If you've lost weight, how long did it stay off for? Did you gain any back?

[AutisticLegoLover]

I've been reading various articles where it's stated that around 80-95% of people put most of the weight lost back on or even end up weighing more. There's various diets to choose from of course and some suit people more than others.

I want to lose the extra 9lbs I gained thanks to a combination of medication, peri-menopause, chronic conditions and eating too much of the wrong thing. Mainly the latter. I'm losing it slowly by eating less junk, making healthier choices, proper portions, exercising more, increasing fibre and fruit and veg, and not eating after dinner at 5/6pm. I would usually consume half a days calories in the evening through mindless snacking so I've stopped that. I'm less bloated which is a big plus. Essentially it's not a diet plan, it's a healthier lifestyle plan and it works for me.

If you've done keto, Atkins, paleo, fast800, 5:2 or whatever else there is and lost a significant amount of your body weight (eg from obese to a healthy weight) did you gain any back once you stopped following the diet? Or did you make long term changes once you'd lost the weight to maintain the loss? As a trained nurse a lot of the popular diets go against the principles of health I was taught at uni and by the NHS Trust head dietician I studied with so Im dubious as to their long term benefits and worry about risks eg from high fat diets.

What's your experience of weight loss? I'm wondering the point if most of us will put the post weight back on again.

Nearly 4 stone off, kept off for 3+ years by logging on MFP. I don’t cut anything out, I’ve had a huge bar of chocolate today!, but I will keep to my calorie targets the majority of the time so going a little over my maintenance calories every once in a while doesn’t cause any weight gain.

A big bar of chocolate now and again is much needed I find! That's an impressive loss! Well done!

Part of me is wondering what's the point of people dieting if most will only gain it back again?

Came back in 4 months.
Tracking calories and exercise to lose.
Now sedentary and excess calories.
Lifestyle to lose and stay lean too hard for me.

Took a year to lose.

That must be soul destroying. How much did you lose in that year?

I know some posters argue that exercise has no effect on weight but it does for me. Half term and no walking to school etc sees 2 to 3lbs go on. If I didn't exercise I'd have to eat a lot less.

@AutisticLegoLover i have a lovely graph that spans almost daily weigh in's from november 2015 to today. prior to my current graph in 2008 i was at my highest wt. 193 lbs.
i loose some and gain some back BUT never to the same degree so loose 15 gain back 7 almost always over the winter months.

when i get to 145 it is very hard for me to get lower. partially because i don't mind how i look at 145. but should be 135 to be in the top middle healthy bmi zone.
it doesn't really really bother me, i know it's a long term project and the canadian winter months are difficult and my winter weight gain is pretty typical over here.
my body likes to have a certain percentage of muscle mass before the weight loss kicks into gear.

Through fairly strict calorie control I lost 35lb in 3 months early 2022. Kept it all off and actually lost a few more pounds over the rest of the year.

Since Xmas I decided to make the effort to lose the final 10lb to get to my goal weight. I have 3lb to go then I’ll go back to maintaining.

I have changed my eating habits pretty fundamentally and I’ve found it very easy to not regain the weight so far.

I do more exercise now than I used to, but it’s the change in eating habits that’s been effective.

I lost 24 kilos, starting weight was well over 106 kilos but I didn't get on the scales. Kept it off for 5 years. I then lost another 10 kilos due to undiagnosed diabetes. That ten kilos came back very quickly once the diabetes was treated.

Now on ozempic and losing slowly. I expect to be on ozempic lifelong and the research seems to show that the weight stays off while you are on ozempic. People who go off ozempic/semaglutide tend to gain the weight back despite lifestyle changes and dietary changes.

I find that to lose I need to diet and exercise.
To maintain weight I need to exercise whilst making healthy choices, and by healthy choices I mean not binge eating which I'm prone to.
I'm fairly active, walking a lot and going to the gym but it seems to work

Lost 3 stone a few years back and have kept it off, don't think I'll ever put it on again unless I have health issues.

However I transformed my diet and exercise regime for life, and I did it fairly slowly not as an epic crash diet. You can't just lose quickly and then go back to the old ways, which I think is where other people fall down.

I lost 3.5 stones over twenty years ago, through a combination of calorie counting and increasing exercise. I usually put on a few pounds on holiday, over Christmas etc, but know what to do to lose it again and have never been more than 10lbs heavier than my preferred weight. I didn't look at the process as a diet though, I looked at it as a lifestyle change.

If I didn't exercise I'd have to eat a lot less.

the thing is, many people simple eat too much anyway. There’s nothing wrong with eating a lot less. My maintenance calories are just below 1,700 calories. When I first started tracking, so I could see where I was going wrong, there were days I was consuming 3,200 calories whilst thinking ‘I hardly eat anything’!

