View Poll Results: How often do you weigh yourself?
Daily 67 66.34%
Weekly 28 27.72%
Bi-Weekly 5 4.95%
Monthly 0 0%
I don't weigh myself 1 0.99%
Voters: 101. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 07-29-2008, 04:47 PM   #1  
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Question How often do you weigh yourself?

I'm in the third week of my "new lifestyle" and I'm getting a bit frustrated. The past two weeks I only lost half a pound and I have not cheated once. I am in no way quitting, but it makes me wonder...

How often does everyone weigh themselves?

I've been doing it weekly, first thing in the morning. I know it takes patience and the scale can be horribly frustrating to deal with, so I'm considering weighing bi-weekly or even monthly.

I understand that it's very early in my weightloss adventure and I did lose the first week, but I can't seem to comprehend how I'm not losing weight with the big changes I've made, especially being the weight that I'm at.

I guess the real question is, how long does it take you to see results from the week you are working on? Does it mean that the work that I've done this week will show up 3 weeks from now? All I want to know is that the work that I have done so far counts for something. It's so hard not being able to see inside yourself and only having the evil scale to determine your progress.

Maybe I just need to learn to change my perspective, instead of looking at it as a week of work without weightloss results, to look at it as building some sort of foundation where each step is necessary to achieve the end goal, but some of the steps will not show numeric results.
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Old 07-29-2008, 05:02 PM   #2  
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Our bodies don't always respond like we would like them to.

There are a couple possibilities
1) Your body is retaining water for whatever reason
2) You are eating too many calories despite eating healthier
3) The mix of the above

#1 happens a lot, #3 happens a lot and #2 happens a lot, probably in that order for most new dieters.

Sometimes I can go a few weeks without seeing a weight change, sometimes I can go a few months, despite being 'perfect'.

I weigh myself daily but I can see ups and downs as I do that although the overall trend is downward. The scale measures so much but mostly it measures water. Your body can hold onto water for whatever reason and hormones can especially make you retain water.

So my advice is keep up with you are doing and see what happens next week or the week after. If the scale still isn't moving, look at what you are eating and doing for exercise and try to tweak those.
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Old 07-29-2008, 05:13 PM   #3  
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I weigh daily as well. The fluctuations bothered me at first to be honest, but now I understand it happens regardless of how well I stay on plan.

To illustrate, a graph of my weight loss since starting is below. You can see the thing is wildly spiky. I haven't had a day off plan since starting.

But, with weighing in every day and documenting it, I can see that regardless of the fluctuations that my trend moves downwards. You'll notice the same, it will just take more time as you weigh in considerably less often!

There's no way to answer your question about when your work will show up. The results of what you do today cannot be pinpointed to a certain date. I assure you though, that over time thoe results start adding up in a big way.

You're doing a fabulous job! Keep going at it!

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Old 07-29-2008, 05:22 PM   #4  
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I weigh everyday. I have learned a lot about my body's fluctuations and response to food and exercise. Weight loss is over the long term (and maintenance even longer) so try to make peace with the scale. A daily weight is just a snapshot, and you have to put together all the pieces to get an accurate idea of where you are and where you are going. Stick with it. Don't make any drastic changes until you have not seen much of a change for several weeks. Patience....
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Old 07-29-2008, 06:32 PM   #5  
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I also weigh in daily. For the most part it is a reminder of me game plan for the day.I spend to many years avoiding the scale. No I want to make it a tool to use to evaluate my progress like midwife says to learn. I want to know what foods my body does not respond to well like rigth now I am trying to figure out how much sodium I can have before retaining water. I may change my daily weigh in if I get upset by the slowness. Who knows. I am taking it one day at a time.
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Old 07-29-2008, 06:40 PM   #6  
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I weigh every day (most times quite a few times during the day) but I've learned to only pay attention to it once a week on my offical weigh in day. I've tried not weighing so much and it drives me crazy but I've learned not to take it seriously -- I'm just too scale obsessed to give it up.
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Old 07-29-2008, 06:49 PM   #7  
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I weigh myself once a day, no idea why lol It doesn't effect me one way or another unless I see a big dip or jump. Usually with a jump you probably know it's coming anyway.

