Not-So-Secret-Secrets To Maintaining Weight Loss, Ep #004

In today's episode, we are going to be talking about weight maintenance. You may be thinking this episode is not for me, I have not reached my goal yet, I'm focused on losing weight right now. BUT, you are exactly who this episode is for because you need to know where you're going in order to get there and stay there successfully. 

Sometimes knowing what you're getting into is really important to experience what you're doing fully. When it comes to weight loss, that is absolutely true. We tend to get very focused on losing weight when in reality we should focus more on maintaining weight because that's hard to do. It's as hard to maintain weight as it is to lose weight. Whether you're trying to stay where you're at and stop gaining weight or whether you're trying to lose weight and keep it off, this is going to be the talk for you. We're going to talk about how you get there, and how you stay there.

Points of interest...

  • Why it’s important to know where you’re going [1:51]

  • 5 things we’ve learned from the National Weight Control Registry [5:12]

  • How often do successful weight losers weigh in? [8:00]

  • Watching less TV and weight [11:44]

  • 90% of people who do this have lost 30 pounds or more and are keeping it off [13:15]

  • Having a consistent eating pattern [16:13]

  • When does it get easier? [17:19]

  • What to do with today’s information? [23:29]

90% of people who do THIS have lost 30 pounds or more and are keeping it off!

Of all the tips we talk about today this is the biggest one. It may also be the most overwhelming one. It’s exercise… 90% of people who have lost 30 pounds or more and are keeping it off are exercising an hour a day. That's a number that even in Denver where I'm at, a really active city, people kind of give me this look like an hour a day? Yes, you don't have to start there, but for long-term weight maintenance, it's where you want to be.

Now, the good news is that the vast majority of people in this self-reported study were walking. They were not doing anything crazy. They weren't going to CrossFit seven days a week, but you could do that. They weren't training for a marathon, but you're welcome to do that too. They were walking. 

The type of exercise is probably not as important as how consistently you're doing it. It doesn't have to happen all at once either. It could be spread out over the day where you take a few different walks with your dog or on lunch break. There could be some days you do 30 minutes and some that you do 90, it's an average. The nice thing about this hour-per-day number is that we see that it’s beneficial for everyone's health, regardless of what your weight was or is. We all live longer and better at 300 minutes of exercise a week. Good advice for everyone out there. 

Homework: What to do with what you’ve learned?

What are you going to do to help out future you? How do you maintain that large weight loss over long periods of time? Maintaining weight is just as hard as losing it but there are some well-documented things that people can do to make weight loss maintainable. These are great tips even if you're at the weight that you want to be at and you've been gaining a little over time and you don't want to gain more.

These are great habits that are going to help you stay at a healthy weight long term. The things that we heard about are 

  • 78% of people are eating breakfast every day

  • 75% are weighing themself once a week

  • 62% watch less than 10 hours of TV a week

  • 90% are exercising on average an hour a day. 

I want you to think about the future you and start doing some of these things now and slowly over time build more habits. They may not all be for you, but at least one of these things is for you, probably more. Pick at least one. If you're already doing one or two of them, great, add on one more and see if you can help the future you not be so lost and frustrated with yo-yo’ing and maintain weight loss.

Resources & People Mentioned

National Weight Control Registry

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Keep up Healthy Habits During the Holidays, Ep #005

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Why It's So Hard to Lose Weight, Ep #003