 Hi friends, welcome back to my channel and a very special welcome if you're new here. My name is Jen. I'm a certified weight loss and nutrition coach. I follow weight watchers and I count calories and macros. Happy Friday! It is Friday. It is post-vacation weigh-in. We're going to talk about my week, my weigh-in, and the WW workshop topic, which spoiler alert, ties in perfectly with my post-vacation weigh-in. So if you're excited, give this video a big thumbs up. Subscribe if you're not because I do a weigh-in every Friday and I do upload five videos per week. Check out the discussion box down below where you will find nutrition coaching, highly recommend macros and calories. Like I said, I count those and I lost 90 pounds last year and have lost almost 140 pounds total. You'll also find links and discounts to my favorite healthy things. And of course, come on over, join my Facebook group. We would love to have you. So let's jump into my week, my weigh-in, and the WW workshop topic. We had a fan-tastic week. Like I mentioned in the beginning, I actually just got back from vacation. I had a little girls trip, little getaway in San Diego, California with my friend Rachel and my friend Kelly and we had such an amazing time. And in addition to that, I did a subscriber meetup and we had a fan-tastic turnout. Thank you to everybody who showed up. Susan, Wendy, Sabrina, Heather, Lorraine, everyone who showed up. It was so much fun. We took an amazing hike. We went to dinner. We had coffee. We did some shopping. We just had an amazing subscriber meetup and it's so nice to connect with all of you in person and really build on the foundation of friendship we already have here on YouTube. It was amazing. My heart was so full after this weekend. It just really filled my heart with so much joy to meet everybody. I also did a 5k while I was in San Diego. It was just an amazing, amazing vacation. I enjoyed all the good food. I did not track my food on vacation. I typically don't track my food when I'm on vacation. I just try to be mindful, but I'm also on vacation. So I want to enjoy all of the foods native to wherever I'm traveling to. But overall, I had a great, great trip. I did a hike. I worked out in the gym and I did a 5k. So I was super active, which of course just helps with eating some of the foods that I normally don't eat day to day. As soon as I got home Sunday night, it was back on track. In fact, even though I got home a little bit later Sunday night, I was up at 4am and at boot camp at 5am Monday morning and completed all of my workouts this week and tracked my food, got right back on track. We even went out to dinner for my mother-in-law's birthday on Monday. I made a healthy choice. It was in my Wednesday's what I eat in a day. If you missed that video, I will put it down in the description box for you. But overall, truly honestly, I feel really good about how my vacation went, also how I did returning and just really proud of myself for just getting right back on track and making my vacation fun and also active. But before we jump into my post-vacation weigh-in, let's chat about this week's WW workshop topic because it's so good and it lends itself so perfectly to this last week for me and that is how to maintain weight loss. Once you've lost the weight, how do you keep it off? Like I always say, I mean it comes out of my mouth regularly. Whatever you do to lose weight, you have to do that exact same thing to maintain your weight loss. Whatever program you follow, whatever foods you're eating, you have to eat those same foods, follow that same program, follow that same protocol in order to keep the weight off. Now Weight Watchers does give you some additional points when you get to maintenance. In my opinion, it is not nearly enough to actually maintain your weight in a healthy weight. That is why I track calories and macros to make sure that I'm eating enough. And once I do get to maintenance, which I'm right there, I'll make sure that I'm eating at my maintenance calories. But if you strictly follow Weight Watchers, they will give you some added points to your daily budget to help maintain your weight. But there are things you can do while you're in weight loss mode that will benefit you when you get to maintenance and also will help you keep off what weight you've lost so far. So we have some things that you can try out from Weight Watchers to help just get ready for maintenance as well as maintain the weight you've already lost. And number one, when could pressing pause on weight loss be helpful? Maybe during a vacation, holiday weekend, or stressful time at work. Number two, how long will you be in maintenance mode? Decide on a date, timeframe, or other marker to refocus on weight loss. Number three, what two or three things can help you keep the scales steady? Maybe it's tracking your food, weighing yourself at the same time, attending your workshops, maintaining your activity routine, or anything else that would benefit you. Number four, write out your plan. Starting on such and such date, I'll update my WW app food settings to maintain my weight and continue to do these things. On this date, I'll switch my focus and app settings back to losing weight. There is nothing wrong with going into maintenance mode. It's actually in scientific terms called a diet break. We shouldn't be in a caloric deficit forever. We shouldn't be on Weight Watchers in a deficit for months or years and years and years. There should be times that we take a diet break or that we go into maintenance mode. When I'm on vacation, I'm basically putting myself into maintenance mode. I'm eating more calories than normal. I'm just focusing on enjoying my vacation and not stressing about the food. And my goal whenever I travel or whenever I go into a diet break or maintenance mode is to maintain my weight. That is my ultimate goal. You know that in the month of December, I did maintain not gain. I just focused on really having maintenance overall in the month of December. That is very smart to do because it does give your body a break from dieting. It allows you to eat a little bit more calories to enjoy the event, to enjoy the vacation, and