Before losing weight: what is your ideal body weight?

It is very important when starting a weight loss program to set a goal. And the first step here is to identify your ideal body weight.

I want you to think about short term and long-term goals. Why? If you are 100 pounds overweight, setting your goal at 100 pounds is ultimately going to set you up to fail. Instead, consider a yearlong goal of 50-80 pounds, but a short-term goal of maybe 10-15 pounds in 2-4 weeks. Set a goal that you know is obtainable. When you meet or surpass your goal, you will be that much more excited about continuing with your program.

I encourage patients to initially set a goal of 10 pounds. On this program, you may be able to achieve that goal in the first week or two depending on how rigorously you stick to the diet and how much you increase your activity. Even 10 pounds may not seem like a lot, but that small weight loss has a huge impact on your health and risk factors for cardiovascular disease.

The U.S. guidelines for weight in men and women are only an estimate of what you should ideally weigh for your height. The range is wide and includes many different body types. For instance, small boned individuals may weigh less. Similarly, individuals with less muscle mass should weigh less as well. I do not think that these guidelines should be your long-term goal.

Weight vs Height Chart for Women

What is Body Mass Index?

Another method for determining ideal body weight, is to look at the Body Mass Index. Body mass index is another method of determining if you are overweight. Recent studies have correlated BMI values with a variety of health issues as well as mortality rates.

BMI = (weight in pounds)/ (height in inches)2 x 703

A BMI less than 18.5 is considered to be underweight. A BMI over 25 is considered to be overweight. A BMI over 30 is considered to be obese. The body mass index, however, does not distinguish lean body mass in the form of muscle from fat mass. So, a body builder who works hard to increase lean body mass may in fact be classified as having a high BMI in the obesity range. A recent study recommended using BMI of 29.1 as the upper limit of normal in men and BMI of 28.6 to be the upper limit of normal for women.

There are many other methods to determine health risk for weight, such as waist circumference. As you may have heard, an increased waist circumference correlates with increase in abdominal fat deposition and an increased risk of morbidity. Hence, the increase risk of significant morbidity in persons with an apple body shape compared to a pear.

The norms, as established above, are not modified for age or body build. In general, women with a larger frame or advanced age, would fit at the top end of the normal weight range. Similarly, younger, petit women should weigh closer to the lower end of the range. These tables are wrought with difficulties in terms of determining actual ideal weights for a given individual. No table is perfect. The values will vary for each individual based on age, body frame, muscle mass, etc. We do know that increased body weight in terms of body fat, increases the risk of multiple medical conditions including heart and vascular disease. We also know that women can reduce their risk of these diseases by regular exercise, regardless of whether they are successful at long-term weight loss.

Tracking your progress

Tracking your progress is so important because without any kind of tracking, how do you know how things are going? Other than being able to tell from looking at yourself, you won’t have any kind of definitive data to give you an idea of how well you are doing.

Therefore, tracking is very important as it can be the difference between getting a successful look and feel, and ensuring that you actually know just how far you have come in a short space of time.

• To track, make sure that you are keeping some kind of logbook or journal to show you just how you are progressing. Without this kind of hard information in front of you, genuine personal development is hard to manage and stay on track with – how will you know if you are hitting your targets without following it via a workbook?
• Making progress genuinely gives you some kind of energy – it makes sure that you stay motivated and can see the goal in the distance. When you are literally just spending all of your time going around in circles, it can be hard to stay motivated and to get the job done
• It gives you an idea of just what kind of progress you are making, so it becomes harder to throw the towel in. if you’ve already made so much progress, why would you want to put all of that in jeopardy?