Why is maintaining weight loss so hard?

trophywife24

I think that often times people use deprivation instead of moderation to loose weight. I've seen some people I know fall into the "I'm skinny now, I can eat what I want" state of mind after they loose weight...... then they gain everything back and then some. They used food deprivation (extremely low calories, zero carbs, things that just aren't possible to maintain) to loose weight without changing their relationship with food, portions, exercise etc and it just didn't work out for them.

kelsully

First of all....finding the right calorie target can be tricky...need enough but not too much. Also, if one has a bad week during weight loss they might not lose as much that week. If one has a bad week or two in maintenance they will gain. As soon as there is a gain people have the emotional struggle of needing to not give up on themselves. Also, there is the mental game involved in which one thinks they can reward their success by having a treat etc.

LoraF83

Because the vast majority shot their bodies in the metabolism and lost muscle mass and whacked up their systems.

Maintenance level must be less because they have less muscle. The metabolism is not shot for long, but as soon as the initial weight gain happens they drop cal's again.

That first big 5 lbs weight loss, mostly water, usually comes right back on again, mostly water.

DING DING DING - we have a winner!!!

LuvHinesWard86

For me maintaining is much harder for a couple reasons. One is i started thinking "I've got this, I know what I'm doing" and the other is because the scale goes up & down and the "exciteement of losing" is over.

seansquared

The easy answer is that most people have absolutely no clue as to the macronutrient makeup of the food they're stuffing into their mouths.

mgobluetx12

Maintaining weight is hard because it requires a permanent lifestyle change. You can't get rid of the fat and go back to old habits without regaining the weight.

This is it exactly. I've only lost a lot of weight once before, but it was because of WLS, which didn't, huge surprise, teach me any better habits. I've totally revamped the way I think about food. I won't be regaining this weight.

AntWrig

There is a confluence of factors that make maintaining weight loss very difficult for many people. First of all, when you lose weight, your metabolism slows a little; this is called adaptive thermogenesis - it is permanent, it is inevitable, and it is generally proportionate to the total amount of weight lost. This means that in order to maintain weight loss, a person must eat fewer calories than they are used to eating for the rest of their life; even less than a person who naturally maintains that same weight (i.e. a person who didn't have to lose weight to get down to that particular weight). Further, leptin levels drop when a person diets, and they never fully rebound back to their original levels when a person starts eating at maintenance level, meaning the person always feels a low-level persistent hunger, even when eating at maintenance calories.

The most effective strategy to protect against weight regain is actually consistent vigorous exercise. This has the tendency to attenuate appetite and drives the body toward defending the new, lower weight as its set point. While it is possible to lose weight with diet alone, exercise becomes absolutely critical in weight maintenance.

While your metabolism does slow down due to prolonged dieting, it's not permanent. Moving from a weight loss phase to a maintenance phase should be a slow and gradual process. You most definitely don't have to exercise vigorously to maintain your weight.

reliableopinion

This is often due to yo-yo dieting. For permanent weight loss,it is absolutely necessary to have a complete mental shift. Cleanse and detox are crucial.

seansquared

Cleanse and detox are crucial.

Your body "cleanses" and "detoxes" itself. Please don't post this junk. Thanks.

jillica

Complacency.

AMEN!

RoadsterGirlie

After I hit my goal, it took me about six months to properly learn maintenance, and to know exactly how many calories per day my body needed to maintain.

If you don't go through this process and learn proper form, you are almost guarenteed to gain it back. I lost 90 lbs, and there is NO WAY IN HELL I will ever go back. I am enjoying life way to much right now to ever give that up.

I will say it is harder when you are skinny, and people around you make comments and ask questions as to why you are still watching what you eat. Food pushers really come out of the wood work the closer you get to goal (and the longer you are at goal), and I'm sure I'm not the only one who experiences this.

BCSMama

I'm maintaining now and agree that it's stressful at times. For me, I am still very careful about what I eat and logging it in and staying on track with exercise. Not that I need a ton of encouragement, but it definitely declines and replaced with the attitude that it's okay to "cheat" or "stop dieting" or skip the exercise because you're thin now.

sc1572

I think it's harder because your weight fluctuates so much. There is no excitement of seeing the scale going down every week. It just seems like such a battle with the scale. Plus I haven't upped calories, I just stopped losing.

^THIS!

escloflowneCHANGED

Because a lot of people do fad diets and don't take the time to learn about proper nutrition...

emrogers

Because a lot of people do fad diets and don't take the time to learn about proper nutrition...

A lot of what people posted is true. This above has to be the main reason that years ago when I started losing weight and lost weight I gained it all back. I had NO clue about diet and nutrition which I do now but for some reason it's harder for me to lose it this time around. This time what I have learned is the the BIG secret: Lifestyle change!!!!! and you have to keep looking for new goals. You always, always, have to better yourself. Losing weight and hitting all the small goals is great but once you're there you still need to find other goals to hit. This is why you see people who are already thin say things like, "I want to lean out, or I want abs" then you hear people say, "but you already look good!" To us yes, they do, but to themselves they have other goals they want to accomplish.

DanaDark

Weight loss means going under a certain number. Weight gain means going over a certain number.

It is very difficult to actually know the exact number but easy to say around X. So, to lose weight, eating a good portion under X will result in weight loss.

If trying to maintain, you have to eat X exactly. But what if your estimate of X was off by 100? That means when you are trying to maintain, you're actually eating 100 extra calories a day.

Behavior wise, the difficulty to maintain is cause by people that did it incorrectly. They followed a diet plan, they did MASSIVE amounts of exercise, etc. They never actually did something to permanently change their behavior. Without learning how to eat properly, what is good for you, and what foods do what etc. it is difficult to manage your own food intake properly.

jaybird951

for me it has been due to falling back into old habits.....

yoovie

some people reached their goal weight after fighting with emotional eating for years - sometimes that may relapse and cause them to struggle.

some people may have reached their goals after fighting against inactivity or laziness and they may struggle with that relapse.

some people never had food or laziness issues but they have a very small weight so it's easier to see the fluctuations.

some people never had food or laziness issues and never have a problem with the flux once they reach maintenance either because they are so in tune with themselves.

hth.

cwolfman13

Maintaining weight is hard because it requires a permanent lifestyle change. You can't get rid of the fat and go back to old habits without regaining the weight.

This is exactly right...too many people use "diet' as a verb when they should be thinking of it as a noun. When used as a verb, there is an inherent end to "dieting"...a goal weight is reached and wala...diet over...when used as a noun, it's a lifestyle.

alliebeck2

While your metabolism does slow down due to prolonged dieting, it's not permanent. Moving from a weight loss phase to a maintenance phase should be a slow and gradual process. You most definitely don't have to exercise vigorously to maintain your weight.

Long-term persistence of adaptive thermogenesis in subjects who have maintained a reduced body weight.: http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/88/4/906.full.pdf

There are also numerous papers that have documented an attenuation in weight regain among subjects who engage in vigorous exercise on a regular basis. Also, please note that I did not say it was necessary to exercise vigorously to maintain weight loss; I said it tends to be one of the most effective strategies for attenuating regain -- not the only strategy.

RoadsterGirlie

I've successfully maintained a 90 lb loss for exactly a year now. My mindset is the same as it was when I was in weight loss mode - I just get to eat more calories.

I still track my food, and get plenty of activity and exercise in. I weigh myself daily.

If I don't do this, I know I can plan on gaining it back.