This is the fourth and final post in my series on the 4 shifts you need to make to lose weight sustainably and keep it off for good.

If you haven’t read the previous three posts, I recommend starting there:

• Part 1: Mindset – Going from a dieting mentality to a lifestyle mentality
• Part 2: Metabolism – Going from eating less to fueling your body
• Part 3: Movement – Going from random workouts to strategic exercise

Today, we’re covering Part 4: Maintenance—and honestly, maintenance is the whole point of everything discussed in this series.

If you can’t keep doing something forever, you won’t maintain the results forever either.

But also, you can’t keep losing weight forever. At some point, you have to decide that you’ve arrived and it’s time to maintain your weight and stop trying to lose more.

At the same time, maintaining weight loss is difficult. But, it’s not impossible. Keep reading to learn more about how to maintain your weight loss by starting with the end in mind.

The Sobering Statistics About Weight Loss Maintenance

Research shows that 80-90% of people will regain the weight they lost within a few years. Additionally, most people can only lose up to 5-10% of their body weight and keep it off (unless you’re on a GLP-1 medication, like Ozempic or Zepbound, which can help you lose this amount of weight or more and keep it off as long as you’re taking the medication).

What does that actually mean? If you weigh 190 pounds, you’ll realistically be able to lose about 10-19 pounds and maintain that loss.

But here’s the thing: it doesn’t mean maintaining weight loss is impossible. The National Weight Control Registry tracks people who have successfully lost 30 pounds or more and kept it off for a year or more. So yes, it is absolutely possible – you just need to be smart and strategic about it.

This is also why I put so much emphasis on body composition instead of just the number on the scale.

Why Most People Regain the Weight (And How to Be Different)

So why do most people regain the weight they’ve lost? And more importantly, what can you do to actually maintain your weight loss?

I know what you’re thinking: “Lainey, I can’t even lose weight yet. I’m not at the maintenance part.”But here’s what you need to understand: you need to start with maintenance in mind from day one. When you lose weight in a sustainable way, the maintenance and the weight loss go hand in hand.

The Real Problem With Diets

People regain the weight they’ve lost because no one ever taught them how to maintain their weight loss. Think about it – what was the weight maintenance plan when you were doing keto, Whole30, or Noom? There wasn’t one, right?

You did the program, lost the weight, stopped the program, and then gained it back (plus some). The programs were just focused on weight loss but didn’t teach you how to set up your life and metabolism to actually maintain that weight loss.

The Two Real Reasons People Can’t Keep Weight Off

Reason #1: The changes weren’t sustainable.

You couldn’t keep them up forever because you felt hungry, restricted, deprived, or all of the above. If you can’t keep up with something long-term, you’re not going to maintain your results.

Reason #2: They didn’t set their metabolism up for success.

Diets focus on “eat less, move more” – they’re focused on calories, not your metabolism. The problem isn’t that cutting calories doesn’t work for weight loss – it does. The problem is they didn’t teach you how to maintain that loss or set your body up to sustain it.

Why “Just Eat Less” Fails Long-Term

Here’s what happens when you only focus on eating less: as you lose weight, your daily calorie needs go down because you’re in a smaller body. So to keep losing weight, you have to keep eating less and less and less.

But that’s not sustainable because you can’t just keep eating less – you’re going to be hungry, and being constantly hungry is not a lifestyle you can maintain.

Not only that, when people lose weight, the body actually fights back. Appetite increases when you lose weight – the hormones that tell your body you’re hungry go up. Your body fights to get back to its previous set point. You’re not crazy, and it’s not just about willpower – your body is literally working against you.

You Lose Muscle (Which Slows Your Metabolism)

There’s another factor: as you lose weight, if you’re not lifting weights, you will lose muscle along with fat. When you lose muscle, your metabolism slows down, which means your calorie needs go down even more.

Here’s why that matters: muscle is metabolically active, so the more muscle you have, the more calories you burn at rest.

When you take a metabolism-first approach and build muscle from the beginning, you allow yourself to more easily maintain your weight loss. You’ve increased the number of calories your body burns around the clock without increasing your hunger. So you don’t just have to keep eating less – you can actually eat more and still maintain that physique.

