When to change your maintenance calorie goal

kgirlhart

I reached my goal at the end of July and so far I have been at my maintenance range of 135 +/- 3 pounds. I have gone as high as 137 and spend a lot of time at 135 but I'm starting to go down. This morning I was 131.4 which is below my range. Last week I did "bank" a lot of calories because we went out of town for the labor day weekend to a concert and I knew there would be drinking and restaurants, but I ended up not really going over on those days like I thought I would so I really did eat at a deficit last week. I guess my question is when do you up your calories (or move them down)? I don't want to rush to raise my calorie goal if this is just regular fluctuations, but I also don't want to keep losing weight. Should I give it a week and then go up if my weight doesn't stabilize? Or should I just realize that I didn't eat enough last week and make sure I hit my goal every day?

STEVE142142

All I can tell you about maintenance is it's a learning process. I started maintenance when I reach 220 pounds and I screwed it up real bad and I drop down to 208. I like to where I was at 208 and so it took me about a month to figure it out and I think I've reached a fairly good range now.

From what I've read from a lot of people who've been on maintenance for a while you would adjust 100 to 200 calories/ day either way for a week or so and see what happens.

RoxieDawn

If your weight fluctuates +/- 3 pounds normally and then you added some adjustments in your eating therefore you could have had a steeper deficit some days hense you lost weight.

If you are saying that your calories you are eating are maintain calories then you are maintaining already.. However if this is a deficit and not your real maintain calorie allotment, then make a plan to go into maintenance. edited as I read this wrong.

I also know that when I go to maintenance there is still gonna be these +/- fluctuations (in my case upwards 5 pounds).

jessicarobinson00

I am sure that you know: normal fluctuations are just that. That said, if you have been only maintaining since July..I wouldn't expect your weight to have dropped that quickly on true maintenance counts. I would probably up my calories 100-200 for a couple weeks and re-evaluate. I'm right where you are at: trying to find that sweet spot!

cwolfman13

If you were maintaining at your current calorie level, why would you up your calories? You had a week of smaller eating...no biggie...you're well within normal fluctuations.

kgirlhart

Thanks y'all. I kind of figured it was just fluctuations, but it is hard to find the sweet spot of how many calories to eat. Plus yesterday I had a neighbor tell me not to lose any more weight because I "looked better with your weight on". I think that comment and then dropping below my maintenance range kind of spooked me. I did eat less last week and I will make sure that I hit my goal this week. I like the idea of banking calories, but I'm not sure if it will work for me.

rsclause

Have a beer to celebrate and enjoy it.

sijomial

The way to confirm that you have actually found your maximum maintenance calories is to deliberately go over for a number of weeks.
Add 100/day and it's going to take 35 days to add approximately a pound.

You may be pleasantly surprised - calories in can affect calories out.

cwolfman13

kgirlhart wrote: »

Thanks y'all. I kind of figured it was just fluctuations, but it is hard to find the sweet spot of how many calories to eat. Plus yesterday I had a neighbor tell me not to lose any more weight because I "looked better with your weight on". I think that comment and then dropping below my maintenance range kind of spooked me. I did eat less last week and I will make sure that I hit my goal this week. I like the idea of banking calories, but I'm not sure if it will work for me.

Your normal fluctuations might be +/- 3 Lbs but that doesn't mean there will never be outliers. I'm usually up or down 2-3 Lbs day to day but yesterday I was up 5 Lbs and then down 7 Lbs this morning...it happens...it's an outlier.

I've been maintaining going on 3.5 years and I can tell you that you're just going to have that happen sometimes which is why it's important to ultimately keep your focus on the overall trend itself, not the number...I only ever make changes when I see something happening as a trend over the course of weeks...like 3-4-6 weeks.

cmriverside

I've never been one to have luck with banking calories. I'm at maintenance and have been for many years, and I can mess up my hunger/satiety response by banking calories. Every time I do it, it takes me a while to sort of reset my desires and contentment with food. It may be just me but now that I'm at maintenance I can really tell if I have under eaten for the day, because I just want to keep eating.

That lady with that remark? When oh when will people stop commenting on other peoples' bodies when they haven't been asked to do so? So rude.