I think the statistic is very real and current. It pertains to anyone who is using a "diet" to lose weight and then decides that they can return to their "normal" way of eating when they're done losing. How many of us on this very forum have done this? I sure have. I can't tell you how many "diets" I've tried and how much weight I've lost and re-gained. It's really depressing.
What isn't depressing though is what that actual 5% did. Those are the people that actually changed their lives and attitudes about food. It's hard to do and takes more work than joining a gym for 6 months or eating pre-packaged meals for 3 months, or drinking only shakes for 60 days, etc. We have to think of this as a life long challenge that doesn't end when we hit some magic number.
I'm fighting hard to get into that 5%. But I'm a realist. I know this is not easy and it never will be. I'm always amazed at people who talk about their weight loss as if they can't possibly gain it back. You know the ones who beileve they've found the answer and then lecture other fat people about how they can do it too. Or the ones who whine about plus sized clothing and say if fat women had less options they'd lose weight. Or those like Star Jones who say people shouldn't sugar coat the message and simply call people out as being fat. (Particularly interesting in her case because many people were calling her fat for a very long time and it didn't cause her to magically lose weight.)
And then you see them a few years later and they're right back where they started. So, we should all remain humble and dedicated to this for the rest of our lives.
You'll only fail if you convince yourself that failure is possible.
Failure is not an option. This is a lifetime journey, not a sprint to the finish line. Don't ever EVER give up. You won't fail if you don't give up.
You have total control over your failure or success in this journey. Only YOU can determine whether you will be successful... not some random statistic.
Statistics can be scary. The employment rate is scary - but I found a job (after over a year of searching). Average test scores can be scary, but I know people who have scored in the top percentile. That 95% thing was done in some study in the 50s, I guess you can argue that a majority of people will still regain the weight. But even if a majority did, it doesn't mean that you will. It means that people can, and some have and others haven't. I don't know what it is that caused those people to regain, I know I have a few times and it wasn't because I did some temporary changes, it was because I was an emotional binger and just making physical changes wouldn't cut it for me - we are all individual and who knows what will lead us to long-term or short-term success.
I haven't maintained for 5 years so I may yet become a statistic but I doubt it because as mentioned I'm not on a diet - I've simply changed my lifestyle. That said - I have maintained and been a healthy weight for almost two years and I have a "secret weapon".
I'm going to just beat the IF drum a little more. Sorry to sound like a broken record but for me IF has made maintaining my weight very simple and here is why.
Calories dictate fat loss or gain. (No matter what any person or website tells you this is a fact)
When you limit the number of hours you eat it is easier to not over eat. (Key word - easier not impossible)
The fact that there may be some additional health benefits to it are icing on the cake as far as I'm concerned.
It's not for everyone but if you like eating larger meals as opposed to fequent grazing IF might be for you.
Gosh, I didn't know I was supposed to fail...I've been at goal since 1977 after losing 200 pounds. The reason people fail is they go on diets. Once the diet is over, they return to old eating habits and regain.
Ha! I knew that sooner or later you would post something that I would agree with 100% and without reservation.
Congrats on maintaining for so long as well! Good on you!
I'll toot the horn of IF with you JohnP . I, without a doubt, know that I can maintain my loss for the rest of my life. I have control over my health, and not the other way around!
When I was diagnosed with Hairy Cell Leukemia in '04 I though I was about to die and really over ate. I gains 60# very quickly. But remission lasted 6 years then HCL again in '10 I gained again but more from inactivity and not as much. So I wanted to share a photo of my friend the frog. It was a photo my son traced for me when HCL came back the second time he tracing is on my desk at work. This is the photo he traced.
Idk about the accuracy of the stat, but I think it's like any major lifestyle change.
Look at the stats of recovering drug addicts and alcoholics, or former smokers. Sure there's some failure, of course lots of relapses, but there are also a lot of success stories. And small slips, or large slips, don't mean failure! Giving up is what makes failure.
Slipping back into old behaviors is the real danger, weight gain is the symptom of that. That's why it's said over and over to make it a lifestyle change.
I have read a few articles this weekend that all say the same thing, and it really depresses me. The articles all state that 95% of people who lose weight are destined to gain it back again.
I have already failed twice to keep the weight off. I can't go through the agony of regaining. But basically I only have a 5% chance of keeping the weight off?
The articles also say that surgery is the best way to keep the weight off, but I know that people fail after surgery too. I would be even more depressed to go through an invasive surgery and still fail.
If it is already a struggle just to lose the weight, what hope do I have to maintain the weight loss once (if?) I get to goal? Just having one of my self-pity moments...
Dieters may fail, but, lifestyle change people don't! Some days are better than others, and we will always have to be vigilant, but it's not impossible!
I find that the longer that I'm successful at maintaining, it is becoming easier, because it really is becoming my lifestyle.
I still have days when I don't want to workout, but I do anyway, because once I get there, I'm glad for the me time. Food wise, I still have days, I'd much rather call Pizza Hut for carry out, than go home and cook. Mostly I don't do that. But once a month I give myself a cooking break and order out.
As long as I eat healthy most days, and stick to my workout schedule most of the time, I can actually enjoy the now and then indulgence without guilt or weight gain.
You have to understand something about the weight loss statistics. Scientists basically have two choices when it comes to weight loss studies:
1. They do it all in the lab. That means the participants have all their food monitored, all their exercise monitored and due to funding restrictions they normally only can do these studies for a short period of time. WHICH MEANS very, very low calorie diets and way more exercise than normal. I'd be willing to wager that most of these participants go into starvation mode and the weight loss is just not substainable.
