Best Method of Maintenance

mladha14

What's the best method to maintain your goal weight?

I'm finding it hard to continue counting calories because I have already reached my goal. I recently weighed myself and I gained a couple of pounds that I am trying to lose before May.

How can I stay motivated to continue calorie counting?

ShannonMpls

This works for me; not saying it works for everyone, though. I've been maintaining a 130 pound weight loss since September 2012, maintaining within a 5 pound range.

Pretty simply:
1) I continue the same exercise routine I did while I was losing. This is now an entrenched habit and I don't think twice about it.

2) I log my calories at a deficit M-F. I plan, weigh, pack my food, track my macros.

3) I do not track weekends. I eat what I like. Because I've built in a surplus from my week, going over maintenance is no big deal. I normally get in one good hard workout on Saturday or Sunday.

4) If I find that I'm over my maintenance weight range, I tighten up the weekends - log it all at maintenance, or log just Sunday at or below maintenance.

It's a good balance for me. Calorie-counting may be a crutch, but it's an important one for me to maintain. The break on the weekends is mental and physical. I was surprised to find out that a friend, who has almost always been a healthy weight, operates this way out of habit too. She found she was gaining so started logging her food here M-F and like that, the weight gain stopped.

So, perhaps logging MOST of the time will be enough for you as well.

kdiamond

Been maintaining 11+ years, and I agree with the above poster, that's basically what I do. I average it out over the week and keep very active all of the time, it works! It becomes second nature to log.

SezxyStef

beckkkahhhx3 wrote: »

kdiamond wrote: »

Been maintaining 11+ years, and I agree with the above poster, that's basically what I do. I average it out over the week and keep very active all of the time, it works! It becomes second nature to log.

I looked at your log and do you really maintain eating only 800-1200 calories plus exercise? It seems so low. I am starting to think I have an abnormally high maintenance.

When I am in maintenance I do everything I do when I am losing...prelog for the week and see how I am for the weekend and continue exercising... I did that for the last 9 months...

I am on another deficit to lose vacation weight and another 5 on top of that...

as for the above maintaining on 800-1200 highly doubtful...what you see is a person who doesn't use a food scale and doesn't log most weekends... and is eating a lot more than they think

I maintain on 2000 calories during the winter when I am just lifting and 2400 in the spring/summer/fall when I am outside walking/biking/swimming plus lifting.

StaciMarie1974

I still count calories and log (mostly with the phone app, prefer it to the website for logging) but I do estimate/approximate more now. And I 'aim' for a maintenance range rather than a maintenance weight. For me that's 123-128. Initially was 125-130 but it shifted downward. If I'm in that range, I know all is well. If I seem to go to the higher end, I can limit my calories by 100-200 less than 'maintenance'. And if I'm on the low end, I am careful to avoid 'low' calorie days and make sure to eat 1750+.

mladha14

ShannonMpls wrote: »

This works for me; not saying it works for everyone, though. I've been maintaining a 130 pound weight loss since September 2012, maintaining within a 5 pound range.

Pretty simply:
1) I continue the same exercise routine I did while I was losing. This is now an entrenched habit and I don't think twice about it.

2) I log my calories at a deficit M-F. I plan, weigh, pack my food, track my macros.

3) I do not track weekends. I eat what I like. Because I've built in a surplus from my week, going over maintenance is no big deal. I normally get in one good hard workout on Saturday or Sunday.

4) If I find that I'm over my maintenance weight range, I tighten up the weekends - log it all at maintenance, or log just Sunday at or below maintenance.

It's a good balance for me. Calorie-counting may be a crutch, but it's an important one for me to maintain. The break on the weekends is mental and physical. I was surprised to find out that a friend, who has almost always been a healthy weight, operates this way out of habit too. She found she was gaining so started logging her food here M-F and like that, the weight gain stopped.

So, perhaps logging MOST of the time will be enough for you as well.

I think your method sounds like it will work for me! I'm going to work on losing those extra pounds I put on and then work on tracking during the week and moderately splurging on the weekend.

Jesusjohnjames

Monday- Friday, I eat 1800 cals, on Weekends I do 2000.