I weigh daily and discovered my pattern. I hold steady within two pounds either way for two to four weeks, and then suddenly I lose five pounds in two or three days. Then I hold steady at that new weight... and lose more all of a sudden.

And often I find that in the middle of that long plateau that suddenly my pants have gotten just too loose and smaller ones are needed, and that's comforting when you seem to be holding steady.

I've also discovered that stress is a major contributor to it. I know that today I will post no loss, but I was awakened an hour early because one of my partners was having a mental health crisis. That's enough stress for me to retain water and hold steady in weight for a day. There's probably a nice biochemical explanation of cortisol and kidney function, but I definitely have found that there's a correlation between the daily stress I'm having and how long the plateau runs.

Admittedly, it eventually will show on the scale, but it takes way longer if I'm under chronic stress.

I take progress pics periodically but the first few didn't look any different to me. I was going to take one this week but almost decided against it because it had only been 5 pounds lost since my last pic and I thought no way would I see a difference. I was wrong, THIS is the first picture where I actually see a change!

@amart4224 Nice work! Definitely a difference. I've finally reached the point where other people have started to notice and asked, "Have you lost weight?" I like that stage.

Between a generous serving of chips, salsa and fajitas at a Mexican restaurant (👋🏻 sodium) and a migraine last night. I am up 4 pounds overnight. Thankfully I know it’s just water and it will come off quickly. Now to get hydrated keep going today.

How much weight did you have to lose to before people started to notice you weight loss.

I've lost 23 and can see it on myself but due to the pandemic the only people I see regularly are my parents and they haven't said anything whether they noticed or not.

I'd always heard anecdotally that weight loss tends to go from the extremities in; that you notice your thigh measurement getting smaller before the hip measurement does, etc.

conniewilkins56 wrote: »

Yesterday morning the battery went out in my scales and I was sure I had lost some weight....got the batteries and got on them this morning and YES!.....my lowest weight so far!...exactly 97 lbs gone!...I am pretty excited !

Connie:

Well done.....maybe I need new batteries as my scale isn't moving LOL

conniewilkins56 wrote: »

Yesterday morning the battery went out in my scales and I was sure I had lost some weight....got the batteries and got on them this morning and YES!.....my lowest weight so far!...exactly 97 lbs gone!...I am pretty excited !

Congratulations! 🎉 That is truly amazing!

I feel the same as many of you. I used to dread the scale. It was even worse, since I had to go to a Transportation company to use their scale which was intended for Cargo Freight. As the end of the month approached, I would get a pit in my stomach. In all honesty I think it got worse as I was already beginning to fail, and I didn't want everyone to know it.

Then during a future even, I purchased two fairly good scales and was doing quite well. I would step on both and try with all my might to stay still. But being so large it was quite impossible to get a accurate reading on either scale that it would fluctuate wildly every time I stepped on them. I gave up on the scales, as again it was a very stressful event that would be heavily on mind weeks leading up to weigh in date.

Then yet another attempt... I purchased a good digital scale that if I remember correctly weighs accurately to 400lb (will need to verify). Again every time I stepped on it the reading good swing 30 pounds in either direction. Then depending where you put it on the floor it could sing an additional 30 pounds. I actually thought I was doing good, then one day I was gut punched and consistently got weights in the range of 40 pounds on average higher. Thinking back I think this may be because I actually finally got down to around 400 pounds, and the scale was now giving somewhat a reasonable number, however it still completely fluctuated depending on where I put the scale and how I stepped on them. Either way it totally demoralized me. I then quite soon afterwards lost motivation and fell off the program.

So here I am now... I lost fairly significantly in 2018 didn't use scales. I did manage to gain some good habits though, and consistently didn't go through Tim Horton's or McDonalds for breakfast. However between Christmas 2018 and then going into Covid and the rest of 2019 I still managed to let the wheels fall off, and I gained a significant amount back (but much slower then in the past).

Since January, things have been going 100% amazing. I'm still not using the scales, I haven't' been through a single drive through. And every day my macro's are spot on where I want them to be.

But the scale is beginning to call my name. I'm going to try to hold off long enough that I'm as certain as possible they will be able to give me a number accurately. Will it be 2 months? 3 Months from now? I haven't decided yet.

Hmmmmmm.

There is so much interesting stuff happening around here! Thank you for the good reads everyone!