Maintaining Weight Loss
Dennis Hamming provides six tips to help you maintain your ideal weight.
After several months of eating healthy and exercising regularly to reach your ideal weight, it can be disheartening when the numbers on the scale start going upwards again.
Once you reach your ideal weight after a period of weight loss, you face another challenge: trying to maintain your new weight. If you are not careful, it is straightforward for those lost pounds to start coming back.
When it comes to staying healthy, losing weight is only half the battle. If you want to maintain your ideal weight and keep the pounds away, you should keep the following tips in mind.
Weigh Yourself Regularly
Do not put that scale away just yet. The first tip to maintaining a healthy weight is to check your weight every couple of weeks to make sure that you are not gaining weight. While some weight fluctuations are normal, if you notice your weight is steadily increasing, it could be a sign that you need to change your eating habits or come up with a new exercise routine.
You can always use a TDEE calculator to estimate how many calories you should be burning a day based on your weight. TDEE stands for Total Daily Energy Expenditure.
Keep Exercising
When you are trying to maintain your weight, it is still essential to burn a certain amount of calories each day. While you might not need to complete as rigorous a workout as you did while losing weight, you still need to be doing physical activity each work to maintain your weight.
Find ways to stay active throughout the week, even if it is only taking a walk around your neighbourhood. Calculate how many calories you need to burn each day to maintain your weight, find an activity you enjoy, and burn those calories.
Watch Eating Habits
Do not slip back into poor eating habits. To maintain a healthy weight, you will still want to eat a balanced diet. This includes not skipping breakfast, getting plenty of protein, and eating leafy green veggies. Also, make sure to drink plenty of water so that you stay hydrated.
Try to avoid eating too many carbs or sugary treats. While it is possible to enjoy these foods while maintaining a healthy weight, you want to avoid eating them too often. It is all about finding the right balance between healthy eating and the occasional treat.
Find Support System
One of the reasons some people regain weight after a period of weight loss is that they do not have a support system. When losing weight, most people tell friends and family so that people will hold them accountable.
You are going to want a support system even once you are at your ideal weight. Find friends who will walk with you, find a fitness buddy to go to the gym with, or try new healthy foods as a family. Having the right people around you can encourage you to keep up with your healthy eating and exercising habits.
Develop a Plan
One of the best ways to maintain weight is to come up with a clear plan of how you are going to stay healthy. Then, make sure to stick to it! Sometimes, developing a plan means thinking through potential roadblocks and how you will handle them.
For example, it can be easy to eat unhealthily or not exercise over the holidays. Come up with a plan on what you can do after the holidays are over. If you are planning on eating a lot of unhealthy food over Christmas, maybe you can do additional exercise the week after Christmas.
Do Not Get Discouraged
Keep in mind that some weight gain after a period of weight loss is normal. If you find yourself picking up a few extra pounds, do not get discouraged. Instead, think about what you need to do differently.
Maybe you have started eating cake again and are eating too many calories. Or perhaps you have started drinking more soda instead of water. Think about what worked while you were losing weight and what has changed. Then, change your routine again. If you are struggling to keep weight off, you may need to reach out to a professional nutritionist or a professional trainer.
Final Thoughts
Once you have lost weight, you still need to exercise, eat balanced meals, and live an overall healthy lifestyle! If you find yourself falling into bad habits, you may find yourself regaining weight. If this happens, do not get discouraged! Instead, revisit your goals and determine what aspects of your life you need to change to maintain a healthy weight.
Page Reference
If you quote information from this page in your work, then the reference for this page is:
- HAMMING, D. (2019) Maintaining Weight Loss [WWW] Available from: https://www.brianmac.co.uk/articles/article545.htm [Accessed
About the Author
Dennis Hamming is a freelance journalist.