Rethinking Weight Loss Success: Beyond the Scale

**Jim Hill:** Welcome to Weight Loss And, where we delve into the world of weight loss. I'm Jim Hill.

**Holly Wyatt:** And I'm Holly Wyatt. We're both dedicated to helping you lose weight, keep it off, and live your best life while you're doing it.

**Jim Hill:** Indeed, we now realize successful weight loss combines the science and art of medicine, knowing what to do and why you will do it.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yes, the “And” allows us to talk about all the other stuff that makes your journey so much bigger, better, and exciting.

**Jim Hill:** Ready for the “And” factor?

**Holly Wyatt:** Let's dive in.

**Jim Hill:** Here we go. Welcome to Weight Loss And. I'm Jim Hill along with Holly Wyatt. Holly, we've got a really interesting and important topic today. We're going to talk about success in managing your weight. We're going to suggest it may be time to rethink that success.

Many of our listeners are working very hard to manage their weight, but have they really thought about what their long-term goal is? When are they successful? How do we measure success?

Our field has been very inconsistent in defining this. When I first started way back in the dark ages, we thought that success for people was getting back to a body mass index that wasn't in the obese or overweight category. In other words, a body mass index less than 25.

But think about this. If you have someone, let's say you have a 5'5 woman, who weighs 300 pounds, and her BMI is 50. To get to a BMI below 25, she would have to lose 150 pounds, half of her body weight. So I think we realize that's not a very realistic measure of success. We also realized you don't have to get back to that BMI to really have benefits. So fast forward today, many health care professionals talk about a 5% or greater weight loss as being successful. And there are data that suggest that a 5% weight loss will improve your health. But Holly, how many of your folks would see 5% as a success?

**Holly Wyatt:** Probably none of them. Real extremes are what you're showing, used to be 50%. And then medically, we kind of came and said, well, 5% is successful.

**Jim Hill:** So we're going to come back and talk about that. But the other measure of success is keeping weight off. And we don't have any good measures there. Many years ago, when Dr. Rena Wing and I started the National Weight Control Registry, we wanted to study people who had successfully maintained weight loss. Well, there was no definition of what success looks like. So you know what we did? We made up one.

We looked and there was nothing in the literature. And we said, OK, we have to have something. We debated whether should it be 5%, or 10%. And we said, in the interest of simplicity, let's call success maintaining at least a 30-pound weight loss for at least a year. And you know what? Everybody took that up as the measure of success.

No doubt at all. So again, we don't really have any good definitions here. So you talked to a lot of people, Holly, who are managing their weight. How did they really feel about defining their success?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, this is really interesting because just recently I was doing kind of a team meeting with a group of individuals who I felt were very successful and they had won a meeting with me from there. They competed in a competition and they got to come and ask me all their questions. And we stayed on for like two hours talking. One of the questions I asked them during this meeting was, raise your hand if you feel like you're successful.

And two people, two people in this group raised their hands. And I was just blown away because to me almost every person in this group was successful, but yet they did not feel successful. And so it really is, we need to really rethink success not only in the field like you were talking about in terms of body mass index and the amount of weight loss that we can produce, but as an individual because if you feel successful, if you can't recognize success if you have such a narrow maybe definition, that's part of the problem, a narrow definition of what success is, or you're not really clear about what success is for you and you feel unsuccessful. My experience is that leads to you being more unsuccessful versus if you feel successful, you get that momentum of moving ahead. So I see this as a big obstacle for many people not thinking about what success is or feeling success is really limited and that they are not successful when I look at them. My gosh, there is a lot of success in what they've accomplished.

**Jim Hill:** Wow. So it really does suggest we need to rethink success.

**Holly Wyatt:** I think so. Yeah. And not just medically, right? I know medically we can get into this and that's important, but individually what do you think is success and not limiting it so much?

**Jim Hill**: And you know the wild card here is we've talked about this before, the new weight loss medications are redefining success and losing weight. And I think one of the issues you and I want to explore is whether should we base success just on weight measures. Should we come up with here's success and weight loss, here's success in keeping it off? Or do we need to go beyond that and include some other kinds of things?

