Why is losing weight harder the second time around?

We don’t have a weight problem in the world right now.

Oh, I get why you think we do. On the surface, that’s exactly what it looks like.

But dig a little deeper, like I have, and you’ll discover that what we actually have is not a weight gain problem, but a weight re-gain problem.

Think about it. How many times have you RE-GAINED weight you lost?

You may not have re-gained it all, every time…or maybe you re-gained everything you lost plus interest!

Even when you KNOW the program you’re using works, because it worked for other people and it even worked for you, you “can’t” seem to get your poop in a group and get the weight off!

That inner conflict is so exhausting that people often give up (if not forever, then at least for a while) just to get some relief from it. It’s called taking a break from caring.

If the break was a day, or even just one meal, there’d probably be re-gain, but it’d be in the form of a few pounds that come off in a couple of days.

But often, that break from caring lasts days, weeks, months, or even years, and that’s when we get into some major weight re-gain.

Whatever the reason, it begs the question: why is losing weight the second time around (or the fiftieth time around) so much harder than that first time something really worked, where you were SO excited?

There’s more than one factor, and it depends on you and your exact situation.

But here are two that almost everyone who struggles to get and stay at a healthy weight experiences (either one, the other, or both):

1) On some level, you still think of yourself as someone with a weight problem.

How you see yourself is HUGE.

If you think of yourself as a smoker, it’ll be hard to stop smoking.

If you think of yourself as an alcoholic, it’ll be hard to stop drinking.

And if you think of yourself as someone with a weight problem, it’ll be hard to get and keep all the weight off for good.

Not impossible. Just hard. Harder than it has to be.

That is especially true when you re-gain weight over and over. You’re reinforcing that old identity…that old belief that you’re “someone with a weight problem.”

The identity you want to work toward instead is that of someone who comfortably stays at their healthy weight.

When you shift your identity, the actions it takes to get to and stay at a healthy weight become easier, because you don’t feel at war with yourself.

Your beliefs determine your actions, so again, what you believe about yourself is HUGE.

The other common cause of struggling to get and stay at a healthy weight is:

2) Trauma or abuse.

The root cause of obesity is very often a traumatic experience (or several of them), and/or abuse.

For example, SO many women who’ve been raped or molested (as kids) gain weight as a form of protection. They think no one will want to rape them if they’re fat.

It’s one of those parts of weight loss that isn’t talked about by the people peddling magic pills and powders.

If you were traumatized or abused (sexually or otherwise), getting mental and emotional help is gonna be key for you in getting and keeping the weight off…

Because if you don’t feel safe at a healthy weight, it’s gonna feel really tough for you to stay there.

Again, NOT impossible. But you’ll have to constantly battle that primal part of you that believes you aren’t safe unless you’re fat.

(As an aside, it is factually not true that obesity is “safe.” It’s linked to a host of life-threatening diseases, including heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and many others.)

The bottom line here is that getting and keeping the weight off is not about HOW you lose the weight.

You can lose the weight doing just about anything.

(Of course, if you a pick a weight loss method that’s unsustainable, you’ll re-gain the weight. I’m talking about outside of that.)

If you want to stop the weight re-gain, stop thinking about a temporary fix, like a “diet” and focus on permanent fixes, like shifting your identity, or getting help healing from the trauma/abuse.

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