When you are ready to take charge of your health and lose the excess weight, know that losing the weight is only half of the battle.  Keeping it off is the other half.  A useful link found on the MAMSI website gives valuable information on how to maintain a healthy weight once you have worked so hard to get it off.

According to the article “Lost Weight? How to Keep it Off” from MyOptumHealth.com, going up and down with your weight has many negative effects.  Some of these negative effects include anxiety, bingeing, and additional challenges losing weight as you age.  Research has shown that women who weight-cycle gain more weight over time than women who do not fluctuate.

Some tips included in the article to keep the weight off includes recognize that you cannot go overboard once you reach your goal weight.  You must watch what you eat each day and only add about 200 calories back into your daily diet.  Weight yourself weekly.  This will keep you accountable if you do happen to have a bad week where the pounds pack on.  It can happen fast.  Get support from others and of course stay as active as you can to help maintain a healthy weight.  By following these simple guidelines you can keep off all of the extra pounds that you worked so hard to get off.  Staying healthy not only improves your quality of life but can lower health insurance rates, and life insurance premiums.