What is a Healthy Weight Range?

When you're trying to lose weight, it helps to have a goal in mind. If you're overweight or obese, the chances are you would like to lose enough weight to fall into a healthy weight range. It isn't too difficult to establish what category you are currently in and how much weight you would have to lose to be able to call yourself a healthy weight. There are plenty of Body Mass Index (BMI) calculators available online that will enable you to determine whether you are carrying too much weight for your height. BMI tends to be a good place to start, though for some people to fall into a healthy range would be impossible, especially those with a more muscular physique.

However, if you have far too many wobbly bits, you know that the fact you're classed as obese has nothing to do with muscle mass. BMI may not be the ideal way of determining how much weight you need to lose, since a healthy BMI is considered to be between 18.5 and 24.9, which leaves plenty of room for manoeuvre. You may end up at the higher end of what is healthy for you and decide that you don't need to lose any more weight, or you may enter into a healthy weight range, but decide that you would look better if you lost a few more pounds. Thus, you have to work out what is best for you.

Everyone is different. There are different shapes and frames, so that what looks good on you may not look as good on someone else and vice versa. Thus, instead of concentrating so much on a particular number on the scales, it may be a good idea to use other measures to establish whether you're a healthy enough weight. Thus, it may be worth keeping track of your measurements, since these can be a good indicator of health. People who tend to gain weight around their waist have a greater chance of developing heart disease and diabetes, so that it may be worth knowing what your waist to hip ratio is, as this will tell you whether you need to lose more weight.

You should also think about the way you feel and how you have actually gone about your weight loss. If you still feel that you're too heavy and that your weight is stopping you from living a full life, then you should continue to lose weight. Clearly, it is better to lose weight gradually by eating healthily and exercising regularly than by going on a crash diet, and so you not only need to consider whether you have reached a healthy weight range yet, or not. You also need to think about the nutrients that are going into your body and the amount of exercise you do, since it is entirely possible to get into a healthy weight category without doing so in a particularly healthy way.

Overall, then, what actually constitutes a healthy weight range can differ from person to person, which is why you have to pay attention to your weight, measurements and general health and well-being to determine whether you are at a weight you feel comfortable with or whether it is time to lose more weight, or even gain weight if you feel that you are too skinny. After all, the BMI and the waist to hip ratio are only a guide to what a healthy weight actually is, so that the focus should be more on taking steps to lead a healthy life rather than becoming fixated with numbers.