**Holly Wyatt**: So because of the weight loss medicines that are now available and producing this larger amount of weight loss for more individuals, it really is even changing how we think about this more because before it was kind of focused a little bit on how much weight and a lot of people couldn't get to this level that they thought would be successful. Now some more people are going to be able to get to that 20, 25% weight loss. Is that going to feel like success for them? Is that alone really going to be successful? And I think this will be interesting to watch to see because I'm not so sure. I'm not so sure that that weight loss alone is going to be it.

**Jim Hill:** I keep thinking about someone that maybe goes on the medications. Maybe they lose 50 pounds, which a lot of people are losing that amount of weight, but they don't exercise. They don't particularly eat healthy. They're not very fit. They haven't sort of changed their mindset. Is that success?

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. They don't feel any different. Yeah. I mean, that's the question and we're going to get to see that because more and more people are going to get to this level of weight loss.

**Jim Hill:** I've always felt like that again, you and I, I think welcome these medications as tools, but they're tools. They're not the only solution. And the reason I'm excited about them is let's face it, Holly, you and I struggle to get people to achieve the amount of weight loss with lifestyle that the drugs can achieve. So now if people are reaching these goals, I think we have a wonderful opportunity to say, okay, you've hit the weight goal. Now let's look at some of the other aspects of your life that might be important for what you want to achieve.

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. It's the and part of it. I think we can get to the weight loss. Is that enough? Or is it weight loss that really creates what people want?

**Jim Hill:** Okay. Let's talk about the and. We've talked about weight and I think weight needs to be in there. I'm not saying forget about weight. Weight is one important part, but I think there's more than weight. What, to you are the non-weight factors that we need to bring in as we start talking about success?

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, there's a lot of them, but in addition to just weight, I think we need to think about the functionality of the body. So fitness level, can you actually do the things that you want to do, you know, so that fitness function piece of the body to me is also in there with success. Now weight loss a lot of times goes hand in hand with that. You lose weight, and you may increase functionality, but you may not. It depends on how you do it. It depends on what happens, right?

**Jim Hill:** You know, and Holly, that's becoming more and more apparent to me as I get older is I want to keep doing the things I want to do. I want to be able to lift that suitcase into the overhead and bring the groceries in and weight loss doesn't fix that.

You've got to actually use your muscles and that's why I think we often recommend that people do some resistance exercise because it allows you to keep your muscles functioning so you can do those important things in life.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. So when I have someone set a weight loss goal and I believe in a weight loss goal, I know there is this fat acceptance movement out there that says we should not be setting weight goals, but I believe in setting a weight goal if that's what somebody wants. So, but when I set that weight goal or we set that weight goal together, I'm also setting a functional goal, a body state goal that's kind of functional fitness goal with it because I do think they kind of go hand in hand and you want to make sure as you're losing the weight, you're progressing in that area, you know, too, I guess.

**Jim Hill:** And you and I have studied measures of long-term success over and over and physical activity exercise constantly comes out and I think it's so important. I'm just really skeptical that anybody, even with the medication, is going to be able to reach their goals over the long term without increasing their movement.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. A second goal that's set and this is set by the medical community. And sometimes I believe the medical community has blinders on this. This is the only thing that they want to look at in terms of success. They don't even necessarily want to look at weight, but they want to look at metabolic health.

**Jim Hill:** Ah, yeah, defining it as, okay, how are you managing your diabetes better? Are you healthy? And if we go to something I love, which is the quality of life, that's one important part of quality of life and everything. People can reach these metabolic goals and that's great. That's not necessarily getting them all they want to do.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. So lowering blood pressure, improving cholesterol, you know, treating diabetes or preventing heart disease. I mean, there are so many things that we know body weight, body fatness, and obesity are associated with and I think as medical health care professionals, it makes sense. This is what we're dealing with. So we think this is really important and we think success equals, you know, getting rid of this, treating this, preventing this. It's all about that. And I think yes, but not exclusively. That's not the only thing.

And I get really mad sometimes when doctors are on the show or talking, you know, and that's all they can see. And I'm like, yes, it's that. And that's not the only thing that is associated with success, but it's part of it.

**Jim Hill:** And that's a big reason that you and I both feel like losing weight is an important goal and weight should be in there. We're just saying it's not everything because, you know, we asked people really what their goals are in going on a weight loss journey. And as you know, we call it peeling the onion.

