OK I have heard multitudes of people complain that the *second time around*is more difficult in terms of losing....

Here's a quote from the Nov 2001 edition of SHAPE magazine:

FAT FACT: You develop most of your fat early in life.

The average person is born with 5-6 billion fat cells and research suggests that you acquire most of your fat cells before the age of 20. The average adult has 30-40 billion fat cells, but can add more anytime a significant amount ofweight (at least 20-30 pounds of fat) is gained.

I figure that if every time we re-gain the weight (and add more) we are increasing the number of individual fat cells, and it is logical that the more fat cells you have the slower you are going to lose. Something to think about, anyway.