I am sure to regret this

starwhisperer6

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

autumnblade75

Well, I don't think you need to slow your loss to prepare for maintenance, but when you get very close to your ideal weight, it gets tougher to have a huge deficit without consuming so few calories that your body cannibalizes muscle for energy. If you want to conserve more muscle, you slow your roll and be a little patient.

rainbowbow

I think it's easier for people to transition into maintenance calorie wise when they don't have much to lose. It is definitely alarming to most people when they start eating "normally" around maintenance and the scale shoots up a few pounds at first. I.E. you've been eating 1,200 calories for 5 months and you all of a sudden start eating about 2,000.

Additionally, i dont think they are saying "you need to slow the pace" but that "your body will slow the pace". As you get closer and closer to your goal weight the harder it will be to lose said weight while eating a sufficient amount of calories. You often hear people talk about the "last 10" being painstakingly slow.

As you diet down your metabolic rate is lower, you've lost muscle mass, your margin of error for calories is lower, and you have to be diligent in logging accurately.

This of course depends on the deficit you are eating at as well as your "goal weight". Whether these are already at a reasonable level and whether your goal is within the lower end or higher end of a healthy BMI.

kristen6350

Only speaking from my experience. I'm an incredible loser. The weight just drops off. My mind is in the game all the time. The only thing I think about when I'm trying to lose is losing. Not what tastes good or what I want at that moment, it's about losing weight. So, for me, when I got to that magic number, I had a really hard time eating more mentally. Physically I was fine eating at deficient. I had energy, I felt good, but I knew if I didn't start eating more I'd keep losing weight. And I only had a 250 calorie daily deficient. I still had a hard time and ended up losing 5 more pounds because my brain hadn't caught up with the situation. You also run the risk of losing too much muscle if you are eat a large deficient longer.

So, no one can tell you how you will be at the end game. That only comes from experience. And if you haven't done this and been there, you can't know. You could also be someone who's lost and gained their whole lifes, someone who's good at dieting, but the end game is just this. You lose the weight, then you have to learn how to maintain it within 5lbs. For life. That's not as easy as you think.

So, I see you are sceptical of the reason why people say this, but most of the people who ARE saying it have been there and are trying to save newbies the issues they faced.

starwhisperer6

not even a bit skeptical just unaware of the reason behind it. Thank you.

GaleHawkins

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

@starwhisperer6 you make a good point. When our health recovers and we are eating the foods our bodies needs to maintain health then our weight should get back on autopilot.

If one has to watch what they eat forever then something is wrong health wise. The reason for 40 years I regained 100%+ after each weight loss in my case was due to never healing my body by my way of eating.

starwhisperer6

GaleHawkins wrote: »

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

@starwhisperer6 you make a good point. When our health recovers and we are eating the foods our bodies needs to maintain health then our weight should get back on autopilot.

If one has to watch what they eat forever then something is wrong health wise. The reason for 40 years I regained 100%+ after each weight loss in my case was due to never healing my body by my way of eating.

Thank you this was a pretty insightful response.

MondayJune22nd2015

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

autumnblade75 wrote: »

Well, I don't think you need to slow your loss to prepare for maintenance, but when you get very close to your ideal weight, it gets tougher to have a huge deficit without consuming so few calories that your body cannibalizes muscle for energy. If you want to conserve more muscle, you slow your roll and be a little patient.

That muscle cannibalizing, also includes your heart; this is what anorexics die from. As you get within approximately 25 pounds, of the minimum healthy weight for your height & frame, it's unhealthy to create a deficit; that would cause you to lose more than a half of a pound a week because you wouldn't be consuming enough. It's unnecessary to minimize your deficit to prepare for maintenance (that's preferential) but it's necessary to always consume enough.

msf74

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why?

There's a couple of reasons including psychological (if you transition gradually there's less likelihood of seeing a bigger jump up in calories leading to possible bingeing issues.

The primary physiological reason in having a smaller deficit when you are leaner is to spare lean body mass whilst still losing fat. The leaner you are the greater the potential impact of the body attempting to protect existing fat stores by finding energy from other sources in the bodies to include organs or muscles etc.

For the average person (rather than athlete for example) I think it is worth considering but not getting too stressed about.

lpadancer

The body can only pull a certain amount of energy from each fat cell each day. As you lose fat and get closer to your goal weight, it is smart to taper your rate of loss so that your body does not need to pull (excessive) energy from lean body mass that it cannot source from your fat stores. When you are already at a healthy weight (and definitely when you are on the mid to low end of healthy BMI), it is a good idea to shift down to .5lb/week. At 5'5'', I plan to shift to .5lb/week at 140 pounds.

Liftng4Lis

First, I think this is more the case when someone has more to lose. You had a total of 15 pounds so shouldn't affect you as much. That being said, the closer you are to goal, the smaller the deficit and the tighter the logging has to be, so you want to be able to eat as much as possible.
Say you take someone with 100 pounds to lose and they lose on 2800 calories a day, after they lose 75 pounds, they may be losing on 1500 calories a day. To keep that rate of loss, they would have to drop them more, and frankly, that sucks.
Remember, the winner gets to eat the most and still lose.

rainbowbow

GaleHawkins wrote: »

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

@starwhisperer6 you make a good point. When our health recovers and we are eating the foods our bodies needs to maintain health then our weight should get back on autopilot.

If one has to watch what they eat forever then something is wrong health wise. The reason for 40 years I regained 100%+ after each weight loss in my case was due to never healing my body by my way of eating.

