Deducting the Hair Extensions weight gain! 💇

Try putting it on some kitchen scales?

1.5 to 2lbs sounds incredibly heavy though, I'm getting a sore neck just thinking about that kind of weight hanging from my head 🙂

I once weighed myself with dry and then wet hair, it barely made a difference on the scale, surprisingly (I have long hair, but quite thin).

I get the worry, but dry hair weighs next to nothing. Just weigh yourself as normal.

To be honest, when something like that happens, I just consider it sort of a "reset my head" moment. I haven't gotten hair extensions, but a similar thing happens when getting a new bodyweight scale: It will give a different reading.

Mostly, I don't care about my weight as much as I care about my weight trend over a few weeks, i.e., whether my weight is heading up, down, or hovering around the same weight. In all cases, there will be day to day ups and downs, so I figure results in weight management are about how the multi-week averages look.

So, in the new scale scenario, I weigh in on the new scale, assume it's going to be a little different, put it in my weight trending app in the usual way, and don't worry about it. Then I keep going from there. In a small number of weeks, I'll start seeing whether my weight is behaving as I'm intending.

It's like there's a small time period where I kind of don't know, but if I'm mostly on-plan with eating and activity, I know there are no big surprises coming when it comes to gaining, losing, or holding steady with body fat levels.

If I got heavy hair extensions, I'd look at it that same way: A short period of uncertainty in the data from the scale, reasonable expectations based on experience and how I've been eating and moving during that uncertain time period, then clearer answers from the scale trend after those few weeks.

I understand that wouldn't work for everyone, though.

I am not familiar with hair extensions but I very much doubt they are 2lb

They would weight next to nothing, to the point you should 100% ignore them.

Thats like worrying about cut or uncut nail weight or clean shave vs a big bushy beard. its a little odd

It seems like a lot, but when you factor in that the amount of water weight you hold can vary up to 5 pounds day to day, a .5 pound blip is nothing, as long as it doesn't keep going up (which, hair extensions won't continue to get heavier each day).

Given the way that a body can vary over the course of the day, it really isn't significant at all. Your weight will fluctuate by multiple pounds depending on hormones, digestion, intake, sodium, weather, medication etc etc. I "lost" a lb (400g) going for a half hour walk this morning and using the bathroom.

Stressing over less than a pound is stress no one needs to spend energy on.

I get that, but I still think it's a spend of energy that's totally unneeded. You might be 2lbs from 'goal' right this minute, but in an hour you might be 1.5lbs from goal, or 2.5lbs from goal, or 1lb closer, or 1 lb further away.

It might be hair extensions, or water retention, or 50g more carbs consumed today compared to yesterday, or the weather being a few degrees warmer or more humid… I just think that if you're going to start stressing about half a lb being added to your hair, you're going to stress yourself about a whole lot of other unnecessary things. Are you going to drop your goal by half a lb if you have a big haircut because the goal you set included the hair you no longer have?

When my daughter enlisted in the Navy, she lopped her hair off to prepare for basic training, going from hair past her waist to a pixie cut. She said it felt almost like she was walking on her toes, as high and light as her head felt in comparison.

Yes, that’s correct. I’ve had extensions many times. They’re shockingly heavy (and expensive). I accounted for it and moved on, you’re totally fine! People are blowing your question out of proportion. And it’s a perfectly fair question.

I see you. I get it.

gosh, I’m just sad at the lack of curiosity.

Don’t you just ever wonder about random stuff?

I’d be bored out of my mind without side trips like that.

OP gets brownie points for imagination, and creative thinking in my book

Strikes me as similar in nature to emptying pockets, removing shoes, even earrings before stepping on the scale at docs... except extensions are afixed :D

Generally not a fret, except... if # is close to goal, suppose would prefer to understand the added weight.

Imho thinking, is maintenance/goal weight a hard target # or a range between lbs? Given natural variations.... at some point, one would want to catch too low or too high so weight could be managed back to target/range... (i have not personnally had the issue, yet ;)

Thanks Ann! Always the voice of reason on MFP.

So this isn't about hair extensions and maybe it's hijacking the OP's post, but I have realized that my obsessiveness in weight loss (laser focus would be the positive spin) is something I need to watch. Does it make me more anxious? Sometimes, and that's not good (multiple weigh-ins in one day, for example). Has it helped me lose a lot of weight, though? Yes. (I have a 206 day streak on MFP and admire the people with 1000+ streaks. THAT'S dedication.)

Will the maintenance phase go better if I can find a balance? Definitely. How to go about prying my (white knuckled) fingers off the steering wheel of the "weight loss" car so that instead of barreling down a mountainside at top speed I can enjoy a leisurely outing? I'm not sure how to make the transition.

Time to haunt the Maintenance boards for inspiration and insight.

One final word on hair extensions: I've never had them, probably never will, but tonight at the high school open house, my daughter's friend was showing us hers and they were heavy. And they took 10 hours to put in. Impressive!

Curiosity about something is distinct from stressing about something.

I'm unnaturally curious, including about things that affect my scale weight. I weigh myself daily and record my weight, and did so for literal years before really trying for weight loss. I learned a lot from doing that, and the things I learned then helped me later, once I did commit to weight loss.

I still weigh myself sometimes after workouts to evaluate my hydration strategies, have weighed myself at various points within one day occasionally to better understand my typical daily weight cycles, and things like that - just curiosity, sometimes with a point, sometimes not.

That's different from being stressed or distressed about some factor that makes my short-term weight trend less obvious, or a weight shift of a few pounds overnight that has no obvious cause. What's on the scale is just one snapshot at a point in time of my body's relationship with gravity. It's not in any way a measure of my self-worth.

Health-wise, it's the general nature of body weight that's important (i.e., is my weight at healthier or less healthy general status recently). Health improvement wise, it's the multi-week trend of my weight that's important: Am I gaining when I should maintain, losing when I plan to lose, and that sort of thing.

Curiosity is healthy, or at least neutral. Avoidable stress or anxiety isn't healthy.

As always, just my opinions.

I’d just change my new weight to my new weight and move on. Don’t let it mess with you.