So if you ask them, the first issue is like what you would expect, oh, I want to control my glucose and lipids and everything else. But when you peel the onion, you find some different things, don't you?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And that's what I tell other healthcare providers. I say, I know for you, you think that's the most important thing. But when you talk to your patient and you really get down to it, not just like you said, the first thing they say, not just the lip service, not just the, oh yeah, everybody, we want to be healthy. When you really get into what's motivating them, it's usually not that it may start as that, but it's really something else in addition to that. That's really motivating.

It's really not getting that glucose down. It's about how they're going to feel and their life, what it's going to be like associated more than that. So I always say, while the healthcare providers may see that as the most important thing, I don't think that all of our patients, or maybe some, but a lot of patients don't see that as the most important thing. And I kind of get mad when healthcare professionals say, well, they should. Well, they don't. So you know what? Get over it.

**Jim Hill:** I think it's happiness, Holly. I keep saying over and over what people want is happiness. Now they think weight loss alone will get them to that and it will do some parts of it. Improving metabolic management of chronic disease is a big part of happiness, but not all of it. Happiness is relationships. How you feel about yourself.

Are you engaged in life? I know one of the things you always talk about is people on the sidelines because they blame their weight for the fact they're not out engaged in life. And oftentimes losing weight, people think it's the answer, but it's not.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And so it may be that and then something else, but if they don't recognize there's something else hooked to it with it, then they're going to lose the weight, but in the end, not get really what's motivating them, really what they want. I think the other kind of broad piece, and we're kind of hitting on it, is that mindset and that emotional resiliency that is associated kind of with success, that no one really knows how to measure. So it's hard to know if you're successful or not, but I do think it's kind of like what you're talking about.

How you want to feel is so important. And it's tied to that functional piece. It's tied to the weight loss.

It's tied to the metabolic parameters, but it comes down to, yeah, I want to feel this way and engage in life this way and have these experiences. And that to me is part of the definition of success. I think the difficulty in that is we don't know how to measure it. Therefore, when I ask people, are you successful, they don't include that in, am I successful? Do I feel, you know, has my confidence increased or am I happier? Or am I feeling more connected? Or they don't include that in evaluating whether they're more successful or not.

**Jim Hill:** So I would summarize our discussion to this point as saying, we think it's very clear that success has to include things other than weight. But we have no scale currently to measure that. So Holly, how do we move forward here?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. That's, I think, one of the challenges. And, you know, we're trying to do that. I think we've kind of come up with some big buckets that we're putting people in and trying to measure them and see if we can kind of come up with a scale. Let's face it, one of the reasons we use weight as how we measure success is because we can measure it very easily.

We know exactly how many pounds you've lost. We can, you know, figure out a percentage. You get on the scale at yes or no, you know, very clear versus some of these other things are not as, you know, they're more, you can't really measure them as clearly to say yes or no. So is there a way we can start measuring them and coming up with a score? We like a score. We like to see numbers change. You know, what would that look like?

**Jim Hill:** So do we have to solve problems on this podcast or can we just get by with identifying the problem? Did we sign a contract that we have to come up with solutions or is it okay just to talk about it?

**Holly Wyatt:** I think it's okay to talk about it because I think that awareness is always the first step. And that’s what I was saying with this group that was saying they weren't successful. And I said, okay, let's step back and let's just be aware of what's happened. And that can lead to more, you know, to understanding. So I think awareness is problem solving.

**Jim Hill:** So just making people aware that you need to think beyond weight and give us enough time to come up with solutions. But we are actually working on this. So talk a little bit about maybe how we see eventually developing a different way of measuring success.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. So I think we've been playing with the kind of three buckets, you know, three buckets to put things in. And those buckets that I'm going to talk about are interrelated. They're connected.

They always are, right? They overlap. But the one big bucket is the body state. And in that bucket of body state is weight, but is also that functionality is that fitness is that how does your body move, you know? And that is associated with success for so many people because how you want to live your life is about that body. You're living your life in your body. And so, yes, I do think that body is important. And you know, other people don't feel that way, but I do. And I do believe that that's one of the important buckets.

**Jim Hill:** Is body state more than just a weight?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. Yeah. It's that weight, but it's also that function. That's where I put function and fitness. I put that all together in there. You know, I'll digress and tell one story.

I don’t think I've told this before, but this really impacted me. I went to Santorini last summer. And if you in Santorini, there's all these stairs you climb up. Now they have a cable car because not everybody can get up all these stairs. So they now have a cable car that'll take you up.

