Failing at Losing Weight

If you have tried to lose weight and failed, know that you are not the only one who has met with defeat. Failing to lose weight sometimes results from one or more causes you need to recognize before you can succeed. To win the battle of the bulge, find out why you failed at losing weight, and then try again.

Falling Victim to Temptation

Eating fewer calories than you normally eat is an important key to losing weight, so analyze whether or not you frequently succumbed to the temptation of commercially prepared sweet treats and high-calorie snacks that may have caused you to consume an excess amount of calories. Stress coupled with temptation also works against weight loss by causing you to eat more during moments of tension. Instead of eating, exercise when you feel stressed and tempted to eat. To avoid the temptation to eat commercially prepared sweets and snacks, keep them out of your sight and out of your kitchen.

Expending Too Little Energy

Burning more calories than you feed your body is another important key to losing weight. A sedentary lifestyle will not contribute to weight loss. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends engaging in exercise that ranges from moderate to intense for 2-½ hours each week and doing exercises that strengthen your muscles two days a week or more to lose weight. If you have failed at losing weight, consider whether or not you have been exercising enough and ask your doctor how much exercise you should be doing to lose weight.

Aiming for Unrealistic Goals

Setting a goal to lose about 45 lbs. in 60 days is not a healthy way to go about losing weight, and doing so can result in discouragement and disappointment when that goal is not reached. If you have failed at losing weight because you abandoned your weight-loss plan when you became discouraged, make your goals more obtainable and strive to lose weight slowly the next time around. Do not lose your motivation if you lose only a pound or two a week. Instead, reward yourself with a gift and keep moving forward with your weight-loss regimen.

Health-related Issues

Hypothyroidism can cause you to gain weight instead of lose it, so if you have failed to lose weight, have your doctor examine you to rule out the possibility of this health condition. Also consider the possibility of menopause as the cause of your weight-loss failure since a woman's metabolism slows down at this stage of her life. Birth-control pills, medication for diabetes and other drugs may work against losing weight as well. Ask your doctor if any of the medications you are taking are holding you back from losing weight, if you are on medication.