does anyone else weigh themselves before and after they pee? just to see what kind of a difference it made? not that i expect it to go down drastically or anything, i just am kind of curious how much pee i carry around, i guess.
I drink alot of water, most days close to the recommended amount and along with other drinks. It all has to go somewhere. I haven't experienced what ya'll are talking about because I weigh myself once a week and put my scale away (even though it lives on the floor). I always pee before I weigh in too because depending on how much my body absorbs and how much liquid it wants to get rid of it can really effect my weigh in. Like this week, I really though I wasn't going to have a good weigh in because my body was retaining a lot of the liquid i was drinking, however I still had a decent weigh in somehow
I try and think about it this way a pint is about 16oz which weighs about 1.25lbs. I would venture to say if someone were to drink a significant amount of liquid you could at least pee this amount (think about the pee in the cup thing at the doc). So it could effect your weigh in, in theory.
If you're really talking about fifteen minutes difference, with no food/water intake in and no potty out, and no strenuous exercise during those 15 minutes...
it's your scale, not you. It would be impossible for a pound to disappear unnoticed. Conservation of mass (like you learned back in junior high) still applies, so to lose a whole pound, that pound would have to go somewhere, that is be excreted in body fluids or gasses. If you've not gone to the bathroom, that leaves sweat, breath, and/or intestinal gas. Any of which would be quite noticeable. You'd be drenched if you sweat out a pound (and you'd have to dry off, before weighing or the scale would still register most of it), and while gasses have some mass, I think it's even less likely that you could expell an entire pound of gas without noticing it.
Something about how you are standing, or where you are placing the scale, is likely influencing the fluctuation. If you weigh yourself every 15 minutes throughout the day, you probably would see random fluctuations as well as those you can account for (food and liquid in, and potty breaks out).
I've actually gotten to the point where I step on the scale at 3 random times during my morning routine then take either the number I see twice or the average of the three if I get three different numbers. There are just so many variables that, unless you go someplace that has their scales calibrated very regularly, you aren't going to get a completely accurate number - no matter how sophisticated your scale is. The other thing I've noticed is, if I'm, um, a little "bloated" then relieve the bloat (if you understand my meaning ) I actually weigh more after the "passing" than I did before. Leads me to believe that methane is a lighter than air gas that sort of "floats" me off the scale and results in a lower number
I would agree with that if the number fluctuated.. up and down, and if things like posture or where my scale's sitting on the floor affected the number (it doesn't, I'm ashamed to admit I've tried weighing myself standing on one leg and came out the same )... however, it's a consistent thing that's happened with numerous scales for me, and something that I've found multiple accounts of online, so I think there may be something else going on there that we're unaware of.
I'm not so simple as to think it just disappears, I'm sure it's something a little more scientific than that.
BTW, I'm not a 20-something but this post caught my eye in the new posts last night (so I hope you don't mind me posting here). I tried this expirament this morning and I had the same result. I got up went potty, stripped and stepped on the scale. Took my shower, dried my hair, stepped on the scale. Two pounds lighter.
Ever wake up all puffy-faced from fluids? I just wonder if it is possible that a significant amount of fluid can evaporate from the body. Just a thought and certainly not scientific.
I'm sticking with the lower number on the scale (especially today since it's my weigh-in day). lol Seriously tho, doesn't really matter as long as the scale is consistently going down over a period of time.
Last edited by Blue Serenity; 10-24-2008 at 11:07 AM.
This morning I did the same thing Blue Serenity did - I got up, peed, weighed, bathed, dried my hair, weighed. Almost a pound less on the second from the first. I did take a really hot bath, so maybe sweat got out some more water that the initial peeing hadn't taken care of?
Wow! It is true! Woke up, weighed 264.6, peed 263.1, got dressed made sure to do a few extra laps around my laundry to make the number change and weighed 263.0. So, I didn't see a HUGE number, but it did change.
On a side note, I peed 1.5 pounds of water?!?!? Geeze, no wonder I sprinted in to the bathroom this morning!
Wow! It is true! Woke up, weighed 264.6, peed 263.1, got dressed made sure to do a few extra laps around my laundry to make the number change and weighed 263.0. So, I didn't see a HUGE number, but it did change.
On a side note, I peed 1.5 pounds of water?!?!? Geeze, no wonder I sprinted in to the bathroom this morning!
1.5 pounds of water is 3 cups. Probably you didn't pee that much, but you probably peed a good portion of that.
I've definitely noticed quite significant differences after going to the bathroom, to the point that it was rather disturbing.
I'm not a scientist, but if there's a scientific explanation I'd love to hear it. I would be astonished if a whole pound of water could evaporate in fifteen minutes on a person of normal size, under normal conditions without being obvious (profuse sweating, for example). I'm not saying that it is absolutely impossible, it just seems to me that knowing a fair amount about physiology that the loss of an entire a pound of water or gas (and those are about the only two options) would be quite noticeable under most circumstances. Now things like brushing your hair and washing your face could remove some mass in dead skin and shed hair. Evaporated sweat, and exhalation could account for some, but an entire pound?
It's just the amount that is a stumper. A few ounces would be one thing, but an entire pound is entirely different. For a pound of water to evaporate, unnoticed, I would think you'd have to be in the Gobi dessert or some other extremely hot and dry environment. A pound of dead skin and shed hair would also be one huge pile. So unless you're taking a dry sauna in those 15 minutes, it just doesn't physiologically seem likely.
If anyone does have a scientific explanation, I'd love to hear it. I remember weight loss topics being very popular during graduate and undergraduate biology classes (one professor did an entire lecture on why ice water did not burn significantly more calories than room temperature water), and I just can't think of anything that accounts for this kind of unexplained loss.
I know when working in a hospital with bulimic patients, patients would be weighed before and after each meal, snack and beverage and before and after each trip to the bathroom. And the toilet was lined with a measuring cup, so that even what was excreted was measured/weighed before they could flush it (no tp allowed in the cup), and the flush had to be witnessed. If there was any discrepancy of more than a couple ounces, the person would have to go to the bathroom accompanied, because it was an indication that they were vomiting in secret.
If one could have a pound go missing, those procedures don't make any sense.
reporting in...I tried this on Saturday morning. I woke up, peed and weighed (the usual) i was around 219. Decided to start some laundry and about 10 min later i weighed again and I was around 218! I weighed maybe 10 min after that and it was back at 219...so I decided to accept the 219 and move on, I ended up losing the extra pound that day shopping!
Who knows if there's a medical explanation...sometimes its just the way things happen!
You'll also have to count in that a scale is not as precise as you'd like it to be. I think that especially the non-digital ones can be off as much as 0.5-1 lbs. Reading errors, different positions and the scale mechanics aren't perfect either. It is odd when it always changes in the same way in the same timeframe though.
) I actually weigh more after the "passing" than I did before. Leads me to believe that methane is a lighter than air gas that sort of "floats" me off the scale and results in a lower number 
)... however, it's a consistent thing that's happened with numerous scales for me, and something that I've found multiple accounts of online, so I think there may be something else going on there that we're unaware of.
