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Many people experience weight rebound after losing weight, and doctors often report that patients struggle to maintain their results. “Patients control their weight for a period, then lose control, and now they’re even heavier—gaining 20-30 pounds…”
This situation not only undermines weight loss efforts but also discourages those trying to lose weight. Why do many people regain weight shortly after losing it? How can we lose weight without experiencing rebound?
Why Do Many People Regain Weight Shortly After Losing It?
Currently, experts widely believe that the “yo-yo effect” is one of the main reasons for weight rebound after weight loss.
The “Yo-Yo Effect”: This primarily refers to the psychological relaxation and self-reward that people experience after benefiting from weight loss behaviors, which can lead to loss of dietary control. Additionally, fat cells have a memory effect—once a person returns to unhealthy eating habits, fat cells quickly return to their original state, triggering weight rebound.
Long-term dieting or extremely low-calorie diets cause a significant decrease in basal metabolic rate (BMR), putting the body into “energy-saving mode” to reduce energy consumption in response to perceived “famine.”
When normal eating resumes, the metabolic rate cannot quickly recover, and caloric intake suddenly exceeds metabolic needs, leading to fat re-accumulation.
How to Lose Weight Without Easy Rebound?
For most people trying to lose weight, some degree of rebound may be difficult to avoid. However, understanding your obesity condition, setting reasonable weight loss goals, and choosing appropriate weight loss plans can help prevent or reduce rebound after weight loss.
Understand Your Obesity Level
Body Mass Index (BMI) is a universal standard for evaluating overall obesity, calculated as BMI = weight (kg) / height² (m). For Chinese adults:
- BMI < 18.5: Underweight
- 18.5 ≤ BMI < 24: Normal weight
- 24 ≤ BMI < 28: Overweight
- 28 ≤ BMI < 32.5: Mild obesity
- 32.5 ≤ BMI < 37.5: Moderate obesity
- 37.5 ≤ BMI < 50: Severe obesity
- BMI ≥ 50: Extremely severe obesity
While BMI is easy to calculate, it has limitations. Special populations require multiple indicators such as body fat percentage and waist circumference for obesity assessment.
Set Clear Weight Loss Goals
Weight loss goals should be personalized and stratified. For most overweight and mildly obese patients, reducing weight by 5%-15% within 3-6 months and maintaining it can effectively improve health conditions.
Patients with moderate and severe obesity need higher weight loss targets to achieve better improvement in obesity-related diseases, and typically need to consult professional medical weight loss centers to establish appropriate goals.
Choose a Suitable Weight Loss Plan
The most basic weight loss approach is dietary and exercise intervention, suitable for all overweight and obese individuals.
Weight rebound often occurs because diet plans are unreasonable—they may show quick results in the short term but are difficult to maintain, making weight regain inevitable.
Currently, intermittent fasting is a dietary intervention method suitable for various weight loss populations and can be applied long-term. It generally adopts a 5+2 model: relatively normal eating for 5 days of the week, and consuming about 1/4 of normal energy intake on the other 2 non-consecutive days—approximately 600 kcal/day for men and 500 kcal/day for women.
Of course, there are many medical weight loss diet plans that adjust energy and nutrient ratios. No single diet plan is suitable for all obese populations. A healthy diet plan that can be maintained long-term is the most important step in avoiding weight rebound.
Exercise is an important component of the weight loss process. Appropriate exercise not only consumes energy and fat but also increases muscle mass, enhancing basal metabolic rate and physical fitness. You can perform aerobic endurance exercises 2-3 times per week, 30 minutes to 1 hour each time, such as running, cycling, swimming, or other large muscle group activities. Gradually increase the total amount and intensity of exercise according to your cardiopulmonary function and health condition.
Other exercise options include strength resistance training, dynamic stretching, and static stretching. Focus on safety during exercise to avoid exercise-induced diseases and injuries.
The earlier obesity is addressed, the lighter the memory rebound of fat cells will be, and the better the weight loss results. If lifestyle interventions are ineffective and you are experiencing repeated weight loss followed by repeated weight gain (the “yo-yo effect”), you may need to seek help from professional medical institutions or weight management centers for scientific weight loss guidance.
