Scared to weigh myself...

http://quantumscale.com/ This scale doesn't show your weight, only your cumulative loss or gain. I used it to help myself stop focusing on "the number" when I was losing. It definitely helped me break my number obsession.

GauchoMark wrote: »

Honestly, weight doesn't mean much of anything anyways. Once you hit your weight goal, are you going to wear a tag that shows how much you weigh? No - no one knows the number but you. What matters is how you feel, look, and that you are healthy. That is what people will see, not some irrelevant number.

@Keladelphia, that scale is interesting. Does it hook up to wifi? I kind of like the concept, but would rather it just show me my % body fat. That's all I really care about from my scale anyways.

@GauchoMark Mine doesn't but I have an old version that I bought when I was losing a couple of years ago. I don't think the newer version connects to wifi or shows BF% but it does give you the option to use it as a regular scale (my old one didn't). I think it mostly benefits those who get consumed with focusing on a number.


If you have a recommendation for a scale that seems to calculate BF% though i'd love to know what it is as that's what I gauge my progress on now and haven't found a way to get a consistent accurate BF measurement.

Your weight is the same whether you look at it or not. It's better to have that information than to not have it. I do understand your hesitation, I've been there before. I was already a week or more into my change of eating and exercise before I stepped onto the scale years ago to see 253#! Yeah, that was a rude awakening to how bad I had let myself go. If you don't weigh now, how will you know when you have that first pound of success, and the 2nd, 3rd, etc.

Go weigh! Hell, take a pic of it and hang it on the fridge. Eventually it will become a source of pride for what you have lost.

I'd say weigh yourself, but also take body measurements with a body tape measure or a cloth tape measure. I'm willing to bet that after three months your measurements will at least be a bit smaller.

It was tough to see that scale number when I got on it again after a bad patch, but I really wasn't surprised by it. But since that day, seeing a lower number is making me very happy. By not gritting your teeth and seeing what you weigh now, you are denying yourself that satisfaction.

I also am using "test pants". I have a bunch of clothes that I grew out of but that are still in my closet mocking me. Back on that first weigh in day I tried on a pair of jeans that I could wear just a year ago and I couldn't get them over my hips. This week I tried them on again and they came up over my hips but I couldn't fasten the waist. I'll try them again in a month. I keep them out where I can see them every day. Of course I have even smaller pants that will become the next test pants in their turn.

Not weighing myself because I was scared too is part of the reason I got as bad as I did. I was in total denial about my size and was scared to see the number. When I jumped on the scale in May and saw that big 258.9, I about cried. I didn't realize I let myself gain that much weight (It had been about 6 months since my previous weigh in). I finally did something about it and am now down to 227 and still going strong. I cringe to think of how much more weight I would have kept on gaining had I not stopped myself then. It didn't throw me into a depression, it made me stop and think about what so was doing and how my life could be affected. Now I know not everyone feels the same and some prefer not to look at the scale, but I like knowing where I started and seeing just how much weight I have lost.

How do your clothes fit? That's more important than what the scale says.

lorrpb wrote: »

The scales give you a number (data) not a moral judgement.

Thats how I feel about it and I don't really understand people who have anxiety or emotion tied to it, but I do try to be sympathetic about it and think "if this caused me anxiety what would I do" and honestly the most obvious answer is "don't do that thing". You don't absolutely have to weigh yourself to lose weight. I mean it helps to have some sort of readout of your progress but you can get that from other sources. I'd just be concerned whatever that source was your anxiety would just be associated with that instead. But I don't know, anxiety over my weight has never been a thing for me. I've been concerned by my weight, but I feel thats a different thing.

Need2Exerc1se wrote: »

I say don't weigh yourself if it's going to be upsetting. Just get on plan and weigh yourself when you are feeling better about your weight.

I second this. This is what I do.

It's interesting to me to see that a lot of people mis-routed the OP's point to something completely nonissue and then say they don't understand it.

I don't think the OP fears the information or the scale itself. Who does? The underlining fear of the scale is one's fear of his own failure in an endeavor. Personally I do feel a bit anxious sometimes before stepping on the scale. It's not the scale. I'm anxious because I do not want to see my effort wasted or having to redraw my plan which is work.

I clicked on an advertisement that said lifting improves health in a lot of ways. Namely, lower insurance costs. So, I shall acquire a bar and 200 lb of weights and commence dead lifting soon. That's an example of a thought process which finds a reason to do something and plans to do it, using any convenient excuse. Seeing your OP, you plan to do nothing and the convenient excuse is "I'd know my weight". Is that really the way you want to go through life, erecting false barriers to yourself?

I've struggled w/ the same problem. From my personal experience ( this is a disclaimer because everyone handles things differently), like some others above have said, you should pretty much focus on what you know would be best for you mentally which from what you have said seems to be stay away from the scale for now. Just because you may not want to be where you want now, does not mean that tomorrow you won't be able to make that chnage for the better. Get a good workout in& make a consistent schedule for some time to workout everyday& watch not only calories but the content of what you give your body. Never give up if you have a goal!! This is my advice to you from my very recent& past experiences, hope this helps

When I logged into MFP today it told me that I had last weighed myself 75 days ago. That was pretty much when I went off the rails on my diet too. It was also when I stopped logging because I don't log if I am not trying. If I can't be concerned enough to eat properly, and exercise properly, as in the things that I was doing that were actually having me get from 387 to 295... why bother logging them. I know I was "bad" LOL.

Today I am starting to get back on the horse as it were. I didn't hit the high carb/high calorie/high sugar snacks at work, I started bringing my own food and eating every couple hours like I was before. Now that the weather has cooled down a bit, I got back to walking in the Seattle rain and now that I have a tablet with plenty of cannabis podcasts on it, I found it much easier to not focus on the walk itself.

Tomorrow I will hit the Shipping scale again like I used to do every morning before I started work. If the home scale is accurate, it will likely tell me I am back up to around 317-320. And that is OK. I knew it was coming. It won't be a shock. I mean, not exercising and going back up to probably 3500-4000 calories a day.... it should be there.

I know how to get it back down though. And today I start getting back on track. And when I backslide again, and it will happen, I will just repeat the process but try to shorten the time I am off track. With cooler temps, and shorter workdays due to my business.... I have no excuse to not keep working on that number.

I mean, that is all it is, a number. If I truly want it to be a smaller number... it's on me.