Maintenance Range Question

My doctors goal for me was 120.  I just don't feel like that is good for me at all.  My goal is 150.  When I got to 160 I started feeling that I looked a little sickly like it was too much too fast.  I still want to get to 150 but I am not sure if I should shot for the doctors goal. 

I am curious how others of you decided on what your maintenance range is and how broad is your range? 

This is a very individual thing. My surgeon's goal was 155, mine was 145. I ended up reaching 145 but bounced back up to 155 when I started weight training (lost inches, but gained weight so I'm still smaller than I was at 145).

I looked sickly when I first reached goal. But between exercise and the passing of time, my fat and muscle redistributed and I look much healthier now. I think it's typical to look a little sickly when we first reach our goal or lowest weight. And then after some time, things settle into place.

You have to decide where YOU are most comfortable. I'm 5'5" and 155. Others at the same height are in the 120's. This used to bother me and now it mostly doesn't bother me anymore. I'm me and this is what works for me. I look good and more importantly, I FEEL good. If I eventually decide to lose some more, then that'll be fine too.

I have people comment now that I am too thin. My PCP cautioned me not to lose anymore (seems weird since I am slightly above a healthy BMI). But I'm a size 6 most days, small shirts, so that's pretty reasonable, I'd say.

That's not a real definitive answer, but we're not one size fits all. Good luck!

How tall are you?

My suggestion would be to check out your body fat percentage. That's really what affects your health is too much body fat. That may help you solidify your goals.

You want to be healthy, but in the final analysis it's YOUR body. You know it best.

 I'm 5'4". My doctors goal for me was 175. Yeah, I know, right?  My goal was 149.8 because I just wanted to shed 100 pounds.  My healthy BMI is 145 so I decided to aim for that once i got the 100 off.

Anything under 145 is ok.  My comfort zone is 141-143.  This summer I've been hiking 30-40 miles a week and I've seen my zone creep up to 143-144. a few times.  I want to pull that back down and not get into eating extra calories because winter means less activity particularly if I find a job.

Its such an individual thing.  Line up ten women my height and weight and we will all look different.

I set my goal to be in the middle of the normal/healthy range of body composition (typically body fat % in the teens for men, twenties for women) rather than BMI which only really has meaning for populations, not individuals. On a BMI basis, I'm still overweight, but am a healthy composition due to fairly high lean mass.

It can take a while for things to redistribute once you lose what you are going to lose (which is why the plastics guys generally advise that one waits a year or so after reaching goal weight to have any reconstruction done) so it is not unusual for one to look a bit sickly or over-lean at first (part of this is also just your appearance relative to the fat you that you have been used to seeing all these years!) Try to get a handle on your body fat % to get a better idea of where your goal should be - body composition scales cost in the $50-100 and can be used daily (and should be to get a good average reading) and bodpod or hydrostatic body comp tests cost a similar amount on a one-time basis.

I'm 5'8" and wanted to get to a normal BMI so that I wouldn't get the "lose weight" lecture from my PCP. That's 160 for me, but I wanted to see if I could hit 150, where I spent much of my 20's and most of my 30's. At 150, I started to try to maintain, but kept losing. Add a gallbladder removal and a facelift and I easily maintain at 137-138. It turns out that I have a small frame and as others have said, I looked gaunt at the end of my loss. I've been maintaining now since January and look loads better and feel great at this weight. Inches are still moving around even though the scale is not. I'd say pick a weight where you like how you look and feel and can maintain without too much effort.

Dr. Alvarez didn't set a goal for me, but I set it at 130, because that was my weight as a young adult before I got fat and the few times I actually got all my excess weight off in those early years.

Whoa, no way!  When I got to 150, I was looking really scrawny.  Although I am only a bit above five feet, I'm 59 years old, not a cute young thing like I was last time I weighed 130.  I finally figured out that at this age and after all the years of carrying over 100 pounds of excessive avoirdupois, I'm carrying about 20 pounds of blubber on my hips and backside that won't go away.  They are waaaaay smaller than when I weighed 265, of course, but they aren't what they were when I was 25.  

So 150 it is, and I'm thankful for it.  Even though I'm wearing 12s and 14s, sometimes even 16s, I feel slender, and people tell me I "look wonderful."  I choose to believe them, ha ha :-) 

You do what you feel comfortable with....

--Dorothy

My surgeon just shot out a number for me ... 150. Probably because I am 5'5 and that puts me at the highest end of normal on the BMI chart. I think I will be happy at 145 so that is what I am shooting for. I also hope it gets me in size 6 but we'll see. I'm not that anal about that part.

My surgeon set my goal at 164. Not 163 or 165 ... I'm 5'8", big boned and have a lot of muscle mass. I'm pretty thin at 175, which was my goal, and it's as low as I've gotten thus far. But how I look and how my weight redistributes over time has been interesting and pretty drastic, so I've delayed having any plastic surgery until I know where I'm going to land, though I'm approved for a TTuck in January and might go for it. Also, I started working out, lifting weights, cycling and doing TRX, and immediately, I mean within ten days, my body looked totally different. I also stopped losing weight and gained a little, which is normal.

Then I had a freakout and started eating crap and put on weight, but that's strictly because I started snacking on slider foods. I've put a stop to that and am trying to come to terms with feeling safe about life without hiding inside a fat suit.