Achieving a healthy body weight following a weight loss or weight gain effort is a significant accomplishment. Maintaining that weight is equally crucial to staying in good health, as repeatedly gaining and losing weight can lead to a variety of health problems. The easiest way to maintain your body weight is to calculate your caloric needs, tracking dietary intake and calories expended during exercise. Keep your diet and exercise balanced to avoid significant changes in body weight.
Step 1
Calculate your basal metabolic rate, or BMR, which represents the amount of energy expended by your body at rest. An accurate BMR calculator is provided online by the American Cancer Society. Alternatively, you can use the following equations to calculate your BMR. Formulas vary by sex.
Women: BMR = 655 + (4.35*weight in pounds) + (4.7*height in inches) - (4.7*age in years)
Men: BMR = 66 + (6.23*weight in pounds) + (12.7*height in inches) - (6.8*age in years)
Consider a 30-year-old woman who is 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighs 125 pounds. Her BMR = 655 + (4.35*125 lbs) + (4.7*66 inches) - (4.7*30 years) = 1368 calories. This means that a woman of her size uses 1368 calories at rest.
A 45-year-old man who is 6 feet tall and weighs 175 pounds would use the following calculation: BMR = 66 + (6.23*175 pounds) + (12.7*72 inches) - (6.8*45 years), or 1765 calories.
Step 2
Determine your typical amount of daily activity. Consider your activity level while at work, commuting, at home and engaging in recreational activities. Classify your activity levels as sedentary, lightly active, moderately active, very active or extra active. A sedentary activity levels means you perform little or no exercise. Moderately active people engage in physical activity 3 to 5 days per week. An extra active classification means that you engage in extremely hard exercise or sports every day of the week.
For example, if you perform a 30-to-60-minute workout at the gym 3 or 4 days a week, classify yourself as moderately active.
Step 3
Calculate the calories you need to maintain weight by using the following formulas. Depending on your activity level, multiply your BMR by an activity factor to figure out your caloric needs.
Sedentary: BMR*1.2
Lightly active: BMR*1.375
Moderately active: BMR*1.55
Very active: BMR*1.725
Extra active: BMR*1.9
For example, if the 30-year-old woman from the previous example is lightly active, her caloric needs would be 1368*1.375, or 1881 calories. This means that she should consume 1881 calories per day to maintain her current weight.
If the 45-year-old man from the previous example is very active, his caloric intake should be 1765*1.725, or 3044 calories per day. Because of his larger body size and high activity level, he requires a higher caloric intake to maintain his body weight.
Things You'll Need
- Calculator
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