What keeps people from sticking the landing when they try to lose weight?

In this week’s vlog, I want to talk about something very important: the barriers to contented, sustained, effective weight-loss maintenance.

Nobody Wants to Lose and Then Regain Weight

Here’s the truth: nobody wants to lose weight and then gain it back. We want weight loss to be one-and-done. We want to get to a place where we can live our lives, focus on what matters, and not spend the majority of our time and energy thinking about food and weight.

And yet, I’ve talked to people who spend 70, 80, even 90 percent of their mental bandwidth on weight loss. Contented maintenance should be closer to 15 percent.

So why does this happen?

In my new book, Maintain, I talk about some of the deeper reasons we get stuck. For many people, this happens because they don’t fully face the grief and the fear that come with long-term change.

Grief is Part of the Weight-Loss Process

Let me be honest. Grief is common. There’s grief in not losing the weight, but there’s also grief in losing it, because there are things you may need to give up.

Foods like sugar and flour, for one thing. In a diet mentality, it doesn’t feel so final, because you think you’ll go back to these foods later. But when you realize that instead you’re working toward an identity shift for long-term loss, it can feel overwhelming.

Changing the way you eat can also shift your relationships. Maybe you were the baker in your family. Maybe food was how you connected with people. That changes, and it’s okay to grieve that loss.

Sometimes, staying in a diet mentality is a way to avoid that grief—because if it’s temporary, you don’t have to fully face what you’ve lost.

But here’s the good news: you don’t have to feel it all at once.

In the early days, when your brain is still wired for certain foods, the idea of giving them up feels unbearable. That’s normal. I see it all the time.

But over time, your brain heals. Your dopamine receptors recover. It starts to feel okay, and you don’t need those foods in the same way anymore.

So as the weeks and months go by, there’s an invitation to gently face the grief and allow the identity shift, little by little.

And Then There’s Fear

Maintenance can also bring up fear.

Fear of how your body will look. Fear of attention—maybe unwanted. Fear around relationships, or even your own sexuality. For some, it connects to past trauma or a sense of vulnerability.

But if we don’t make space for our fear, one of two things tends to happen.

More commonly, we stay in the diet mentality, hovering just above our goal weight, and never quite settling into contented maintenance.

Or we reach maintenance, but a food-controller part of us clings tightly to the rules to keep the fear and grief pushed down. When that happens, life can start to feel rigid and constricted.

Doing the Inner Work

This is where the real work comes in.

In Maintain, each chapter ends with questions to help you explore this gently, through journaling or talking to someone you trust.

You can begin to ask: Where is there grief? Where is there fear?

This is doing the inner work. Learning to feel what’s there, making space for it, and continuing to move forward.

Takeaways on Maintaining Weight Loss

This work matters.

Because what’s waiting on the other side isn’t just weight loss, it’s peace. It’s freedom. It’s a life where food and weight don’t take up so much space.

So let me leave you with this: Where might there be grief or fear in your own journey, and what would it look like to slowly begin to face it?

Learn more about Maintain and order your copy at JoinTheMaintenanceMovement.com.