Maintainers: What happened when you switched?

mikeyrp

When you switched to maintenance did you:

1) Continue to loose weight for a short while.
2) Start gaining immediately.
3) Manage to maintain straight away.

I have 5 'vanity' lbs to go and I'm concerned that if I switch to maintenance after I've lost them I'll continue to loose for a few weeks and end up underweight... Something I want to avoid. Any advice/ experience you can share?

HeidiMightyRawr

I gained a few lbs but then I wasn't all that good at sticking to the cals either in that time, and it wasn't immediate.
After I started being more disciplined and sticking to cals (still maintenance) I managed to lose again though. Depending on how light you end up after you've lost the 5lbs you may still carry on losing. If this happens and you feel you're getting underweight, you can manually switch your cals to higher than what they give you, start about 100 extra and stop increasing it when you start to stay the same :-)

broadsword7

Hi, I am not at maintenance yet, and I am curious as to the replies you might get to this question. But I also wonder this: After hitting my maintenance goal, if I am still losing extra fat, and not muscle, and have energy, and feel good, would that not be a good thing? It seems to me that all things considered, if one is eating right and doing the proper amount of exercise, the body will determine it's ideal weight. Whatever goal we establish for ourselves, based on scientific calculation, etc., would there not always be a bell curve, since every body is somewhat unique?

louiseei

I've been gradually transitioning to maintenance.
When I was about 3lb off target weight of 133lb, I switched my settings from 1lb a week loss to 1/2 lb, and I actually lost more. Since then I've added 50 cals to my daily target each week, and last week, when my goal was 70 cals off maintenance level, I lost 0.6lb (rather than the projected 0.1lb). I'm now on maintenance cals from today and don't want to lose any more, but we'll see.
Maybe I'm above my ideal weight , but I doubt it - I'm 5'7 and 130lb (3lb under my target) and starting to look a bit bony up top, though I could tone my legs more I suppose.

Good luck with your transition.

rybo

I lost a couple more lbs after hitting maintenence mode, but then I evened off.

mikeyrp

Thanks guys. Based on that I will wait until I hit my goal weight rather than running down slowly.

Legs_McGee

I switched to maintenance mode after I hit my goal weight in mid April - now I have a 5 pound range I stay within. So far it's been fairly easy. A couple weeks ago I dropped below the bottom end of my range but I've pretty much evened out.

bunchesonothing

I have been maintaining my weight so far, no increase or decrease for the past couple weeks or so.