Weight Management – What Is It?
- Jay Homewood
- Oct 21, 2024
- 4 min read
Weight management is the process of maintaining a healthy weight for your age, height and gender. It is not just about dieting, but rather the process of making sure you are at the right weight and maintaining this over a sustained period. Moving from being overweight or underweight to a healthy range is a temporary measure, but maintaining that healthy range is the result of a lifestyle change and requires an ongoing understanding of what your body needs to remain in this range. This is necessary for people who are overweight but also those who are underweight or who have been diagnosed with eating disorders and find it hard to stay within the healthy weight range for their age and height.
Determining whether someone is a healthy weight is most commonly measured using the Body Mass Index (BMI). A BMI of between 25 and 29.9 means someone is overweight, and a BMI above 30 means someone is obese. There has been a growing increase in the number of overweight and obese people in the United Kingdom and worldwide, and it is projected to rise even further. Obesity is one of the leading causes of heart disease, cancer and diabetes. Heart disease is the number one killer worldwide, and so weight management is crucial to reduce the risk of developing these conditions and ensuring you live a long and healthy life.
There is a myriad of factors that influence weight loss and weight gain including genetics, medical conditions, diet and lifestyle. Although genetics does play a role in weight gain in some adults, recent worldwide trends showing an increase in overweight and obesity suggest that environmental and behavioural factors are at play, and these can be managed through effective diet and lifestyle choices.
Diet
Maintaining a healthy weight all boils down to one thing – making sure that you are not eating more calories than you burn. To lose weight, you should burn more calories than you are eating. To gain weight, you should eat more calories than you are burning. How effectively you can do this can depend on what you eat, how you exercise, portion control and your mentality towards food.
Your Resting metabolic rate (RMR) is the number of calories your body burns daily without doing anything else. Each person’s RMR will differ, but online calculators are available that will give you an indication of your RMR based on your age, weight and activity levels. If your RMR is 1500 calories, then to maintain a healthy weight you should eat 1500 calories per day, plus any additional calories you burn by taking part in physical activity. Technically speaking, you could eat unhealthy foods and as long as you did not eat more calories than you burned, then you would maintain a healthy weight. However, the quality of food that you eat will have a big impact on your appetite. Food and drinks high in sugar can be high in calories but will not affect your hunger, so it is easier to consume excess calories with these in your diet. Foods that are high in protein such as lean meats will leave you feeling fuller for longer and more satisfied at the end of a meal. The same is true of foods high in fibre. If you struggle with controlling the amount of food that you eat, then you might need to look at the nutritional content of the food in your diet and work out if you need to switch to foods that will increase your satiety.
Another way to improve weight management when it comes to diet is ensuring you are eating the correct portion size. Studies have shown that people who eat larger plates of food do not report feeling fuller but still consume more calories than their body needs. If you are trying to lose weight, you may find it helpful to weigh the portions of food that you eat to see if you are eating more calories than you think. Learning how many calories are in each portion of food can help you cook the right amount for you. Other techniques to reduce portion size include using smaller plates and bowls, cooking in smaller batches, increasing vegetables on the plate instead of carbohydrates like rice, and spending more time chewing your food. It can also help to wait after finishing your main meal before fetching a dessert, as it takes time for your body to recognise that it is full.
Exercise
Your RMR is based on the calories you burn when your body is completely at rest. To support the maintenance of a healthy weight and increase the number of calories you can eat per day, exercise is key. People who exercise are much more likely to maintain a healthy weight. A combination of exercise with a healthy diet is the most effective way to manage your weight, as well as reducing the risk of developing heart disease, some cancers and diabetes.
The average adult is advised to do 150 minutes of moderate activity each week, or 75 minutes of vigorous exercise. Moderate activity can include brisk walking, yoga or gentle cycling. Vigorous exercise includes running, aerobics or strength training such as lifting weights.
If you are aiming to lose weight, you will need to burn more calories than you eat until you reach your goal weight. Once you reach your goal weight, you should incorporate exercise into your routine to maintain a healthy weight.
Exercise lowers stress, improves your mood and confidence and over time replaces fat with lean muscle tissue. Finding an exercise that you enjoy that can be part of your routine will allow you to maintain a healthy weight as well as reduce your risk of developing health conditions in the future and reduce your risk of becoming overweight or obese.
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