Why the scale lies to us
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SHBoss1673
Posts: 7,161 Member
originally posted on my blog
http://bankshealth.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/why-the-scale-lies-to-us/
Ever start a new routine, say “OK, this time I’m going to eat exactly right, exercise, and weigh myself every week”, do great for the first month, then on week five step on the scale and realize you’re up 2 lbs? It happens to everyone who is trying for weight loss. Here’s my pitch to why this shouldn’t bother you, and why the scale is a big *kitten* of a liar.
First lets take a make a few statements you should know. Please note these aren’t excuses, they are just plain science and should be heeded.
1) Home use scales are not accurate enough to distinguish less than a pound, so anyone worrying about those numbers to the right of the decimal, forget it, they mean nothing.
2) The human body, depending on your age, sex, weight, activity level, diet…etc. can fluctuate body weight up to 5 lbs. in EITHER DIRECTION on any given day, that means that if you step on today and weigh 190 lbs. and tomorrow and weigh 194, that’s nothing to be worried about, it’s normal. The day after you could step on and weigh 188 lbs., and I’ve seen this happen, so it’s not just some theory, it’s real.
3) Sodium is a killer. Most people in the US who eat at least some processed foods will have more sodium in their body than they need, really we need about 2000 mg if we don’t exercise, and anywhere from 2500 to 4000 if we exercise (depending on length, type, and intensity). Why is sodium relevant? Because excess sodium promotes water storage in the body, and water is HEAVY, it takes nothing to gain a lb of water weight in a day, and after a sodium heavy meal you can put on 3 to 4 lbs of water and not even realize it.
4) Different foods metabolize and are eliminated at different rates. I.E. a steak dinner may take 12 to 24 hours to be completely eliminated from the body, where as a salad might only take 2 hours to completely cycle and break down, fiber is a factor as well.
5) Changes in exercise routine messes with the metabolic rate. This is a good thing in general, but it will screw with weight loss in unpredictable ways, new weight training routines often cause a plateau in weight loss simply because newly activated muscle fibers require water and glycogen at the muscle site, and more energy in total to be sustained; this reduces any fat loss on the scale. But it’s a VERY GOOD THING, so don’t worry about weight plateau or even gain after changing up your routines.
OK so now that we have some facts that explain short term scale fluctuations, what do we do to minimize the panic that sets in? First, never judge your progress on a single scale session. I tell all the people I advise to log your scale numbers and take the forest view over the tree view. I.E. grab the last 6 or 8 scale measurements and look at the trend, if the trend is down, then you’re doing it right, the more sessions you can add, the more accurate the trend will be. And when I say this, I don’t mean taking 7 days in a row, that’s just not long enough, I mean like 4 to 8 weeks’ worth of numbers.
The second thing you should do is realize that the human body just doesn’t change that quickly. Nobody gains 10 lbs. of fat in 1 week, and I dare say that you would have a very hard time gaining even 5 lbs. of fat in a week. It would take a real, concerted effort to do this. So if your scale jumped 5 lbs. in a week, relax, it’s probably just water weight. Likewise don’t become too excited if you drop 5 lbs. in a few days, sorry guys, but just as you can’t gain that much, you really can’t lose that much that fast either. I’ll caveat that last statement with this, if you are morbidly obese or are overweight but train extremely hard for very long periods of time every day, 5 lbs. of fat in a week is possible, but in 99% of the cases, it’s not recommended or even healthy to do so. If you have enough fat that you can afford to lose 5 lbs. in a week, then you’re probably not in good enough shape to work as hard as you need to in order to do so.
The last thing I’ll mention is that with fat loss, consistency is key, the metabolism has built in safeguards to balance out any very high or very low calorie days, if you swing your calorie types, or amounts wildly throughout the week, it can be disastrous to your weight loss, I won’t get into details about why, but feel free to ask me in an email or tweet if you want to know more. Just know that if you’re consistently swinging from many hundred calories below maintenance to a few hundred calories above maintenance throughout the week that’s NOT the same as maintaining a 300 calorie deficit every day, the body reacts to extremes, and it reacts with fat storage, this is fact, not opinion.
hope this helps!
-Banks
http://bankshealth.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/why-the-scale-lies-to-us/
Ever start a new routine, say “OK, this time I’m going to eat exactly right, exercise, and weigh myself every week”, do great for the first month, then on week five step on the scale and realize you’re up 2 lbs? It happens to everyone who is trying for weight loss. Here’s my pitch to why this shouldn’t bother you, and why the scale is a big *kitten* of a liar.
