I’m starting maintenance and need advice please!

_L_A_
_L_A_ Posts: 170 Member
edited December 26 in Goal: Maintaining Weight
🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁

I’ve decided to maintain my current weight 🥳

Roughly... I want to stick between 10 stone and 10 and a half stone (aka 140-147lbs, or 63.5-66.5kg, average 65kg). My original goal was 132lbs, but I am happy where I am, so I’m going to stick here for now, I think it’s the right thing for me

I have never really maintained my weight, there’s only even a couple of times in the last ten years where I was happy and wanted to try to maintain my weight (but failed). The rest of the time I still wanted to lose weight, and then spiralled in to binge eating and gaining

I don’t even know where to start with maintaining my weight

Current plans
- continue 16:8 IF as it helps my diabetes control
- continue low carb diet but increase fats and protein to reach maintenance calories
- slowly increase my calorie intake until I am maintaining
- start strength training to help alter my body composition

How often do others weigh themselves whilst maintaining? During losing weight I weighed in between once a day and once a week, I was thinking of continuing daily or at least every 3 day weigh ins whilst I adjust to maintenance over the next few weeks, and then where should I settle? Once a week, a fortnight, a month? Continue daily? 🤷🏼‍♀️

Any other tips and advice? 😊

I am excited to be maintaining!

Replies

  • rheddmobile
    rheddmobile Posts: 6,840 Member
    Are you diabetic, or just pre? Either way eating lower carb is a good idea if you’re concerned. I’m type 2 and find that I can eat quite a few extra carbs on days when I run, but otherwise I need to keep under 45 g net per meal. Everyone is different though! Find what works for you.

    Personally I weigh every day and log every day, and plan to do this forever. I think many people can ease up on logging if they pay attention to their weight, or ease up on weighing if they pay attention to their logging. But since I need to track carbs anyway, logging is the simple way of doing it for me, and weighing more often lets me learn my body’s normal fluctuations.

    Speaking of fluctuations, I have a six pound range. If I hit the top end I take action until I reach the low end.

    Best of luck to you! I’ve been maintaining three years now following a 125 lb loss. It’s much easier with the right tools and the right attitude, and it sounds like you’ve got both.
  • DancingMoosie
    DancingMoosie Posts: 8,619 Member
    I weigh every day and try to stay within a 5lb range. One weigh in doesn't necessarily mean you gained that much, look for trends. If I'm trending at the upper range for a few days, I'll cut back cals somewhere, add a snack if trending low.
  • _L_A_
    _L_A_ Posts: 170 Member
    Thank you all 😊

    I think I am the same as you all and would rather daily weigh ins to get more data points allowing me to spot trends and correct them quicker! But hopefully when I’ve maintained for a while I will be comfortably able to weigh slightly less frequently!

    rheddmobile wrote: »
    Are you diabetic, or just pre? Either way eating lower carb is a good idea if you’re concerned. I’m type 2 and find that I can eat quite a few extra carbs on days when I run, but otherwise I need to keep under 45 g net per meal. Everyone is different though! Find what works for you.

    Personally I weigh every day and log every day, and plan to do this forever. I think many people can ease up on logging if they pay attention to their weight, or ease up on weighing if they pay attention to their logging. But since I need to track carbs anyway, logging is the simple way of doing it for me, and weighing more often lets me learn my body’s normal fluctuations.

    Speaking of fluctuations, I have a six pound range. If I hit the top end I take action until I reach the low end.

    Best of luck to you! I’ve been maintaining three years now following a 125 lb loss. It’s much easier with the right tools and the right attitude, and it sounds like you’ve got both.

    Wow I don’t know what I’m most impressed by, the 125lbs down, or the maintaining for three years! Both are very impressive, well done!

    I actually have a very rare type of diabetes, it’s genetic, not type 1 or 2, closer to type 1 diabetes in that I do not produce enough insulin, but treated with tablets like type 2! Regardless I need to keep an eye on my carb intake, but it’s very hard to relate to either type 2 or 1 diabetics!
  • mtaratoot
    mtaratoot Posts: 14,389 Member
    As a recovering scientist, I also like more data. I'm in the weigh every morning under the same conditions camp. I can have large fluctuations on a daily basis, but am able to keep track of the longer term numbers more easily.

    I have two ranges I try to stay within. One I call my "ideal" range, and it's a six-pound range. The other is my "absolute" range, and it has the same midpoint but is +/- five pounds instead of three.

    I definitely log every day, pretty much everything I eat. I weigh many things and estimate others. I find that using the scale helps keep my powers of estimation calibrated better. It seems to work ok. I've only been maintaining 26 months, so I'm still learning. I expect I will need to pay attention forever because I love to eat, and I don't think it would be too hard to slowly slip back into old habits and... POOF, then I'm no longer maintaining.

    Stay in touch during your transition to this part of your journey. May you enjoy it and the results it brings.
  • kgirlhart
    kgirlhart Posts: 5,188 Member
    I think your plan sounds really good. I also weigh daily. I don't worry about the fluctuations that way and really only look at the trend.
  • nanastaci2020
    nanastaci2020 Posts: 1,072 Member
    I'm an all or none in terms of tracking. When I was maintaining successfully, I still stepped on the scale most days and logged my food. I did allow for more frequent estimation. And of course I aimed for a higher calorie #.

    I maintained for a few years. When I stopped, I stopped doing all of it. Walking/running regularly. Stepping on the scale. Logging food. I don't think I stopped doing everything on the same day, but ultimately I was not doing any of those things that help me stay on track. Then began the slow cycle that ended up with me +18 by this time last year. I did not get whole-hearted into the process again, but did lose 8-10 by March then totally gave up AGAIN. Routines got whacky due to COVID. Back up to 148. 148 is my magic # it seems, as it is the point when my jeans reach that point where I can (barely) get them zipped but can't breath lol. Got back 'on track' in mid June and I'm down 11.

    For me, I need to log, weigh in, etc. permanently. I'm a creature of habit. If I relax on one habit, it becomes a slippery slope.
  • Strudders67
    Strudders67 Posts: 989 Member
    Congratulations. It is exciting to be at this point.

    I weigh weekly, with occasional mid-week checks. I reached maintenance just at the start of lockdown, coinciding with suddenly being at home on furlough, away from endless snacks in the office vs gym closed but then doing a long, brisk walk every day to get myself out of the house for a bit. Although I was eating my exercise calories, I found that the calories MFP gave me as maintenance still had me losing, so I now eat around 100 cals more, a few times a week. The mid week weigh-ins just help me check that I'm still maintaining although, since I increased my calories a little, my weight has only fluctuated within a 2lb range.

    Like others, I'm still logging daily. It helps with carb tracking and I'm hopeless at eyeballing portion sizes so expect to be doing this for a very long time.
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