Scared of Maintenance

sarah2harris

Is anyone else afraid to transition into maintenance? I hit my goal weight, and then went ahead and lost another 6 lbs. I'm afraid that if I start eating more calories, instead of maintaining, I'll start gaining. Even eating only 1200 calories a day, there were weeks where I didn't lose any weight, and weeks where I gained as much as 1.5 lbs. To really complicate things, half of my thyroid was removed last year, and I'm on thyroid supplements. I feel like my metabolism is not normal because of this and can be very unpredictable. I also feel like starting maintance right around the holidays is a mistake. Any suggestions?

beethedreamer

i would suggest upping calories gradually. Don't just start eating maintenance calories right away because your metabolism won't be used to it. If you up your calories by 50 or 100 calories every few days, your body will be able to eventually process the increased amount of calories and you won't gain weight.

lukasmac

add 250 calories and try for 2 weeks... weigh yourself at the end of the 2 weeks and if you lost add another 250... continue until you feel you are maintaining.

potluck965

Yeah, I'm wondering about it, too. I lowered my original goal weight because I was afraid I didn't have enough cushion in case I gained before I could regulate maintenance. As a result I will probably not make my reduced goal until the first of the year. Better than the holidays, but still going to be hard because it will be the dead of winter and hard to get outside and hard to motivate myself.

I actually bought a heart rate monitor in anticipation of this. I figure I am going to have to work just as hard at this once I am on maintenance so I wanted to know a little better what I was burning in the course of my daily activities.

Let us know how you are doing. Maybe we should ask for a Maintenance subforum on here.