First lets take a make a few statements you should know. Please note these aren’t excuses, they are just plain science and should be heeded.
1) Home use scales are not accurate enough to distinguish less than a pound, so anyone worrying about those numbers to the right of the decimal, forget it, they mean nothing.
2) The human body, depending on your age, sex, weight, activity level, diet…etc. can fluctuate body weight up to 5 lbs. in EITHER DIRECTION on any given day, that means that if you step on today and weigh 190 lbs. and tomorrow and weigh 194, that’s nothing to be worried about, it’s normal. The day after you could step on and weigh 188 lbs., and I’ve seen this happen, so it’s not just some theory, it’s real.
3) Sodium is a killer. Most people in the US who eat at least some processed foods will have more sodium in their body than they need, really we need about 2000 mg if we don’t exercise, and anywhere from 2500 to 4000 if we exercise (depending on length, type, and intensity). Why is sodium relevant? Because excess sodium promotes water storage in the body, and water is HEAVY, it takes nothing to gain a lb of water weight in a day, and after a sodium heavy meal you can put on 3 to 4 lbs of water and not even realize it.
4) Different foods metabolize and are eliminated at different rates. I.E. a steak dinner may take 12 to 24 hours to be completely eliminated from the body, where as a salad might only take 2 hours to completely cycle and break down, fiber is a factor as well.
5) Changes in exercise routine messes with the metabolic rate. This is a good thing in general, but it will screw with weight loss in unpredictable ways, new weight training routines often cause a plateau in weight loss simply because newly activated muscle fibers require water and glycogen at the muscle site, and more energy in total to be sustained; this reduces any fat loss on the scale. But it’s a VERY GOOD THING, so don’t worry about weight plateau or even gain after changing up your routines.
OK so now that we have some facts that explain short term scale fluctuations, what do we do to minimize the panic that sets in? First, never judge your progress on a single scale session. I tell all the people I advise to log your scale numbers and take the forest view over the tree view. I.E. grab the last 6 or 8 scale measurements and look at the trend, if the trend is down, then you’re doing it right, the more sessions you can add, the more accurate the trend will be. And when I say this, I don’t mean taking 7 days in a row, that’s just not long enough, I mean like 4 to 8 weeks’ worth of numbers.
The second thing you should do is realize that the human body just doesn’t change that quickly. Nobody gains 10 lbs. of fat in 1 week, and I dare say that you would have a very hard time gaining even 5 lbs. of fat in a week. It would take a real, concerted effort to do this. So if your scale jumped 5 lbs. in a week, relax, it’s probably just water weight. Likewise don’t become too excited if you drop 5 lbs. in a few days, sorry guys, but just as you can’t gain that much, you really can’t lose that much that fast either. I’ll caveat that last statement with this, if you are morbidly obese or are overweight but train extremely hard for very long periods of time every day, 5 lbs. of fat in a week is possible, but in 99% of the cases, it’s not recommended or even healthy to do so. If you have enough fat that you can afford to lose 5 lbs. in a week, then you’re probably not in good enough shape to work as hard as you need to in order to do so.
The last thing I’ll mention is that with fat loss, consistency is key, the metabolism has built in safeguards to balance out any very high or very low calorie days, if you swing your calorie types, or amounts wildly throughout the week, it can be disastrous to your weight loss, I won’t get into details about why, but feel free to ask me in an email or tweet if you want to know more. Just know that if you’re consistently swinging from many hundred calories below maintenance to a few hundred calories above maintenance throughout the week that’s NOT the same as maintaining a 300 calorie deficit every day, the body reacts to extremes, and it reacts with fat storage, this is fact, not opinion.
hope this helps!
-Banks
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Replies
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Preach.0
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let me add picture proof that the scale lies
gray top pics by crochetmom2010, on Flickr
in the picture on the left, I was 188-199 pounds. I worked out with a group of women from my church, and I started at 199 pounds...I lost 11 pounds during that time, so had to be no less than 188 pounds when that was taken.
after the group broke up, I went on to gain weight, and hit my all time high of 228.4 pounds. In February I started exercising and watching my diet. By Thanksgiving I had lost 32 pounds. In the picture on the right, I am wearing the same shirt as in the picture on the left...the pants have been falling off me since March or April. I am now 196 pounds.
