This idea doesn't make much sense to me. Input welcome.

You know how some people say that losing weight too fast is bad 'cause you'll be more likely to gain back all the lost weight and then some, well I don't understand how this is possible. What's the theory here?

Logically, I would think, one should be equally likely of gaining weight back, regardless of weight loss speed, depending on one's eating/exercise behavior.

 

Thanks.

 

I think people say that because one may be able to control themself for a few weeks to quick drop the weight they need but then just return to their old eating habits they do not take the time to resolve the issues behind their eating problems

Your body starts thinking that you're living in a place with very little food, and that you need to save the fat, so you don't die of starvation. I'm not quite sure about the scientific stuff, but that's pretty much what it is...maybe?

My theory is that when you are dropping weight fast it most likely means that you are in a very restricted diet. A diet that you will probably won't be able to stick to for the rest of your life and one which you will get tired of and eventually quit. On the other hand, if you are losing weight at a slower pase it most likely means that you are in a diet that allows you to eat a lot of things but in moderation ( Like eating half a burger instead of the whole thing). So when you loot at it you are more likely to stay with the diet that allows you to eat more but that will make you lose weight at a slower pase.

 

Well thats my own theory anyways :P Hope it helps =D

If you drop weight too fast, it means you are on a diet which is not sustainable in the long run. Excessive caloric restriction leads to well-known psychological consequences including obsession with food and bingeing behaviour. So not only are you more likely to go off your eating plan, you are more likely to go nuts on food when you do. Hence... more regain. Furthermore, excessive caloric restriction will lower your metabolic rate, sometimes sharply (aka conservation or starvation mode, which you will hear about a lot on CC) and this means that when you do "crack", you will put on weight faster than you would have otherwise (for a couple of weeks, anyway, until your metabolism heals back up).

When you drastically cut your calories below the level you need, your body is unable to metabolize fat fast enough (you can only get 31 calories of energy per pound of fat per day, melkor mentioned, here), and to make up for the energy demands it breaks down excessive amounts of muscle to make up the difference. Muscle burns calories by just being there, fat does not. By breaking down all that muscle, your Basal Metabolic Rate (the amount of calories you burn by existing and nothing more) has gone down, because you're no longer having to feed those muscles.

Even in the event that you go back to a normal diet and don't binge because you're body's screaming for food after suffering through too large of a deficit for too long, you now must eat even less than you should be able to just to maintain your weight.

If you manage eat at a level which is appropriate with your lower amounts of muscle, your new maintenance level, you would maintain. This is hoping that you're not on the shorter side, because then you might need to eat less than 1200 calories a day to maintain, and then you'd have that whole nutrition problem (info here, second-to-last question)...

I digress; but if you were overweight, you've likely had trouble sticking to even a maintenance level for a normal person, let alone this new, lower level. You never really learned how to eat a balanced diet, just how to restrict, or over exercise. Now you either have to continue to do so for the rest of your life, restricting even further as normal aging slowly lowers your metabolism, or gain it back.

Also, most drastic weight loss is achieved by fad diets or so called 'detoxes' and 'cleanses', or even down right fasts, which are unhealthy to do*, and even more unhealthy to stick to. Actually staying on one for the rest of your life is just ludicrous. Even just highly restricting calories while eating a variety of foods isn't sustainable. In the end, with either option, whether it's 800cal/day or only eating chicken soup, you have not retrained your eating habits, so you go right back to your old ways as soon as the 'diet' is over. Thus, in the end, you gain.

Add in the complications of the starvation/retention mode, which also lowers your metabolic rate and confuses your hunger signals ... You're just digging yourself into a hole, that could be avoided by most methods of gradual weight loss.

That's what I think, anyways. I'm no expert. :o)

 

* Disclaimer on the 'fasts are unhealthy' thing: I know if done properly, there's nothing wrong with safe, short-term fasting, but fasting for maintainable weight loss is just silly. Of all things, fasting is especially not maintainable: if you don't eat, you die.

edit: reworded 3rd & 4th paragraphs to make them more clear and added link.

