Struggling with number on the scale

mcgeevercaitlin

hi everyone-

last November I hit my lowest weight of 150 and I was so happy with that number and finally reached my "goal". Then after my birthday, thanksgiving, christmas and a California vacation I had gained about 8-10 lbs.

After the new year I was back on my routine working out 6 days a week and eating right. I have kept that up for the past 7 months. And I am still lingering around 158-160 lbs. which is really discouraging to me.

I know that the number does not matter and my clothes still fit and overall I feel stronger and healthy from working out and doing barre and yoga. We had a wellness coach come into work and take my measurements at 160lbs 5'6 I am 33% body fat.

Can anyone give me advice to get over the number on the scale and essentially hide the scale. Also many some advice on how to shred the last 10

Or could it be that I am gaining muscle from workouts and a daily protein shake. Sorry I am all over the place just feeling a little lost and confused with all this. Thanks

livingleanlivingclean

If your weight is stable, you're eating at maintenance - you talk a lot about exercise but don't mention calorie intake. Are you in a deficit? Do you log your intake accurately by weighing all your food?

tinkerbellang83

Just keep at a small calorie deficit, take measurements and progress pictures instead of focusing on the scale.

steveko89

I can't help but notice you didn't mention of nutrition outside of "eating right". I know it's not sexy advice or a hot tip but if you're maintaining your weight you're not in a calorie deficit, which is priority #1 if your primary goal is to shrink the number on the scale. If you're not already doing so, log your food diligently, use a food scale and ensure you're in a caloric deficit. In my experience, tightening down logging and ensuring I'm consistently in a caloric deficit is the best and only way to "shred the last 10". Overall, make sure you're expectations are set correctly as losing weight when already close to goal/healthy weights can be very slow; most recommend a deficit requisite to no more than 0.5 lbs/week with 10 lbs to lose. However, if 33% body fat is accurate, you may be able to lose more weight than you think (if you so choose) and get down in the 135-140 range, which would be closer to "ideal weight" range for your size per the established formulas.

As far as mindset surrounding the scale, there are two primary schools of thought:
- Weigh oneself infrequently so that it shows a quantifiable improvement over long periods of time between weigh-ins.
- Weigh oneself daily and use an app like HappyScale or Libra to track the overall trend.

I'm a big proponent of the latter over the former. Weighing daily can help eliminate the event-based value we place on scale weight by turning it into habitual data collection. It also provides good feedback over a shorter period of time whether or not the measures one is taking (i.e. calorie level at which one is eating) are being effective in losing weight.