Maintenance?

charcharbec

So... I am now about 15 lbs from my goal. WOO. However, I am not thinking about what maintenance is going to look like. I eat below 1200 calories (honestly if all you are going to do is tell me how unhealthy that is I am going to ignore your post--- you don't know life situations or what my support system looks like). Anyway, I am scared of gaining weight (going to try and create a buffer if I can), but I want to be able to increase my caloric intake once I get down between 110-115 lbs. I figure I will probably end up up and down 5 lbs a ton. I exercise 6 days a week now, and plan to continue that as I increase my intake. Is 200 cals every two weeks too much too soon? Should I be doing 200 every 4 weeks? I have a physical at the end of February, and hope to be even close to my goal by then and plan to ask my dr. about it. But thought I would try to plan for now too.

Thanks everyone for your help in advance.

melsinct

What do you currently have MFP set at (pounds/week)? When I got to 15 pounds from goal, I set MFP to lose 0.5 pounds/week, which makes your deficit 250 calories a day instead of 500 calories for 1 pound/week. Most people I talked to on MFP did the same thing around 10-15 pounds out from goal to ease their way into maintenance. Not to mention, most people physically can't lose 1 lb/week up to their maintenance weight. Bodies tend not to lose weight in such a linear fashion.

It is impossible for you to gain weight by eating more if you are still eating in a deficit, so don't worry about it. If your maintenance calories is 1800, there is no way you can gain weight by eating 1550/day (which would be a 0.5 lb/week loss). Approach it with common sense, not fear of being fat: a deficit is a deficit.

Lastly, if you aren't eating 1200 a day, will you be able to eat more as you get to goal? How will you be able to eat maintenance calories? I am not judging at all (just in case it comes off that way via internet), I am genuinely curious.

charcharbec

I can technically eat more as I get to my goal, I am just finding that I have very steady weight loss at the caloric level that I am at..... I guess my thought was that when I got a few lbs under my goal weight, I would just add 200 calories every couple weeks until I got up to maintenance calories.