work of a lifetime forming them is often difficult to overcome, but it's never impossible.