After my first cut, I didn’t reach the big weight loss goal I had in mind. And I was torn. 90% of me was ready for maintenance to get a mental break from dieting. And the other 10% told me I wasn’t working hard enough and I must not want it bad enough to keep going.
It was a constant battle of internal noise.
My body was telling me I needed a break. And my ego was trying to lead me astray.
OUR BODIES AREN’T MADE TO EXIST IN A CALORIE DEFICIT FOR LONG PERIODS OF TIME.
How did I know I needed to go into maintenance?
1. I found it harder to stick to my macros. My BLTs increased. My pre tracking decreased and I was doing more on the fly tracking.
2. My weight and metrics stabilized. Up here and down there. No declining trend line, but a straight line showing I was maintaining.
3. I was getting diet fatigue. Planning my meals, calculating macros, making modifications for social events, weighing, measuring, grocery shopping, meal prepping… I was over the entire process. More head noise started to creep in, constant thoughts like “I just want to eat the damn donut 🍩 without doing math or worrying about the macros.”
You see, despite doing all the things I had to do while losing weight were the EXACT SAME THINGS I did when in maintenance with this ONE BIG EXCEPTION:
In my first cut, I associated dieting with deprivation #scarcitymindset and that lead to intense mental fatigue. As such, my slip-ups became more frequent and extreme.
As I’ve entered my second cut, my mindset has shifted. I’m choosing this. I don’t have to do it. I want to do it. I’m not tied to it. I’m allowing my body to tell me if we keep going or if we stop.
Having a year in maintenance has taught me some great tools:
👉🏾 maintenance is NOT a pause on progress!
👉🏾 increased mindful eating
👉🏾higher quality sleep
👉🏾better stress management
👉🏾hitting lift personal bests
👉🏾improved mental health
👉🏾increased confidence
👉🏾improved self-esteem
👉🏾healthier lifestyle habits
When you can truly adopt this mindset shift about maintenance, you’ll set yourself up for another successful stretch of dieting if that’s what you want!
