The Scale Debate

If you find yourself falling into a trap of the numbers obsession. Enforce a limit of days between weigh in, most do it weekly. I started doing it everyday, it led to bad eating habits.
After I set some rules on when I could weigh in that helped jump that mental hurdle dealing with fluctuations. I stuck to weighing in every 4 days, and only before eating or drinking anything for the day. It let me see the progress happen even if I stalled for a day or two.

Now Im back to daily, but without worrying about the number knowing there will be fluctuations.

Fluctuations can fool you too. It seems intuitive that if you weigh yourself first thing, on an empty stomach and after using the bathroom, then you would be your lightest weight that day.

Not true for me. Out of curiosity, because like Ann I'm a numbers and statistics guy and I like data, I weigh to gather data. If I weigh myself after a cardio workout, that is typically my lightest of the day - regardless of the fact that I've (usually) eaten 4/5 of my meals by then. I have been up to 1 lb less after the workout than in the morning. That tells me that calorie burn is going on all the time, which we all know; but it's also telling me that I burn faster throughout the day. (That should also be obvious of course).

Don't know all the science behind the why, but if I was obsessed about numbers, I know I wouldn't do this. The only progress weight I record is every Saturday morning first thing. I don't care if I weigh less after the afternoon workout. It's the trend and fat loss that matter. And being able to do more. I am not obsessed with only recording my lowest weight of the day, whenever that is. I like to weigh at times where conditions would be relatively the same.

dawn_westbury wrote: »

I weigh once a week only! I mean you can tell you're losing by your clothes but I like the scale once a week personally![/q

SAme here

I'm a daily weigher. Every morning I use the restroom and weigh myself. I take measurements 1x a week when I weigh as well. This is what works for me and everyone is different. I do sometimes find myself becoming to focused on the scale at times and at that point I stop weighing all together for a while.

I weigh-in weekly, though I skipped last week because I was out of town. I think that if you understand what the scale is telling you that it is really hard to become number obsessed. Your weight can fluctuate in one day a greater amount than is considered safe weight loss. So any given weigh-in may not tell you how well you did during that week. But if the reading tends to be lower each week you are losing weight. If it tends to be higher each week then you are gaining weight.

I use the scale to keep me accountable. There are days that I overeat and I enjoy it. But because I know I'm going to be stepping on the scale and seeing the result of that overeating I don't continue overeating day after day. I also know that if I overeat too much that I will see a number on the scale that tells me I need to cut back for a while. Without the scale it would be easy for me to just convince myself that a little extra doesn't really matter.

I can see how some might become obsessed with the numbers but personally I find weighing daily (even though I'm in maintenance now) is a good habit. I know how my body works, I know when the scale will fluctuate up, I know what causes the fluctuations and I know that on a Mon and Tues each week I will be heavier than I am by the weekend - knowledge is power

I weigh in whenever I can get to my mom's house first thing in the morning (don't have my own scale). So Saturdays that I work, she babysits, so I can weigh every other week or so.

I weigh myself infrequently, but find having a scale helpful. I like to know where I stand.

I'm not obsessed with some arbitrary number on the scale. When I'm losing weight I watch the trend...when I'm maintaining I watch the trend...it's one tool in the tool box, not the be all and end all.