**Jim Hill:** Most Americans can't, right?

**Holly Wyatt:** Most Americans cannot. That's, yeah. So everybody took the cable car up, got to be toward the end of the day, late afternoon, and that the line for the cable car down over two hours. And it was in the sun and two hours, three hours, it was unclear so long. And so people started walking down the steps, thinking they could make it down. So there are all the cruise ships were down at the bottom of these steps.

**Jim Hill:** And that’s downhill, you think that's pretty easy. It's not uphill.

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. Now it was super hot. These steps don't have handrails really. They're slick. You know, it's this is Greece. This isn't, you know, compliant with rules at all. This is, you know, rock and granite and all this kind of stuff. Well, I started coming down. People literally were falling down because it was slick and hot and they couldn't get up, couldn't get up. So functionally, they could not take their body weight and stand up on these steps. And I was pulling people up and people were trying to pull people up. And I just thought, wow, the function of your body, your body weight, and how you can function is important. Here is a life event.

They're on vacation in Santorini. And when I got down to the end, it was like, well, how must that feel to be down on the ground and not have the ability to stand up? How that must feel and limit you in certain ways. It really, it really impacted me so much thinking, no, we've got to have our function, our body state such that we can live our lives and we can stand up if we fall. Because imagine how that must feel. So I put all that in that bucket.

**Jim Hill:** So then improving body state would be weight loss would be part of it, but not just weight loss, weight loss combined with increasing functionality, which probably involves movement, maybe some resistance exercise.

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. So losing weight, obviously. just losing weight may help you be able to stand up, but not necessarily.

**Jim Hill:** Right. It isn't going to make your muscles stronger, really.

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. And balance and other things. And so that's where interesting, and with these weight loss medications, if you just lose the weight, but you don't do anything else, are you going to have that functionality or not? We're going to see pretty much, right? We're going to be able to see.

**Jim Hill:** So you can measure that. You can measure body weight with scale. And there are ways that you can measure functionality through a little short performance test. So it's possible to measure that.

**Holly Wyatt:** We're actually doing that. We have some kind of unusual tests that we're doing that we think relate to functionality. And we're trying to see if we can do that so that people can see changes. Because like I said, people like to see changes.

**Jim Hill:** All right. So we've got body state. What else?

**Holly Wyatt:** So the second big bucket that we're thinking about is mind state.

**Jim Hill:** Oh, I love it.

**Holly Wyatt:** Shocker there. Shocker.

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, really. Dr. Wyatt thinks the mind state is important. Hold the presses.

**Holly Wyatt:** I know. Notice I started with body state. Mind state, second bucket, but they're all equal, I think, and important. And that's how you feel. And when I have someone set a goal, a weight loss goal, which we do, it's also about how you feel when you lose that weight. Because that's really what's important to you. I sometimes say if you lose 50 pounds or 100 pounds and nothing else changes, how you feel does not change. You just now are smaller.

Would that be a success? And they say, no, but that's not going to happen because when I lose the weight, I'm going to feel this way. I'm like, okay, all right, let's put that feel how you want to feel. I want to feel more confident. I want to have more energy.

I want to, you know, feel sexy. I don't care what it is. It's whatever is important to you, right? How you want to feel. But that's really what's driving you.

You want to change in that and also how you think about things and how you engage in life and your cognitive orientation, meaning are you thinking about all the things that scare you or are you thinking about all the things you could do and the possibilities and all that really goes into a big bucket, which I find to be really what's driving success for most people, but hard to measure.

**Jim Hill:** Okay. How do you measure it?

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, that's the question. I mean, we try to do scales and say on zero to 10, how do you feel? But that's, oh, that's not quite as good, right? As having stepped on a scale and seeing a number. But it really is about awareness in your life. And, you know, the people that said they weren't successful in this group that I was talking to, this team I was talking to the other night, I asked them, how are they feeling? Oh, yeah, I'm feeling happier.

I'm doing it, I have more energy. I'm like, then what, that is a success. Come on, guys. Pay attention to that. Write that down. Remember that.

Include it. Be aware of, yeah, I don't have happiness every moment of every day, but yeah, I have more moments of that now. I have more moments where I feel connected to my kids because I can go to the park with them and run around.

I have more moments where I feel calm or whatever it is. Be aware, write it down, think about it, and include it. But it's hard, Jim. I don't have the magic solution for that.

