How did you decide your goal weight?

My goal weight seems to be very fluid. When I was 335 my goal weight was 195. Then as I got closer I realized "Holy crap, BMI is.... ACCURATE? But I thought everyone said it was BS?" so my goal weight became 185 (the top end of healthy BMI for me). Then as I got to 190s I realize at 185 I'd still be chubby. Currently my new goal weight is to maintain between 170 and 175. But we will again reassess when I hit 175.

I don't give a hoot what I weigh, but I do want to get my BF% in the low 20's. I'm currently at 27%.

I didn't have a prior weight to work from. I've never been thin or lean. I've been fat, or less fat. I googled ideal weight and it gave me a range of 133-138, so that's what I'm aiming for. I'm currently at 150, and am guessing that 135 will be pretty accurate.

KiwiAlexP wrote: »

I'm 5'2" and started at 100kg so choosing 60kg as a goal put me at the upper range of a healthy BMI. Now aiming for 59kg (130lbs) so I'm in the 50's and then will decide if I want to go further. I'm currently just aiming at getting to "overweight" - 75kg and under

You'll make it :-) I'm 5'2" and started out at 95.5kg and weighed in today at 54kg. My initial goal was 60.4kg and I met that last July.... but once I got there I reassessed and have kept going. I'm now aiming for 52kg and will then see how that feels. At the end of the day it needs to be both comfortable and sustainable. It's taken me 3 years to get this far and I don't want to return to where I was.

I went for the high end of my normal BMI range. I was lower than that 30 years ago, but didn't think I wanted/needed to get to that point again. It was a good decision because once I got to my normal range, I basically stopped losing. I was unable to cut back further to create the deficit needed to keep going another 20 lbs. I am thrilled where I am. 150 lb lost. 2 1/2 years.

DasItMan91 wrote: »

Because it was the recommended weight range that I was supposed to be at to be healthy

Me too.

LOL! I haven't been a size 2 since I was 2! I was athletic or did blue collar work most of my under-35 years. But because I am made from good, solid, peasant stock, even "skinny," I've never been skinny. I've got big bones, and shoulders like a linebacker.
I'd love to be a not-one-ounce-of-fat-on-me 125 again, and do that while eating hot, fresh donuts every morning, and burgers with fries for lunch. But that was the year I was a chair lift operator, and you just burn wicked amounts of calories at that job.
135 is probably a really healthy weight for me, but because I am 57, I don't expect to achieve that. I have a post menopausal metabolism, and even though I have taken up running in my 50s, and enjoy it quite a lot, I really only expect to get down to 145. But here's the thing: I feel good when I'm 145. I have a waist when I am 145. So that's how I picked my goal weight. I choose reasonable over unattainable.

I looked at the healthy weight range charts for my height, and my goal weight is the lowest weight for someone my height with a large frame/large build. I'm 5'7 and my mother is 5'2, so she's significantly shorter than me. When I was a teenager I can remember starving myself and being 10 kilos lighter (around 22 pounds) than her. She gave me some of her rings to try on, and despite my being significantly thinner than her in terms of weight, I couldn't put these rings on my fingers. So this is why I feel I have a large frame/large build and why I am aiming to be in the top of my healthy weight range. Its a healthy weight for my particular body.

AnvilHead wrote: »

The most beautiful thing about choosing a goal weight is that it's not written in stone - you can change it any time you want to. If you set your goal for, say, 140 lbs., but decide when you hit 150 that you're happy there, you can just switch to maintenance and call it good. If you hit 140 and discover you still want to go lower, you just change your goal and keep on keepin' on until you reach a point where you're satisfied.

It helps to have something to aim at, so pick a goal that sounds reasonable to you and head that way. Re-assess as you go and re-establish new goals as you see fit. The beauty of it is that you're not locked into anything.

Absolutely agree 100%!

I've always used bodyfat %, rather than weight as my goal. My particular build doesn't work well with any charts, even at (what I expect to be) 10% body fat, according to BMI i'll be overweight.

I've been fat since my early teens, so I really have no idea what I would look like after losing. So I googled ideal bodyweight for someone of my height, found like eight different answers, and averaged them together.

For the record, I'm 5'11" and my goal weight is 161. When I hit that weight--and I will--I will maintain for a month or two and decide what to do. I have a suspicion that the best weight for me will be in the 180s, but I'll figure that out after hitting my goal.

Right now I'm at about 240, so I have quite a way to go before that becomes an issue.