Alternatively, it's important to note that most people gain a very small amount of weight gradually over time. I'm not talking about yo-yoing within a short period of time. One can gain roughly 20 pounds over the course of 5 years by eating only 40 calories over maintenance each day. And we all know there are days people eat way over that.

Most people need to check in every now and then on their calories and goals throughout their years to avoid this. This is the number 1 cause of people looking in the mirror one day and wondering how on earth they've gained weight. It's hard to notice and see if you aren't looking for it.

starwhisperer6

rainbowbow wrote: »

GaleHawkins wrote: »

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

@starwhisperer6 you make a good point. When our health recovers and we are eating the foods our bodies needs to maintain health then our weight should get back on autopilot.

If one has to watch what they eat forever then something is wrong health wise. The reason for 40 years I regained 100%+ after each weight loss in my case was due to never healing my body by my way of eating.

Alternatively, it's important to note that most people gain a very small amount of weight gradually over time. I'm not talking about yo-yoing within a short period of time. One can gain roughly 20 pounds over the course of 5 years by eating only 40 calories over maintenance each day. And we all know there are days people eat way over that.

Most people need to check in every now and then on their calories and goals throughout their years to avoid this. This is the number 1 cause of people looking in the mirror one day and wondering how on earth they've gained weight. It's hard to notice and see if you aren't looking for it.

Yep this is me, It took me 8 years to gain the 15 pounds I am trying to lose now. 8 years, 10 moves, a divorce and the addition of two jobs lol. It totally crept up on me. I do plan on logging a couple of days a week after I hit my goal just to remind myself to watch it.

usmcmp

Maintaining a steep deficit as you get leaner results in larger lean mass loss. If you have adequate protein and follow a resistance training/weight lifting routine you could potentially keep a larger deficit. You want to keep your muscle because it means you are losing mostly fat and give you better body composition at the end.

vivmom2014

I agree that it can depend on how much the person had to lose. I didn't have much to lose, so I kept a really low deficit and just decided not to hurry. Now that I'm at maintenance, I don't get *that* many more calories.

For someone who kept an aggressive deficit, I guess the transition at maintenance would be a bigger jump.

42firm03

To add to the "because muscles" answer: Each pound of fat on your body can only yield so much energy to 'make up' the difference between your maintenance and your actual deficit. Because you can trust that it will be made up somehow.

So if you are underneath by 500 calories per day but your body can only produce 300 of that from fat (just random easy numbers here). The rest is coming from your muscles. Which includes your heart. And possibly also slowing your metabolism to quit growing hair and stuff. Which is also bad.

Slow weight loss is not fun but it is healthy!

Other smarter than me people can tell you the actual number that a pound of fat can yield. It isn't much though.

usmcmp

@senecarr knows the numbers for fat metabolism

senecarr

usmcmp wrote: »

@senecarr knows the numbers for fat metabolism

What, the 31 calories / lb of body fat per day that can be oxidized in normal diet and NEAT deficits?

starwhisperer6

Very interesting. I am not worried at the moment. My nails are healthier than ever, my hair is growing, my weight lifting has gone up, and my energy level is great. If these things change I will be sure to slow my loss down. What interests me is this though my weight loss has not slowed at all at the same deficit. Which would make total sense if I had a bunch to lose, but as was pointed out I only started with a goal of 15 pounds which will put me smack dab in the middle of my healthy weight for height. So I am half way through and still losing one pound a week with no ill effects at the same deficit. Do I need to slow it down anyway? If it doesn't slow down on its own?

senecarr

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.

Mental preparation is probably a the most essential reason.
Most people can't sustain losing 2 /lbs a week (the upper limit usually seen here and allowed by the MFP software) - one study found that a normal person probably has a limit of 31 calories per pound of body fat per day that can come as a deficit from diet and NEAT: more than that limit means muscle loss / protein metabolism has to happen. Exceptions would be highly active individuals engaging in actual cardio and possibly people with higher than normal lean body mass, ie, weight lifters / athletes.

Other reasons include having a glycogen "snap back". When if strong deficits, and to extent, even in minor ones, your body isn't storing as much glycogen (and water that goes with it) in cells. Maintenance leads to these refilling and it can be 5 pounds of weight gain, from what I recall hearing from MrM27.

StaciMarie1974

This may be repeated (I haven't read the other responses) but as you lose weight, your total daily burn goes down.

Say you start at BMR of 1500; total daily burn without exercise ~1875 for lightly active; eat 1375 to lose 1 pound per week on average.

Eating at 1375 over time you lose weight, your bmr goes down as does your total daily burn. Because it takes less energy for a smaller body to function. Lets say after a while your weight declines steadily and your BMR is now 1300. Total daily burn without exercise would then be ~1625 for lightly active. If you're still eating 1375, your deficit is now 250 for about .5 pounds per week loss.

You'd either need to increase activity/exercise, decrease calories in, or lose at a slower rate.

starwhisperer6 wrote: »

I have a question which I hesitate to ask because the brand of advice given on these forums can be a bit... tenacious. But here it goes. Everyone keeps saying that as you get close to your goal weight you need to slow the pace of weightless to prepare for maintenance. Why? If I am losing and not feeling deprived what is the point of preparing? Is it just a fear that you will hit your goal weight and not remember how to eat? This whole point may be moot when I get to that point I may not be comfortable at the deficit I am eating at. But the idea interested me so I thought I would ask.