**Jim Hill:** You know, Holly reminds me of the work we did with the National Weight Control Registry. Remember, these people were maintaining about a 70-pound weight loss, but they also, almost all of them had significantly increased their physical activity. So they actually modified their body state just as you suggested. And we asked them if life was better before or after weight loss and overwhelmingly, life was better.

Rarely did anyone say it wasn't. So again, the improving the body state will help the mind state, but the question is, can we do other things to the mind state to enhance it over and above improving the body state?

**Holly Wyatt:** And Jim, maybe then what you just said is a solution a little bit. One of the questions to ask yourself, perhaps every day or maybe even every week, is my life better? You know, is it moving in that direction? Am I feeling better and using that in addition to the scale to monitor your success?

**Jim Hill:** I think it's so important. And unfortunately, most programs only give it lip service, if any service at all. Because again, I think what people understand when people go into a weight loss journey, the scale is the most important thing. So if I'm selling to somebody, I want to sell them something that moves the scale, because that's going to get the short-term solution. One of the things that it brings up that I want to emphasize over and over, losing weight is different from keeping it off. What we're talking about now is long-term.

There are so many ways to lose weight and there are so many different things you can do to lose weight, but what we're talking about is that state of keeping it off the forever state. And this is where I think the mindset is maybe one of the most important things in determining who's going to be successful.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yes. And I like what you said that you can't just do lip service to it. Meaning you can't just say yes and check a box. It really does take, I want to say work. I just want to say, you know, working toward it, understanding it, putting some time into it, just like you put time into the diet and into the physical activity. And one of the things that I've noticed is sometimes in terms of the mind state, people come in and they can't even tell me what they want to feel. All they can tell me is what they don't want to feel. I know what I don't want to feel. I don't want to feel what I'm feeling now. I don't want to feel anxiety.

I don't want to have the fear that I'm going to develop type 2 diabetes. I don't want to go down the path that my mother went down where she couldn't, you know, she couldn't take care of herself. So I don't want to feel that way. But oh, working on the mind state is about what you want to feel.

Not what do you not want to feel? You can start there. But it's about spending time and being aware of what success would look like. Success is not feeling something, right? Success is what you want more of, not necessarily what you want less of. And spending some time to think about that because I don't think we let ourselves think about it or some people have never gone there. And that sounds crazy, but it's true.

**Jim Hill:** Holly, is this where the concept of identity might come in?

**Holly Wyatt:** I do. I do think it's identity because if you're thinking about what you don't want and you're thinking about who you are not, that's very different than saying who am I and recognizing that and moving toward it. And when you do move toward who you are, it feels good. And that's part of success. When you start to feel good, that is part of weight loss success. That is part of what we're trying to do. So I do think it falls in here.

**Jim Hill:** I think identity is so important because I think we see a lot of people and their identity is as an overweight person. That's who they identify. And even when they lose weight, they're an overweight person struggling to keep the weight off. And I think what we try to help people understand is you can have a different identity. You can see yourself as a different person. And I think that's an important part of changing this mindset.

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, that's a success, right? Suddenly seeing yourself as who you really are. Oh my gosh, to me, that's a bigger success than the weight loss on the scale. I think it's both. But I think it's even bigger when you have one of those moments where you suddenly realize who you really are and you're moving toward it and it feels good. I would rather have that because that is so powerful. Yet people don't think of that as success, Jim. They don't include it in their success.

**Jim Hill:** Well, we see that over and over. We've seen so many times where people have changed. It's almost as if they're a different person. I know you and I sometimes say what's really happened is now they're outside and inside matched together. They're the person on the outside. They've always felt on the inside. But to the outside world, it's almost as if they become a different person.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And the third, there's one more bucket, Jim, and you're going to love this bucket. This is the bucket you talk about the most. I talk about mind state the most. I think this is the one you really talk about the most is that life state. And the body state and the mind state really create them together; your body and your mind create this opportunity for your life state to change, and to be successful. And that's your experience. I put that as your experiences, which is what we're here. We're living life. And what are the experiences that you're having in that life state and seeing that and changes in that as being a success?

**Jim Hill:** So how do you measure that, Holly?

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, we do have some quality-of-life measures that have been standardized and put out there. They never excite me because they tend to go in areas that I'm not sure are exact areas that I believe that a lot of people have, you know, want to go in. But you can't measure that. But once again, it's thinking about is my life better. I think you said it, right? Is my life better? Am I moving toward a better life?