2. They rely on personal feedback. Again, this is extremely tricky because having someone reliable keep their own food diary is near to impossible. How do you know if they actually measured 1 cup of rice accurately? How hard did they run for 30 min each day? Did they take their measurements accurately? Are they being truthful about the number of the scale? What if they stop responding to your information requests?
Point is that slow weight, steady weight loss is extremely hard to study. The National Weight Loss Control Registry attempts to do this and have found much better statistics. BUT to participate you've had to have kept off at least 30lbs over a year's time. So clearly the participants already have it figured out to some extent..
Overall, you can rely on the statistics. There's just too much that go into them. Also, think about it in terms of yo-yo dieters (like myself). If they counted the number of diets that I've been on in my lifetime, well, there have been a TON of times that I've regained weight. That being said. This time IS different. I've been at this for almost 2 years without ANY regains. That in and of itself is huge for me. So clearly, it's possible even for the worst of yoyo dieters.
Regardless of how old the study may be, I'd have to say based on personal experience, real life friends, neighbors and acquaintances, I know of NO ONE, (IRL) who has ever maintained a weightloss...big or small. Every single person I know in real life who has dieted has gained it all (or most of it) back within a few months to a few years. Old, young, rich poor, popular or not. I am the only person I know (IRL) who has maintained a weightloss for this long. (so far). It is coming up on 3 years that I have met my goal, and it has never gotten easier, and some days I'll be honest, it is down right hard. BUT, because of those staggering statistics, I refuse to give up. I just keep plugging away, day after day because I feel pretty damned special being in that 5%. It's what keeps me going and knowing that I have so far beaten the odds is a great feeling. I'm doing it because I know I can, and I enjoy being a normal weight more than I love pie and ice cream!
I would also like to say that if those stats are based on the 50's or the 80's as some have mentioned, I would have to say they are more than likely even worse now. Since the 80's there has been more sugar, more processed, more chemical laden addictive food added to the grocery store shelves than ever before. It's nearly impossible for some people to free themselves from the cravings and addictions of all the crap being shoved at us today.
Yes, it's depressing to think that we have to WORK at this for the rest of our lives, but it is possible I think, and I truly hope that in 3 more years I can say the same thing! As they say, "It ain't over til the Fat Lady sings!"
I consider myself to be a dieter because my personal definition is that its someone who is eating at a cal deficit to lose weight. I try to incorporate habits so that I can regulate my weight-even thin people I know go up and down a few pounds and they immediately address that. I am not a yo yo dieter but I don't know if I am a lifestyle changer either...I made changes that I consider to be permanent, but I will have to up my cals to maintain my goal weight eventually.
So some habits might shift (unless I decide to continue losing more weight past goal or I find new habits that I want to incorporate) and others may stay the same. Either way OP, no matter how you define yourself, its about what works for you. The people I know who regained did not resolve their relationship with food, only their habits. I treat my body needs and body cravings differently and I never did before. I now look at my knee jerk emotional feelings and address them directly instead of trying to run away from them - anxiety is less scary when I actually face it, than when I try to run away from it with food.
Yes I can regain the weight, but I can also get struck by lightening. At least I can control the weight!
Often we don't know someone has been overweight unless they specifically say something. I can think of 5 people off hand (4 women, 1 guy) that I only knew when they were skinny but each of them told me they had lost a good amount of weight (30-60 lbs) and kept it off. People that have met me in the last 6 or 7 years don't know that I have weighed more than 300 lbs for most of my life. Sure we see struggles of others and we may also struggle but that doesn't mean we are doomed to failure.
Often we don't know someone has been overweight unless they specifically say something. I can think of 5 people off hand (4 women, 1 guy) that I only knew when they were skinny but each of them told me they had lost a good amount of weight (30-60 lbs) and kept it off. People that have met me in the last 6 or 7 years don't know that I have weighed more than 300 lbs for most of my life. Sure we see struggles of others and we may also struggle but that doesn't mean we are doomed to failure.
YES. and like in middle school or something too. When I first lost weight and people noticed I got a bunch of nitpicking, food policing, advice questions and talking about diet diet diet etc. It got so old. Even if the comments come, I think that I will try not to talk about it more than necessary - maybe I know more people hwo were able to lose a lot of weight, but they don't feel like getting tons of attention from it. Or its no biggie to them, so they just mention it in passing. I feel no shame that I am losing weight, but I don't want to talk about it all the time.
Often we don't know someone has been overweight unless they specifically say something. I can think of 5 people off hand (4 women, 1 guy) that I only knew when they were skinny but each of them told me they had lost a good amount of weight (30-60 lbs) and kept it off. People that have met me in the last 6 or 7 years don't know that I have weighed more than 300 lbs for most of my life. Sure we see struggles of others and we may also struggle but that doesn't mean we are doomed to failure.
This!
Since I moved half way through my weight loss journey most of my local friends have no clue how much I've actually lost. To them it looks like it's just a small amount. Unless it comes up in conversation (and it rarely does), I don't mention how high I was at my highest. I figure they know I've lost weight but at some point the actual number of pounds loss becomes irrelevant.
Also, I do know a number of people in my life who have lost weight and kept it off. They might not have kept all of it off but still the majority of it.
. I, without a doubt, know that I can maintain my loss for the rest of my life. I have control over my health, and not the other way around!
(from one cancer survivor to another)
