[domesticbliss]

Most of the shake plans I've read said to do it once a week, but I read an interesting post where a woman said she weighs herself everyday because her doctor told her "not weighing yourself everyday is how you got fat"

1. I've never owned a scale in my life... I get checked regularly at the Dr's office, but I finally ordered one, it's being delivered today, I'm terrified.

2. How often do you weigh in and why?

[gardengirlkp]

Holy smokes!! I'd fire that doctor in a minute. IMO that's terrible thing to say to a patient. I weigh in once a week, although sometimes I weigh twice a week. Water weight, sodium intake, dehydration, and other things can make the scale fluctuate. I also know that I tend to really carry those numbers in my head that are on the scale and I want a "bigger picture" focus on my overall health, emotional health, and of course with loosing weight- not be as worked up over the numbers on the scale.

The weight loss will happen and I'll record it, but I like to also keep a running average of weight loss going so I can see the bigger picture.

Once I get to transition and maintenance then maybe just once a week or twice.

[costasandcroakies]

I don't know why it is bad to weight your self everyday, I do it twice a day, once before going to bed and then once in the morning when I wake up after using the restroom. I find that this is keeping me motivated and keeps me focused. Seeing the weight fall off everyday is a little victory each day and I want to see it!

[jkjkmc]

I weigh in a couple times a week but I only log my weight on Saturdays. I began my new lifestyle change on a Saturday and only feel the need to record my progress weekly.

[domesticbliss]

I thought it would help to weigh in every day, but seeing those fluctuations are driving me crazy, my husband is threatening to hide the scale because I've been hopping on "just to see" if anything has changed...

[MairsieD]

I weigh every day, first thing in the morning, in my PJs. I'm a little obsessive about things, so I just could not make myself miss out on the daily data. I only log official weight weekly, though.

[VeggieGirl84]

every day.

[jinx1969]

I am a chronic weigher! I weigh in every morning before my shower. It tends to keep me in line! I only log it in about once or twice a week.

[sumu1]

Everyday... but I only log on Fridays.

[blueheron777]

I weigh in every morning, knowing and accepting that my weight will fluctuate by a pound or so up or down, every day. But my daily date with the scale keeps me aware of my commitment to maintaining my weight loss.

I don't get upset by fluctuations--if I did, I would drive myself crazy. But I have a range that I need to stay inside. If I go out of it, I have a few days of huge yummy salads to get me back to the safe zone.

I found in the past that if I stopped weighing myself daily, I would start to backslide. But that's just me.

[Gigi33]

I weigh in twcie a week: Monday & Thursday.

I tried the everyday route and the once a week route. Pros & Cons with both. I find everyday makes me too anxioius. Once a week makes me lose touch of my goal.

If I weight myself on Monday I know if I'm on track or if I had way too many apple martinis during the weekend and need to adjust. By Thursday I know if 've been honest with myself and can tell if I'm on track or not.

[amy3469]

I am also a constant weigher! Daily, sometimes twice a day. i think it keeps me motivated.

[kaplods]

There was a recent review of weight loss studies, that found that daily weighers lost significantly more weight that people who weighed less, and overall the less frequently, the less loss.

I don't think it's how often you weigh, it's how you choose use the results. Frustration doesn't happen to us, we create it by choosing to be disappointed in our results.

Common wisdom for years has been "you shouldn't weigh daily because normal fluctuations and gradual changes will make you frustrated," but frustration is a behavior. It's a choice not a universal constant. You can choose not to be frustrated (it just takes changing your expectations).

If you expect huge losses or only moving-downward results, and if you consider even staying the same weight as "failure" then you are going to be disappointed weighing daily.

However, when I chose to see weight maintenance as just as much success as losing, it meant that weighing more often, gave me more opportunities for success. When I interpreted anything less than a 1 lb loss as dismal failure, then weighing more often meant failing more often.

I have to say it's been a lot more fun to succeed at slow weight loss, than it was to fail at rapid weight loss. All my 90 lbs have come off slower than I was losing when I quit all previous diets for failing. My current success is slower than most of my failures were. It was all how I looked at the scale (not how often I used it).

I weigh twice a day, and I've never been tempted to quit, because I choose to reward maintenance as much as I used to reward losing (but only if it was a loss of more than a pound per week. I didn't celebrate small losses because I saw them as almost as bad as gaining).

One of the best uses of the scale I've found is after off-plan eating. Whether it's a bite or a binge, I get on the scale as sort of a "reset" button. You can't gain more weight from food than the weight of the food. So getting on the scale is sort of a worst-case-scenario. I'd get on the scale and ask myself "do you want to make this permanent? If not, eating more isn't going to help.

It stopped the type of thoughts that led to binges in the past (I've already blown it by eating off plan, so I might as well binge until bursting, and I'll start fresh tomorrow).

By using the scale as a "starting fresh" moment rather than the morning after a binge, I prevented the backsliding that was characteristic of my dieting in the past.

I used to hate the scale, now I love it - because I have more opportunities for success than failure (because I redefined success). I also stopped hating myself for gains. Sure gaining isn't my goal, but if I beat myself up for a gain, I'm only more likely to make myself miserable, and if I make myself miserable I'm going to want to quit. I don't want to quit, so I had to stop making myself miserable.

Ironically I had to make weight gain less important, and weight maintenance (no loss) more positve and more important, I've had a lot more success with permanent weight loss. I may be losing slow, but I'm never in the least bit tempted to quit, because "just maintenance" is worthy of celebration. I am so PROUD of the fact that I haven't had a significant weight gain since I've started. In fact, it's been six years. Six years is a terribly long time to lose 90 lbs (though most of it was lost in the last two years), so not so impressive. But going six years without a weight gain of more than 10 lbs, for no longer than a week (I gain 8-10 lbs every month with TOM), why that's practically a miracle. I spent nearly 40 years either steadily losing or steadily gaining. So six years without a gain, feels like a virtual miracle (even if 90 lbs of weight loss hadn't been involved.

I've gone on a bit of a tangent, but weighing two to three times a day has helped me create a miracle in my life, so I'm a bit overly enthusiastic about it.

[JoJoJo2]

I am maintaining a 60+ lb. weight loss, and I weigh myself daily. This helps me stay on track.

Actually a scale is just a tool. I use mine daily, for my own satisfaction.

However if weighing yourself daily is messing with your mind, I suggest you throw the silly thing out of the window, and figure out another way to keep track of your weight-loss journey.

[amy3469]

I think your post is great! I actually feel better about it now. It motivates me to weigh daily. I just have to remind myself that there are some times I will weigh more (ex. TOM). But, I know I won't give up!