Answer: There are some scientists who believe in individual “set points,” which
may explain the difficulty many people experience when it comes to
maintaining weight loss. Practically speaking, your “set-point” is
influenced by your attitudes towards eating and activity and your
appetite/satiety. That said, many people do successfully maintain
weight loss by becoming “addicted” to the lifestyle that allowed them
to reach their goal.
The more weight you lose and the more fit you become, the harder it may
be to continue to lose weight. This is normal. It is not that you need
to strive for an increasingly greater deficit, but you may find it more
difficult to achieve your desired deficit. There are factors that work
against you and make continuous fat loss challenging. As you get fit,
you use fewer calories to do anything. It is similar to tuning-up your
car; when it runs better, it gets better gas mileage and uses less
fuel. Exercise causes the body to increase efficiency of its systems as
well, leading to less fuel, in this case fat, being used. With weight
loss we have a good news/bad news scenario. The good news is you lost
weight! The bad news is you weigh less, so anything you do becomes
easier from a calorie burning perspective. It is considerably easier to
move 150 lbs for 40 minutes than it is to move 175 lbs. These little
adaptations can lower your daily calorie burning, chipping away at your
deficit.
So, what can you do? Changes in exercise and daily activity are the
most realistic options. Never letting the body get used to one way of
working out can help you maximize your calorie burning during and after
a workout. Changes to the intensity, length of time, type and number of
days can keep your calorie burning high. Also, now is not the time to
start getting lax with food intake. Little cheats lead to bigger and
more frequent cheats. This can add a few hundred calories (what you
burn in a cardio session) to your daily intake very easily. Lastly,
supplementation at this time may offer a means for maintaining an
energy deficit by increasing your 24 hour energy burn and/or decreasing
the amount of food you eat.