What does stable weight mean? Why is it important?

Thank you for your insightful question about the significance of achieving and maintaining a stable weight, especially in the context of reconstructive plastic surgery following significant weight loss.
What Does Stable Weight Mean?
Stable weight refers to a situation where your body weight remains relatively constant, fluctuating no more than approximately 5 pounds up or down.
Why Is Stable Weight Crucial?
The importance of a stable weight before undergoing plastic surgery is multifaceted:
Avoiding Further Surgery: If you continue to lose weight after a plastic surgery procedure, you might find yourself needing revision surgery due to further changes in your body shape. This can lead to additional expenses, extended recovery periods, and time off work.
Optimal Surgical Results: Achieving a stable weight ensures that the results of the surgery are more likely to be long-lasting and aesthetically pleasing.
For Weight Training Individuals:
In your case, as you're engaged in weight lifting, you're likely experiencing a shift in body composition, losing fat while gaining muscle mass. This can sometimes lead to weight fluctuations that aren’t necessarily reflective of fat loss.
Percent Body Fat Scale: Investing in a scale that measures body fat percentage can be incredibly useful. It provides insights beyond mere weight, indicating changes in body composition, which is particularly relevant for someone actively building muscle.
Once your weight has stabilized for about three months without significant fluctuations, it indicates that your body has adjusted to its new state, making it an opportune time to consider reconstructive surgery.
Congratulations on your weight loss journey, and I hope this explanation helps clarify why stable weight is a critical factor in planning for plastic surgery.
Good luck as you continue on this path.
Sincerely,

Congratulations!! You should be very proud of yourself. That is a great accomplishment. You want to be at a stable weight and not gaining. You wouldn't want to go through surgery and slowly or quickly start gaining the weight back. Best of luck!

Thank you for your question.When we mention stable weight, it means no major changes in your weight.  So it is alright for you to fluctuate a few pounds up or down.  What you do not want is to drop 20-30 or go up in the same amount when you are preparing for surgery.  The bigger weight changes affect the results you can get from your surgery. Also the amount of time that passes from your consult to when you schedule surgery is important.  If you are seen in consult and do not have surgery for 6 months, there are a lot of changes that can happen to the body.  So it is important if you do wait a significant amount of time between them to have another consult prior to surgery to make sure everything will still be the same for the surgical plan. Good luck.

 Congratulations on your weight-loss. This is a great question. It really depends on how you lost your weight. For patients who have lost their weight through diet and exercise, weight stable means waiting about six months to make sure that you can maintain the weight loss. For bariatric surgery patients we often wait a minimum of three months with no changes. The reason for this is that as you're losing weight body is in breakdown mode, it's not ready for repair. Incisions for body contouring surgery again in your body needs to be ready to incisions. Doing these procedures to early can put you at risk for complications.I know that the excess skin can be a big concern, but always safer to wait a longer than to do them too early. Congrats Gain, a great accomplishment. 

Congratulations on your fantastic weight loss journey.  We like patients to be at a stable weight because we want you to have the very best results from our surgery.  Small fluctuations are not usually a problem.  The main issue would be if you were to have surgery then lose another 5-10kg (10-20lb) then you are likely to lose a lot of your surgical results.  If you have minimal fat left & are building muscle, then you sound like you are a good candidate for surgery.  You should have a consultation with a plastic surgeon & get advice from the person who will actually be operating on you.  Sometimes I see patients over the course of 6-12 months prior to their surgery whilst they are "stabilizing" or "normalising" their weight.  All the very best with the next part of your journey.

My patients are told they should be at their maintenance weight before having body contouring procedures if they wish to maintain those results.  This means the weight where you can plateau with your normal daily activities and eating habits.  If you weight is going up or down, its not stable... it should be at a plateau.  The reason you should easily maintain it is if you are dieting heavily and exercising like a fanatic, it is not something that normal people will be able to continue indefinitely and when they stop, their weight will start fluctuating again.  So be at your stable, maintenance weight before having any major body contouring procedures.