Will you regain the weight?

“Of course not,” you say. “Others fall off the wagon. I’ll be different!”

How do you know?

Personally, I thought I’d maintain my weight forever, but now I’m not so sure…

Spend time in weight maintenance forums and you’ll see common reasons why maintainers regain: they stopped counting calories, they stopped exercising, they returned to junk food, they go off plan and don’t get back on.

Simple, I thought. Don’t ditch those healthy habits! Do them forever. Do them for life.

However, there are other reasons why maintainers regain: divorce, death, injury, unemployment, pregnancy, depression, etc. I haven’t experienced any of those except unemployment, but luckily I was still living at home with parents willing to help.

This means I haven’t been truly tested…yet.

It’s easy to say you won’t regain, but you never know what the future will bring. It’s easy to be big and brave during the good times, but what happens when things take a turn for the worse? At an all-time low, you might say, “Screw being healthy!” and let go because you’ve got more important issues than counting calories and strength training. Suddenly you gobble down pizza instead of nibbling vegetables. Now you surf the internet after work instead of exercising. Alcohol drowns your sorrows better than water ever could.

Basically, don’t ever assume you’ll never regain the weight and more. No maintainer sets out to regain yet millions slip from relapse to regain and don’t realise until it’s too late. Yes, some of them simply fell off the wagon and/or ditched their healthy habits. On the other hand, circumstances changed in ways they couldn’t help or imagine until they lost control.

This could happen to us too.

In short, remain on your guard forever. NEVER assume you won’t relapse or regain. I’m not saying you should live in fear, but remember where you’re coming from or you’ll end up going back there…