maintenance, will it really work?

potluck965

Since I met my second goal weight I decided to take a break for a while and go on maintenance. The cold weather is making me ravenously hungry and rather than condemn myself to misery and failure I changed my goals to maintenance even though I eventually will try to lose another 5 pounds.

The extra few hundred calories that I am now allowed is like having a prison sentence commuted :laugh: But it is kind of scary to eat that much, even though what I ate in the "before" days was a lot more, obviously.

I will have to keep very careful track of the effect that this extra caloric intake will have, no different than when I was losing weight.

How is everyone else doing on maintenance? Are the guidelines that were automatically set up a reasonable amount?

I'd love to hear any stories, bad or good, so I know which way to turn

Caper88

Well I am not even close to that stage so I can not say. However it seems like a good plan rather then set your self up for failure. I think your going to have to work hard by keep your eyes on your cal so you do not gain. Good luck maintaining your current weight

shanolap

I'm not very knowledgeable on this subject, but over the holidays I used maintenance so I wouldn't feel terrible for exceeding my goals. I was on maintenance for 2 weeks and then went back to my goal of losing 1 pound per week. So far I have succeeded. I do know that the body reacts well to confusion.

I am very interested to what other people have to say! Good luck to you!

rybo

I've been on maintenance since right after the holidays. So far I'm holding steady.

paroxysm

I'm on maintenance (after using MFP for weight gain so I guess not exactly the same) I use both MFP and a fitbit to calculate what I need for maintenance and MFP is usually low so I think your safe with what MFP calculates for you as long as you're honest.

I dropped weight using just MFP as it put me too low when I asked for 'maintenance' as a goal. with fitbit I've been able to match a little better and now am holding much more steady. I guess YMMV but you should be fairly confident upping your calories if you were previously losing weight.

LaurnWhit

bump