Loose Skin - Opinions

You'll likely end up with some, but you have youth on your side. The only way to know is to get there. Is loose skin a reason to hold yourself back from getting to a healthy weight?

Incidentally, at 21 I had a baby and was gifted with a ton of stretchmarks during my pregnancy. It's not the end of the world. Almost everyone has them.

To be blunt, not meaning to be harsh: We have no way of knowing. Most people end up with (I believe) less loose skin than they expect, once they reach goal weight and then allow some extra months for the loose skin to shrink. Part of how much this will occur is genetics, but youth helps. The stretch marks are irrelevant to whether your skin will shrink or not (and, after you lose weight causing the stretching, they may fade with time - again, genetics and youth.)

I'd suggest you go over to the Success Stories part of the forum, and find posts by people who have lost very large amounts of weight. I think you will be surprised, and mostly pretty happy, seeing how they look, after some time has passed, especially. They may have some loose skin, but it usually is not a huge amount (compared to what people expect at the start), and it's rarely noticeable when they're wearing clothing. You will find photos over there where people are wearing less clothing (bathing suits, for example), showing the loose skin in detail.

I'm going to post exactly what I wrote on another thread recently:

For folks still somewhere in the middle of the weight loss process: For quite a few of us, things look discouraging part way through, because skin shrinkage happens slower than fat loss, and can't happen in a major way until enough fat is gone that it is no longer conspiring with gravity to keep the skin stretched out.

Forgive the analogy, but we start out like a water balloon that's totally full of water: Plump, rounded, almost firm fat mass. As we lose, the fat cells can deplete anywhere in the fat mass, so the fat areas get more squishy, and even droopy, like a water balloon with some water removed (but no air added). The skin can't much shrink, because the remaining squishy fat is pulling it down and keeping it stretched.

This is a point where people sometimes get discouraged, think this is loose skin (or that it will look like this permanently, anyway), and sometimes give up. Don't!

For a lot of us, things look worse part way through weight loss, but improve as we get closer to goal, and for quite some time beyond goal.

As a previous post helpfully showed, true loose skin is thin wrinkles, like wrinkles in fabric. (Note, You can see these specific photos in this thread: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10711416/is-this-excessive-skin, in the "spoiler" items in a post about halfway down page one.) That kind can shrink more readily, but it's slower than fat loss. Thicker wrinkles or rolls, like 1/2 inch plus, still have some subcutaneous fat. Most folks will see more of the "thin wrinkles" stuff, and gradually less of the "thick wrinkles/thin rolls" squishy stuff, along the route to goal weight. Then, the thin wrinkles skin can keep shrinking for months to years (mine was still shrinking well into year 2 of maintenance.).

At goal weight, we can still have some of the area with subcutaneous fat pulling on skin in some areas. Continuing exercise, especially strength exercise (during loss and at goal), can really help minimize this over time, by increasing muscle mass at the same steady weight (which implies a very slow loss of fat, because it's the same body weight, right?). Exercise (all sorts) and good nutrition may also keep skin healthy and more elastic. Also, some people find that the residual small amount of fatty tissue rearranges itself a bit in maintenance, whether through the skin shrinking despite the gravitational effect, or something else.

I'm not trying to say "no one should ever have loose skin removal surgery". That's an individual decision.

What I'm trying to say is that if the results midway through loss are worrying to you, try to step back and recognize that things will very likely improve as you continue down the path of loss and maintenance. Don't get discouraged, don't give up: It gets better!