Find your set point to achieve weight loss success
If you want to lose weight - and lose it for good - follow the 10 percent rule. Try to lower your body weight by that percentage and then stop losing for a while. Fight instead to keep off just that amount.
So if you weigh 180 pounds, aim to lose 18 pounds in the next three to six months. If you weigh 220, aim for dropping 22 pounds.
Stay at that level for at least six months to give your body a chance to adjust to its new, lower "set point." Your set point is the weight that the body has established as normal, and the body has mechanisms that fight to return to that weight.
So says George Blackburn, associate director of the division of nutrition at Harvard Medical School. His research and other studies show that dropping as little as 10 percent lowers blood pressure, cholesterol and the risk of diabetes.
"You breathe so much better, you sleep better. You have less fatigue and more energy. You take fewer medications and have fewer medical problems," Blackburn says.
Plus, you see the results. "You lose weight from the top down - out of your face, out of your neck, out of your chest and out of the abdomen. So what you see in the mirror looks better."
Blackburn outlines his ideas in Break Through Your Set Point: How to Finally Lose the Weight You Want and Keep It Off, written with Julie Corliss (Collins, $24.95). The book is based on his research with 12,000 to 16,000 overweight or obese patients over 30 years.
He says people often try to lose too much too fast. "They try to stretch the rubber band too far, and they gain weight back."
Your current weight, give or take a few pounds, is the current set point, and it is determined by many factors, including genetics, how you respond to the environment, what and how much you eat, how active you are and how you cope with stress.
Many people are at their healthiest set point about age 18, after they stop growing and developing. Most experience slow, steady weight gain throughout their lives, causing the body to believe its set point is higher than it should be, he says.
People's weight increases over time because they consume too much, aren't active enough or don't lose extra weight they gained during vacations, holidays or pregnancies.
Once you raise your set point, it's difficult to lower it because the body has complex systems designed to defend that higher weight, he says.
Those systems include hormones and chemicals that affect appetite and hunger. In fact, your own body fat works against you, he says. Anytime you eat more calories than you burn, the energy goes into fat cells for storage. When all those fat cells are full, they signal the body to make more fat cells for storage.
You can reduce the fat in the cells, but the cells are with you for life, and fat cells have leptin and other hormones that influence your appetite, he says.
Thomas Wadden, an obesity expert at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, agrees that weight is regulated by a complex set of signals and hormones. "While dieters would probably like a repairman to stop by and adjust their set point, it's not that easy."
Blackburn says it's possible to lower your set point. He suggests that dieters:
Consume at least 450 calories at each meal so you feel full and satisfied until the next one.
Limit your choices at meals. The more choices you have, the more you'll eat.
Get plenty of sleep. Studies show that people who sleep less than eight hours a night are more likely to be overweight.
Be as active as possible. Stand or pace while on the phone, he suggests. Take short brisk walks and climb stairs. Many people need to be active for 60 minutes or more a day to maintain weight loss, he says.
Once you get to that 10 percent goal, see how it feels, he says. Then if you want to lose some more, by all means, give it a try, Blackburn says.
"Involve your family, friends and community. That makes it easier."
Nanci Hellmich
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