TDEE and MFP have changed my life.
tdeecalculator.net

@ThisLighterLife my maintenance calories are currently 2000 a day. I'm very active walking 60 miles a week at pace up and down big hills. My bmi is 24.4 at the moment.

I was a fat child and teenager. I lost 3 stone in my 20's and kept that off through three pregnancies by calorie counting and cutting back when I put a little on.

Then came the menopause and this method seemed to stop working and I went from a size 8 to a 14 in two years.

I then tried 5:2 and successfully went back to a size 8 - I am only 5 foot and have a small frame

I now still fast on a Monday, eat healthily Tues-Fri and relax on weekends. If I ut on more than 3lbs I increase the fast days to 2 and will then lose about half a pound a week

It works for me and my lifestyle

OP you can either do a refeed and stay active.

Or have a look at louise parker. There were some threads on here. I lost my stone that I needed, now using the principles most of the time to maintain. It's basically no sugar, not a lot of starchy carbs, if you do have carbs such as oatcakes, you have a nut butter/houmous with them to balance the sugar rush in your body. Once you get how to build a meal it's easy.

I was diagnosed with asymptomatic type 2 diabetes 2.5 years ago, and took seriously the advice to shed 15kg & see if I went into remission.
A bit of googling around led me to low carbing, which made a lot of sense to me because:
a) diabetes is carbohydrate intolerance'
b) there are no 'essential carbs' (unlike fats & proteins)
c) a lot of our junky snack foods are carb based.
d) my diet was quite carelessly carb-y - muesli breakfast, sandwich lunch, pasta/rice with evening meal.

So, I completely overhauled my way of eating, with a view to this being permanent. Once I'd lost 17kg and was officially in remission, I did relax up a little bit (occasional bread, baked potato etc) for social ease, but the weight has pretty much stayed off.

I would add that part of my mindset during the 'mission' (I really really wanted to defer having to start diabetes medication!) was to find 'things other than food to treat myself/make me happy' . It was quite a mindful approach, and that continues.

I lost 3 stone from start to end of 2019. Stayed off until covid, ive put the 3 back on and 2 more.

The first time I lost weight was in my twenties - the only time I have ever been on a diet. I lost about 20lb and put 10 back on, which left me bang in the middle of BMI which I stayed at for twenty years.

Then started on medication which caused rapid weight gain. Put on 30lb. I lost 15lbs of that just by exercising regularly for a year with no change to my diet. Stopped exercising due to change of work pattern. Gained about 5lbs in 6 months.

Now back to exercising again. I will sort my diet out at some point - I eat way too much. But I like to do things one at a time, so they stick.

I lost 2 stone about 18 months ago. Over the course of a year I then put a stone back on but I've eaten and drank like a pig and done no exercise whatsoever, so of course I am going to put it back on. Pulling it back now and getting that stone back off. Problem is when I stop weighing myself, I take my eye off the ball, I need every day weighing to remain accountable for my own gob.

Your body will always want to go back to the biggest it has been.

I've been doing a lot of eating whole foods, lots and lots of plants, good fats from evo/seeds etc and full fat milk. Not a lot of bread/croissants/rice/pasta. I do eat potatoes. Did you know manufacturers add molasses to bread to make it appear healthier. If I do eat bread its now rye bread. I am going to devour a french stick with butter for my birthday treat 😂 my sugar intake has decreased dramatically along with ultra processed food. It's nice that I don't have to calorie count to maintain what I currently am although I do still want to lose another half a stone.

I'm hoping I can maintain this way when this half a stone has shifted. We'll see.

I lost a couple of stone when my first child was about 2. Kept it off for 4 years quite easily, put it back on when second child was born (but lost it within a year so not sure if it counts). However put it on again over lockdown combined with peri menopause. Lost it again but much much tougher to stay same weight now I’m late 40s.

Your last paragraph resonated with me. I need to do more of this. I have mostly mastered the ‘not eating food as comfort’ bit, but I’m not sure I’ve found a replacement that makes me happy. I’m going to think about that some more. I’m interested to know what is on your list of things that make you happy or treat yourself.

Also your post made me think about how I would eat food out of habit… I work from home, and I would habitually wander into the kitchen for a snack whenever I needed a break. So instead, each morning I would make sure that I had some other ideas for things to do when I needed a break eg empty the dishwasher, wash the dishes, empty the bin, add more wood to the fire, etc. None particularly fun, but they distracted me, and I felt better when they were done.

They also meant I was moving about, which is better than just grabbing something from the cupboard then going back to my desk and mindlessly eating it.

I also need to weigh myself every day to remind me that eating more food = gaining weight. The reminder each morning really helps me to make better choices each day.

A list of things to have/do for a treat rather than a snack would definitely be welcome! Well done on reversing your diabetes!