I am wearing a size 14 or 16 depending on brand or cut...the last time I wore a 14 was when I weighed 175 pounds!0 -
Thanks!0
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Words to live by! Wonderful!0
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best freaking post I've read yet - please keep reposting this every day until the information it contains sinks into every head on here!
Thanks!!!!!!0 -
Thanks
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The scale may lie, but no ones ever truly satisfied with themselves.0
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Thanks for the post. I was just looking in to the effects of too much sodium in my diet. I appreciate the information!0
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Bump! I might just print this out and tape it to my scale :drinker:0
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Word0
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let me add picture proof that the scale lies
gray top pics by crochetmom2010, on Flickr
in the picture on the left, I was 188-199 pounds. I worked out with a group of women from my church, and I started at 199 pounds...I lost 11 pounds during that time, so had to be no less than 188 pounds when that was taken.
after the group broke up, I went on to gain weight, and hit my all time high of 228.4 pounds. In February I started exercising and watching my diet. By Thanksgiving I had lost 32 pounds. In the picture on the right, I am wearing the same shirt as in the picture on the left...the pants have been falling off me since March or April. I am now 196 pounds.
I am wearing a size 14 or 16 depending on brand or cut...the last time I wore a 14 was when I weighed 175 pounds!
Love this!!! Great job btw!!0 -
Love this post and I want to save it forever! I will agree with the girl above who used the 2 pics of her at basically the same weight. I have one of me at the exactly the same weight taken 3 years apart and there's an obvious difference.
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This post just made me feel better. I joined MFP 25 days ago, I have lost 4lbs. I feel stronger, I can do more cardio and my diet is decent (not perfect). I was originally doing 1,200 calories a day net but a friend who is a PT advised that 1,200 was far to low since I was going to the gym consistently. I upped my calories to around my BMR/RMR (we did a bunch of calculations from different methods and found an average) and I increased my calories by about 370 calories a day. I haven't lost anything but I haven't gained either. I guess that suggests a success but the scale was really discouraging me. It never feels good to workout regularly and eat healthy (and obviously a lot less food than I was used to a month ago) to have a weight loss of 4lbs in the beginning. But, I will keep going and keeping as consistent as humanly possible during the Holidays.
Good luck to everyone and keep up the good work! 0 -
Scales don't lie. They are just tools that measure (to different degrees of accuracy) if our bodies weigh more or less. They do not tell us health or body composition, but that is not what scales are for.
We lie to ourselves when we tell ourselves we are failing or not healthy due to our weight measurement not being what we think it should be as a reflection of body composition.
Why blame the scale and call it a liar. It is just an inanimate object object.0 -
I want to thank you all so much first for the information and second for the pictures. I nice to see that even if you weigh the same you body can look different0
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I can't really say that the scale lies either, to go along with what my lovely friend 3foldchord says, but I will say that every time I've reached a certain weight, I've always looked different or carried it differently than the last time. It's better that I go with how I feel rather than go by a number to determine how that day is going to go. Also, give me 5 scales, and you'll have a likelihood of 5 different (though somewhat similar) weights, all within a 5-10 range.0
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Scales don't lie. They are just tools that measure (to different degrees of accuracy) if our bodies weigh more or less. They do not tell us health or body composition, but that is not what scales are for.
We lie to ourselves when we tell ourselves we are failing or not healthy due to our weight measurement not being what we think it should be as a reflection of body composition.
Why blame the scale and call it a liar. It is just an inanimate object object.
Well said. I have a body mass composition scale and I love it. I have weighed the same for the past month, but my body composition has changed. My BF% is down and my LBM is up. I can notice the difference in the way my clothes fit as well. Just like knowing that my overal cholesterol is down, it is just as important to know that my ration of LDL to HDL has improved as well. The scale is a tool, the blood tests are a tool, an HRM is a tool, and I use them as ways to indicate my overall health.0 -
neat 0
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Wait, a well thought out and rational post? I really don't know what to make of this :bigsmile:
Thanks for the post, good information and "grounder" for anyone making the journey to healthy.0 -
Great post SHBoss. I know my scale lies to me. Sometimes I love its little white lies and sometimes I hate them but mostly I'm just amused. 7lbs down in a whole week? WOOHOO! I know I'm not really down that much but it's good to track my body's trends so I log it anyway. I log those pesky upticks too.0
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