Water weight help

Your weight is your total weight. Muscles. Hair. Fat. Bone. Water. Food you're digesting. etc. Bodies have a lot of water. And we hold more or less water at varying times, for varying reasons.

Eating more sodium or carbs than usual. Time of the month. A new exercise routine, or a change in frequency, intensity, or type of exercise. Being low on certain vitamins. There are a lot of reasons why we retain water.

It isn't really something to worry about, obsess over, or go to great lengths to prevent or correct. It's part of your body's natural operations.

It's just that people trying to lose weight can get very emotional about the scale, about thinking they aren't progressing just because the scale weight is staying the same for a few days or a couple weeks, or thinking they've somehow magically gained 5 lbs of fat overnight (they have not!).

Although it may seem counter intuitive, the more water you drink, the less water you retain, which means you have less water weight. On days that I don't drink anything, i always weigh a pound or two more than the day before. Also foods with high sodium content can cause water retention, increasing water weight.

My suggestion is just to drink lots of water, and understand that if you gained 3 pounds overnight, it is almost certainly just water weight unless you managed to eat over 10000 calories the day before. Don't let it freak you out, it will go back to normal pretty quickly.

When someone talks about water weight, they are usually talking about the quick weight loss people usually have the first couple weeks they are eating better. For instance, I've lost 9 lbs in 8 days. A LOT of that is water weight because I only ate at enough of a deficit to lose 2.34 lbs. I will probably lose another 7 lbs this week, also mostly water weight. After this, my weight loss will come to a dramatic slow down where I'll be lucky to lose two lbs despite the numbers indicating I should have lost 2.5 lbs. After that, it will probably even out and be predictable results somewhere around week 5.

Additionally, if you are female, there will be monthly fluctuations of a couple lbs around your period which will come and go and has nothing to do with actual weight loss.

Additionally, you may not usually eat salt and eat a meal that is saltier than usual and despite it being within your calorie limits, you experience a temporary weight gain from water retention. But, of course, that is not real weight gain either.

Now, if you eat higher calorie than usual for a special occasion, you will experience a gain that is part water weight, part real weight and it takes a couple days to tell which was which.

I think those are pretty much the instances where you hear the term "water weight" thrown around.