**Jim Hill:** And that's what people want. They want the weight loss, but what they really want is a happier life.

**Holly Wyatt:** But I want to say this because I know where people will go with this, but body state can be part of that. Like, don't tell me, don't tell me that I can't want to change my body state because it's really about happiness. It's only about happiness. No, it's about happiness. And if I want to change my body state and that's part of it, then I believe that you should be able to do that.

**Jim Hill:** Body state is such a big part of happiness that again, if weight loss is important to you, we have the tools now to help you do that. And if that's part of your happiness, which I think it is for a lot of people, we should not discourage people from losing weight

**Holly Wyatt:** or make them feel bad about it. I mean, I've had people make me feel bad. You know, Holly, you don't love yourself or you're not, you know, because you want to lose 10 pounds or 15 pounds or whatever it is. And I'm like, no, who are you to tell me that? I'm not telling you you have to lose 10 pounds, but don't tell me I can't.

**Jim Hill:** It's up to the person. If you don't want to if you want to keep your weight, you're not worried about your weight, you want to work on your mind state or other behaviors, that's perfectly fine. But if you want to work on your weight, that's perfectly fine too.

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. I'm not going to judge you. Don't judge me. You know, where is that? And I think, believe it or not, I mean, I'm an MD. I'm a healthcare provider. A lot of healthcare providers definitely feel strongly that, you know, it's got to be one thing is the thing. And I'm like, guys, where did that come from? Why do you get to decide that for your patients? I don't get that part of it.

**Jim Hill:** Wow. So where are we here? This has been a wonderful discussion. And I think if people can take away the concept of edge, you're thinking about success just beyond the scale, just being aware of that's important. And I think our group and other groups may be working on better ways to measure that and better ways to help you do it. So how do we pull this together for our listeners today?

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, I have one listener question. I have one listener question I thought we could put in.

**Jim Hill:** Oh yeah. Oh, we like those.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. Because that helps us get some, making sure we're kind of getting some pie in the plate if we can answer this question something. But one of the listeners kind of wrote, when will I be done? You know, and I said, well, what do you think is success? And success is when I'm finished, right? When I'm finished, when will I be done?

When will I not have to think about or worry about my weight anymore? That's a success when I'm, this is over in a sense. This, you know, journey is over.

Wow. You know, and I do think people think about that and success when I no longer have to think about my weight, then I'm successful in my weight management journey.

**Jim Hill:** Well, Holly, I'm not sure that people will ever get to the point when they don't think about their weight. I go back to the National Weight Control Registry. These people are so successful. If you ask them, they say, look, I struggled at first. I know I'm going to keep the weight off, but they still tell you it's hard. They still tell you they have to work at it. They tell you life is better. So I don't think they get to the point where they don't think about it. I think they get to the point where they live a lifestyle that helps them maintain the weight. They think about it, but I'm not sure they obsess over it the way a lot of people do.

**Holly Wyatt:** Oh, I agree. I don't think we should be thinking about success at an endpoint. I think this, you're going to continue. I actually do think it gets easier in the sense that you know what to do so you don't feel as afraid that you're going to regain the weight. And so for a lot of people, there's a big fear. I think even Rainy, our success persons, talked about that we did the interview with Rainy, and she was like, yeah, first I was scared to death. I was going to regain. Now I'm not scared. So I think it gets better in that sense.

**Jim Hill:** But the not scared part, I think, is establishing a lifestyle and routines that are different from those that you had before you lost the weight. You can't go back and live life as you did before the weight loss. It's not like you go and do something temporarily, then you go back to living your life the way you did before. You have to do something permanent. But once you do that and you get the routine, it takes less effort to be successful.

**Holly Wyatt:** You have these tools and you've had past experiences. So I think part of what I hear Rainey talk about another is, oh, I did regain some weight and I got it off and I know what to do now. And therefore, I feel more confident. And therefore, which brings me to this kind of definition of success, a lot of people think if I lose weight and I regain some of it, I'm not successful.

And I'm where did that come from? Because I guarantee you, I regain weight all the time. I then will lose it, get back to a certain weight, and feel very successful. And so part of it is, I know what to do. I have the tools, I have the support, I put it in place. What success? Being aware, I know when I've gained a few pounds, I know what to do. Oh, to me, that is a success. It's not, I'm not going to beat myself up or say I'm unsuccessful because I've regained some weight. And that's what people do. That's what makes them feel unsuccessful.

