I have two suggestions and I believe if you ONLY stick to these two things, you will be less affected by the negatives, like compulsions, and you stand a fighting chance against regain.
1) drink your water. measure it out in the morning or the night before, then drink it until it's all gone over the course of the day, and
2) write down EVERY SINGLE CRUMB YOU PUT IN YOUR MOUTH. Once you realize you're eating more than you thought you were when you were eating everything mindlessly, you'll be able to CHOOSE to eat less.
Both of those strategies are based on the simple principle of honesty. It's hard for people to see or admit that they are lying to themselves, and who wants to anyway? But by raising your awareness through measuring and documenting food, it will become prominent in your thoughts.
And on the subject of water: everyone complains about the difficulty they have drinking water, and there are a lot of logical reasons for that. Surely one reason people don't necessarily know is that city water/treated water actually has a taste, and it's a bad taste. That's why I only drink water from a spring (like the one on my brother's property) or buy spring water at the store. I NEVER drink municipal water. I hope if you're having problems with drinking water, you'll find a solution that works for you, because drinking the recommended amount of water also accelerates weight loss. In my first three months, I lost 35, then 25, then 15 pounds, which was about 80 percent of the weight I needed to lose all together. It took a total of 13 months for me to hit my goal because I plateaued for months, but I did reach it, and I have managed to keep it off all these years since WLS.