The Solution: Why Sustainable Weight Loss Is Easier to Maintain

When you approach weight loss the sustainable way – by focusing on your habits, mindset, and metabolism – it’s so much easier to maintain. You’ve developed habits, behaviors, and routines you can actually keep up with, and you’ve set your metabolism up for long-term success.

How Habits Make Maintenance Easier

When you change your habits, things become second nature. You eat that high-protein breakfast because it’s a habit now, so it’s easier to keep up with. Plus, when we focus on habits, we think about what to add, not what to take away – so it feels doable and doesn’t leave you feeling hungry.

The Mindset Shift

You’ve also done the mindset work, so you understand this is the long game, not a short-term quick fix. You’re not waiting for it to be over.

When you’re on a diet, you’re thinking “when is this going to be over so I can go back to my life?” That’s the problem – you cut calories for a short time, then go back to living how you were before, add those calories back in, and gain the weight back.

When you embrace sustainable weight loss, this IS your life. You know that whatever you’re doing, you have to be able to keep it up forever.

Setting Up Your Metabolism From Day One

From the very beginning, you’re setting your metabolism up for long-term success. You’re not thinking about maintenance only after you hit your weight loss goal – the maintenance is baked right into the weight loss journey from day one.

The Habits That Set You Up for Success

These habits increase your metabolism and calorie burn without spiking hunger:

• Lifting weights to build and preserve muscle
• Eating more protein to fuel your metabolism and keep you full
• Eating more fiber to support satiety
• Increasing daily movement throughout the day

Now your metabolism is set up to work WITH you instead of against you. You’re fueling it properly and preserving muscle, which keeps your metabolism high.

If you keep taking a dieting approach – just eating less, choosing the lowest-calorie foods, doing workouts that burn the most calories – you’re not going to be able to maintain your weight loss. You have to think about your metabolism and how to set it up for long-term success.

The Hard Truth About Set Points

Your body has a set point range that it likes to stay in, and it’s easier for that to go up than come down. People who follow restrictive diets and lose weight quickly will see it come off fast, but then it comes back just as fast – usually with extra pounds.

But it’s not impossible to move your set point down if you do it the right way.

The Right Way to Lower Your Set Point

Focus on slow, sustainable weight loss of about half a pound to a pound per week, and lose about 5-10% of your body weight at a time.

At that slow rate, as you change your habits, your body will eventually settle at a weight (a 2-4 pound range). At that point, assess: is there anything else you could really be doing, and do you want to do those things? You could always keep losing weight, but what’s the cost?

Assess and Maintain

Once your weight has settled, I recommend trying to maintain that for 3-6 months or more. A lot of people can lose weight, but maintaining it is the real challenge.

During that maintenance time, shift from focusing on the scale to focusing on body composition. Lift weights, get stronger, burn fat. Take your waist circumference or use a pair of jeans to measure progress. Step on the scale occasionally, but don’t be obsessive about it.

The Number on the Scale Doesn’t Define You

This is really important: you can feel good at a number on the scale that is higher than the number you thought you needed to reach.

I have felt good in my body at 130 pounds, 140 pounds, and 150 pounds. You can probably relate – you used to weigh a certain number and thought you were heavy, but now you’d love to weigh that again.

The number doesn’t define how you feel. You can feel amazing at different numbers because five pounds of muscle and five pounds of fat weigh the same, but muscle takes up way less space. The scale measures everything in your body, not just fat.

You may have to come to terms with a new number – one that wasn’t your original goal, but it’s your healthy, happy number. You might need to change your goal weight and really focus on how your clothes fit and how you feel in your body.

Summary: The Maintenance Shift You Need to Make

In order to maintain weight loss, stop separating weight loss and weight maintenance into separate phases.

Instead, think: “whatever habits I change to lose the weight, I have to be able to keep up with to maintain that weight loss.” And focus on your metabolism from the get-go, not just eating fewer calories.

Maintaining weight loss is possible, but it requires a different approach than what you’ve been taught. Focus on habits you can keep forever, set up your metabolism for success, and be willing to adjust your expectations about what your “goal weight” really means.

Because at the end of the day, the number on the scale matters far less than how you feel in your body, your clothes, and your life.

Ready to build habits that support long-term weight loss maintenance? Download my free guide: 5 Habits for Sustainable Weight Loss for Busy Working Moms – these are the exact strategies I use with my clients to help them lose weight and actually keep it off.