**Jim Hill:** So Holly, I feel like we've almost just scratched the surface on this success thing. How can we continue this? What can we do to continue our sort of work to rethink success?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, so I'm thinking a lot about this because I do think this is an evolving topic. And it's so timely with these weight loss medications really throwing this new, well, more people are going to be achieving a certain amount of weight loss. So I like what we're doing with having the success visits like Rainy on.

So if you have been successful and we all different types of success, please send us an email. And we want to have more of that on the show. But I think we also thought about, let's have some people who are just starting their journey, or as the journey is going, and let's have them on the show and let's talk about different types of success as they're progressing real-time.

**Jim Hill:** Interesting. Interesting to show maybe different ways that people have achieved success.

**Holly Wyatt:** You know, and maybe they won't even see it. Maybe we can point it out. And if we can point it out, well, you know, the scale didn't go down as much as you anticipated.

But now you're able to get on the ground and play with your kids. And that brings you a certain sense of whatever. I mean, we can point it out. I think not only would it help that person, but also help other listeners who are also on a similar path.

**Jim Hill:** I love it. You know, when we used to live in Colorado, we would hear people talk about, I want to climb a mountain. That's my goal. I want to be able to climb a mountain, even if it's a small mountain, climb a mountain. I love that idea. I love the idea of following some real people and looking at how they see success.

**Holly Wyatt:** Because I think then we can start to evolve it and we can start to maybe put some parameters around it. But I think the big thing is let's broaden it. It's so narrow. Let's broaden it. And that means we can include weight and other things. It's not, you know, one more thing, Jim.

I just thought about this. I think one of the reasons why people don't want to broaden their definition of success is because they think that if they say, okay, success is me having more moments of happiness or confidence or having more energy if they say that success, that they have to let go of the weight loss, then they won't have the weight loss. You know what I'm saying?

It's like, yeah. Okay, I don't want to, it's like they think that if they say this is success, then it won't, they can't also have weight loss as an outcome of success.

**Jim Hill:** They need to understand the concept of and, Holly.

**Holly Wyatt:** Exactly, exactly.

**Jim Hill:** It's weight loss and…

**Holly Wyatt:** I would say they'll have our cake and eat it too what a great analogy for us, right?

**Jim Hill:** I hope our listeners are getting the sense that you and I think it's the and part that's really what's important here.

**Holly Wyatt:** I think they've got that by now.

**Jim Hill:** Okay, put it all together for us and let's conclude this one.

**Holly Wyatt:** I think this one is still open. It's evolving.

**Jim Hill:** Okay, continue this one, not conclude.

**Holly Wyatt:** So I think I want to have some of our listeners email us.

**Jim Hill:** Oh, yeah. We love the listener questions.

**Holly Wyatt:** The questions, but also, are you a success story? Want to be interviewed for a success story?

**Jim Hill:** Oh, do you want to be on the podcast and tell your story?

**Holly Wyatt:** Do you want to be on the podcast? Are you willing for us to follow you through your journey and look at success?

**Jim Hill:** And becoming an international celebrity by being on weight loss and…

**Holly Wyatt:** Reality podcast. That's what we have here, a reality podcast.

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, I love it. I love it.

**Holly Wyatt:** We don't know more TV shows. You're going to be on a reality podcast.

**Jim Hill:** That's great, Holly. Love it. All right. Okay, we are going to continue this. The conclusion here, success has got to be more than just the number on the scale. We will continue.

We will look at real people and how they've succeeded. So this is Jim and Holly signing off on another episode of Weight Loss and...

**Holly Wyatt:** Bye, guys.

**Jim Hill:** And that's a wrap for today's episode of Weight Loss and. We hope you enjoy diving into the world of weight loss with us.

**Holly Wyatt:** If you want to stay connected and continue exploring the “Ands” of weight loss, be sure to follow our podcast on your favorite platform.

**Jim Hill:** We'd also love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or topic suggestions by reaching out at [weightlossand.com](http://weightlossand.com/). Your feedback helps us tailor future episodes to your needs.

**Holly Wyatt:** And remember, the journey doesn't end here. Keep applying the knowledge and strategies you've learned and embrace the power of the “And” in your own weight loss journey.