to come back in maintenance rather than gaining weight. Now, of course, you may see the scale spike up a little bit. I know for me, the day Monday when I weighed in, the scale was up a little bit from traveling, from travel blow, from, of course, eating foods I don't normally eat. But taking a break or a diet break and putting yourself into maintenance actually is really beneficial for your journey. Technically, you should only be in weight loss mode or in a calorie deficit for about six to eight weeks. So that's about a month and a half to two months. And then you should take a maintenance mode or take a diet break for another few weeks before going back into weight loss mode. This is what is really most healthy for your body and your metabolism. So take advantage of this, set your up to maintenance when you want to go on a vacation or just enjoy a little break from dieting. I'm not suggesting that you shift to maintenance every time life happens, right? Every vacation, every holiday, every time you're stressed out. But taking a diet break or shifting into maintenance pretty regularly can be really beneficial. Take a pause and really think about is switching into maintenance mode something that you need to do. And remember, there's nothing wrong with switching into maintenance mode or taking a diet break. In fact, it prepares you for what's to come when you reach your weight loss goal. Maintenance is harder than weight loss. You don't have something exciting happening every week. Seeing that scale go down. You're literally just humdrum, maintaining your weight just smooth and steady rather than getting excited seeing that scale move. So maintaining your weight can be even harder than being in weight loss mode. So practicing that while you're losing weight not only helps your health, your metabolism, your body, but can set you up for success when you do get to maintenance. In fact, I want to share three fast facts from Weight Watchers with you. Number one, we can temporarily shift from losing to maintaining weight at any point during our journey. Number two, this can help us stay connected to our journey when we need more flexibility for other priorities. And number three, practicing maintenance can also help us prepare for when we do reach our ultimate weight loss goal. I can't stress enough the importance of diet breaks. Going into maintenance mode, please do this throughout your journey for all of the reasons that we mentioned in today's video. I know for me whenever I take a trip or a weekend away, I'm in maintenance mode. My goal is to maintain my weight. I'm not going on vacation to stress about food. I'm going on vacation to enjoy vacation. I'm going away for the weekend to enjoy a weekend away. I'm taking a stress break from work to alleviate stress, not to stress about food. These are all times that taking this maintenance mode and going on a diet break is really, really helpful for our overall success with weight loss. So let me know down in the comments, are you someone that takes maintenance breaks or are you someone that's never put yourself into maintenance mode during your weight loss journey? And if that is you, I really hope today's video propels you forward in taking these little bit of maintenance breaks in diet breaks. I promise you it's really, really beneficial, not only for your weight loss, but your physical health and even maybe more important for your mental health while losing weight. Speaking of maintenance mode and a diet break, let's talk about my little trip to San Diego. I left on a Thursday, came back on a Sunday, so I was gone about four days and three nights. And like I said, I didn't track my food. I was very active and that was one of the tips recommended was to maintain your physical activity because this does help counterbalance some of the calories in the foods that you're eating while you're on a maintenance break. But my goal for my trip was to just enjoy my trip and hopefully come back maintaining my weight. And like I said, I was up a little bit on the scale for a couple days post-vacation, which isn't weight gain necessarily. It's just post-vacation, weight fluctuation, whether that's from flying, extra sodium, different foods, maybe not drinking all of your water. I know I definitely didn't get in the same amount of water while I was on vacation as I do when I'm at home. But overall, I feel like my vacation went really well. My food choices went really well. I enjoyed myself. I didn't overdo it. I didn't go completely off the rails. I was still mindful. And when I weighed in this morning, I actually am exactly the same as when I left for vacation. So again, more proof that going into maintenance mode isn't a bad thing. And it's okay to maintain your weight. In fact, it's healthy and it's good for your body overall. I'm really proud of myself for every choice that I made on vacation, for indulging in the things I indulge in, for moving my body, for just enjoying my vacation and building connections and relationships with all of my subscribers, spending time with my friends. Like I said, it just fed my soul, it fed my body. And I couldn't be more happy with a complete maintenance for the week. Now I want to hear from you guys. What are your thoughts on Diet Breaks maintenance mode? Let me know. Do you do this? Is it something that you find helpful in your journey? Or are you excited about being able to do this while still losing weight? And of course, let me know how your week was, how your weigh-in was. Let me know everything down in the comments. And if you enjoyed today's video, don't forget to give it a big thumbs up. Of course, subscribe if you're not. I would love to have you here and I do a weigh-in every Friday. And again, I do upload five videos every week. Nutrition coaching is down in the description box. I cannot recommend it enough, as well as links and discounts to my favorite things. And of course, come join my Facebook group. We would love to have you. Happy Friday, friends. I hope you have an amazing, amazing day. And I'll see you in tomorrow's huge, massive, ginormous grocery haul. Have a great day and I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.