I've heard theories from nutritional scientists that the body establishes a weight zone in which you naturally stay at.  You may fluctuate 5-7 lbs within that zone but your body will correct it as you go up and down.  According to the theory, as you lose weight beyond that zone, the body attempts to get back in its zone by triggering eating impulses.  They argue that the only way to avoid this is slow and steady so that your body has time to create a new zone.  Once again, these are theories, but I know for 5 or 6 years my weight fluctuated from 167-173 (I'm a guy) regardless of my exercise or eating habits until I started working out heavily (and essentially shocked my body out of that zone).

dcyounts, there is some support not only for the concept of set point, which is what you describe, but that set point can be changed slowly and with some effort. I believe that we all have a set point within the healthy range, and to maintain lower than that winds up being 10 times more work than it "should". However, dedicated and prolonged overeating (i.e. my 20s) can change it upward, so that you wind up with a new obese "set point" based on your unhealthy lifestyle, that you maintain, more or less, whether you eat lots or a little on any given day or week. Only by returning to a healthy lifestyle will the set point go back down - and your body will demand little plateaus along the way, to give itself little intermediate "set points".

if you loose weight too quickly you are probably not eating enough calories and damaging your matabolism. If you damage your matabolism, when you start eating normaly again your body wont be able to keep up with the food you're eating and you'll gain all the weight back. If you loose weight at a slow and steady pace you are going a lot easier on your matabolism and helping it to get faster as you get thinnner and you'll be able to keep the weight off.

usually this is said.... as most others before me have said too, because you need to make a life style change. Also because your metabolism will slow down to keep what you have, so things need to be adjusted, not just switched

Original Post by lynnlette:

When you drastically cut your calories below the level you need, your body is unable to metabolize fat fast enough (you can only get 31 calories of energy per pound of fat per day, melkor mentioned, here), and to make up for the energy demands it breaks down excessive amounts of muscle to make up the difference. Muscle burns calories by just being there, fat does not. By breaking down all that muscle, your Basal Metabolic Rate (the amount of calories you burn by existing and nothing more) has gone down, because you're no longer having to feed those muscles.

The one thing that I consider in this is the category we call "morbidly obese" (although on here they have a nicer term for it).  There are links from here and elsewhere that people who are obese wind up burning fat and not much muscle.  Some of these concerns do not have the same effect.

I digress; but if you were overweight, you've likely had trouble sticking to even a maintenance level for a normal person, let alone this new, lower level. You never really learned how to eat a balanced diet, just how to restrict, or over exercise. Now you either have to continue to do so for the rest of your life, restricting even further as normal aging slowly lowers your metabolism, or gain it back.

I also think this is the whole point.  For those of us extra large people, the key is that we have to completely relearn how to eat and continue to do so the rest of our lives.  I think this is why gastric bypass is successful too.  In my opinion at least.  It forces people to completely revamp how they eat.  They have no choice, and willpower (or lack of it) really does not factor into it until they've been doing it for such a long period of time.  So, I am now eating below what my maintainance will be once I'm at my ideal weight.  In doing so, I have a larger deficit which should, hypothetically, lead to a faster loss initially.  That's not necessarily my intent.  But what's the point of lowering now and then getting used to that and having to lower it again.  And again.  And again as I lose more weight.  That seems counterintuitive, since I'm trying to set up patterns of behavior now.  I still struggle with eating as many fruits and veggies, less chocolate and cheese.  But, I have made a fairly big change in cutting my calories back and stuck with my range for 3 and a half weeks.  Making that sort of pattern is what matters.

So on this I'm with mortalmonkey.  I know you also started with over 50 lbs to lose.  No idea what your BMI is, but I have read some of your stuff.  Love seeing success stories...helps me stay focused.  Anyway, I think it's different for us larger people, as opposed to people trying to do only 10-20 lbs.  I think they problably slip more than those of us with big losses.  Consider it, by the time I reach my goal, at least a year and a half will have passed of these good habits.  That's a long time.  But somebody much smaller can do that in 1-2 months at 2 lb loss a week.  Seems like it'd be harder to keep that pattern.