Feeling Discouraged

Soon2BeSkinny321

Last I knew (as of a few days ago), I had lost a few pounds. Been doing really good with tracking my food on here this week so just weighed myself hoping I might be down another pound or 2. But...I weighed 3 pounds more then last time I checked!! How can that be when I stuck to 1200 to 1300 cals the past few days?! I will say noticed my sodium intake was pretty high & I didn't drink very much water at all these past few days. So do you think maybe I'm up 3 lbs due to retaining water? Really hope that's all it is & that if I drink more water and keep watching my cals I'll get rid of those 3 lbs plus some asap!!

__TMac__

I easily retain 3 lbs of water after eating lots of sodium, and it takes 2 or 3 days for it to settle back down.

ACSelkie

Save yourself a lot of angst! Weigh yourself once a week trust your food plan and never define success by a number on the scale... Hang in there and congrats on sticking to your calories this week...

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AnnPT77

To add to comments above: I don't know your age, but among pre-menopausal women, it's absolutely common to gain several pounds of water weight at some point during your menstrual cycle. Reportedly, it can happen any time between ovulation & the end of menses.

Unlike some above, I prefer to weigh myself daily. For me, it helped me understand the daily fluctuations, what causes them, and how rapidly they reverse. Nowadays, fluctuations don't stress me at all, and I can often predict when they'll occur. But this is not for everyone: One does need to be able to avoid freaking out about the little changes until the patterns clarify in one's mind. If it's super stressful for you, then weighing less often may help.

There are even weight trend apps you can use to record your weight, then the app makes a statistical estimate of your weight loss direction, kind of smoothing out the daily bumps so you can better see the trend. Happy Scale (for iOS), Libra (for Android), and Trendweight are just a few examples.

Personally, I've seen a change of as much as 3-5 pounds on the scale from one day to the next, without having eaten anything even remotely close to the 10,500-17,500 calories above maintenance calories that it would take to gain that much fat.

In your case, it's certainly water weight, perhaps from the sodium, perhaps from your cycle - and there are other potential causes of water weight, too. If you know you haven't eaten 3500 calories above maintenance, you haven't gained a pound, let alone 3.

Take a deep breath, stay on your healthy course, and the water weight will drop off, probably in 2-3 days (if sodium), or a week or so (if monthly cycle). You're doing fine.

Alpine0021

Measurements measurements measurements! The scale makes u feel better at its physically there in front of you. Don't stress too much about actual weight

Soon2BeSkinny321

Thanks so much for your input everyone. That makes me feel a lot better now.