My official WI is Saturday though.
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Old 07-29-2008, 07:54 PM   #8  
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I used to weigh weekly, but the closer I get to goal, I feel the need to do daily just to keep a tight reign on things. I only consider my Wednesday weigh in the official one, but like to keep tabs on the other days.

Recent studies showed that maintainers who weighed daily were more successful.
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Old 07-29-2008, 08:09 PM   #9  
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fiberlover View Post
Recent studies showed that maintainers who weighed daily were more successful.
I've read the same thing from very reputable sources. I'm also a daily weigher, but I only record my Monday morning weigh-in as the official one. However, we all have to keep a good perspective when weighing daily as the scales don't always accurately reflect our efforts and that doggone water weight can really play headgames with a dieter. If a gain shows up on the scales and will throw you off-plan, then you might consider getting on the scales less often. Also, if the scales are consuming your every thought and are becoming an obsession, then get rid of them. These lifestyle changes are supposed to be for life. I can't imagine stressing myself out like that every day.

Also, please consider taking measurements. Sometimes, we drop inches before the scales catch up with our progress. And, aren't inches so much more important than a number on an inanimate, sometimes cruel , object?

Last edited by GirlyGirlSebas; 07-29-2008 at 08:11 PM.
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Old 07-29-2008, 09:06 PM   #10  
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Once in the morning and once at night, then I average the loss/gain
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Old 07-29-2008, 09:31 PM   #11  
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I can't stand weighing myself every day. It's like asking to beat my head against the wall.

When I first started I didn't have a scale and would have to go to the drugstore to weigh myself. It was awful. First, the machine would display my weight for everyone to see. Then they got rid of it and I was happy, until the second machine came in. It told me, out loud, my weight, that I was morbidly obese and that I was going to die.

I have issues with non-American scales.
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Old 07-29-2008, 09:43 PM   #12  
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Add me to the daily people. I weigh every morning, right out of the shower, naked. I log each daily weight in DailyPlate, but my Monday weight is what I consider my "official" one and what I set my ticker here to (except on weeks like this week when I know that my Monday weight is off due to my TOM).

I used to weigh weekly and found that *that* depressed me - if my Monday happened to fall during my TOM or after a particularly salty Sunday or whatever I'd get depressed at seeing too little of a change.

By weighing daily I see exactly what my body is doing. A prime example is this past week.

Monday 165
Tues: 164.6
Wed: 164.4
Thurs: 165
Fri: 163.4
Sat: 165.2
Sun: 163.6
Mon: 168.2
Tue: 163.2

If I were only weighing on Mondays, I'd see that last week I was 165 and this past Monday I was 168. 3# up - argh - and I'd be depressed that a week of eating on plan made me *gain* weight.

But if you look at the trend over the days .. it's mostly down ... with a spike of 168 on Monday (which co-incidentally was the last day of my period). By this morning I'd dropped FIVE POUNDS (of water weight and period bloat, obviously). But because I track daily I know that (a) the 168 wasn't an accurate representation of my weight and (b) this is what my body does every single month on my TOM. So I wasn't depressed because I knew when I stepped on the scale this morning, that 168 would be gone.

(You can also see on Saturday I was up 2 lbs - and wouldn't you know Friday night I went out to dinner with friends and ate kung pao spaghetti at CPK - stayed within my calorie range, but my sodium was through the roof that night ... and lo and behold, I retained water to the tune of 2 lbs.)

So by tracking daily I have learned exactly how my body responds to hormonal changes as well as to what I eat.

For me, it's the only way to go. I can predict that I will be a daily weigher for the rest of my life ... it's a part of my routine now and I know that it'll help me keep a tight watch on my weight when I'm in maintenance.

.
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Old 07-30-2008, 02:05 AM   #13  
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Thumbs up Sweet!

I'm really glad that I posted this poll question. I had NO IDEA that so many people weighed themselves daily.

After careful consideration, I have decided to adopt the daily method as well. With FB's wonderful suggestion, I created a chart in Microsoft Excel to track my daily weight with room for notes on my mood, special notes, etc.

I focused on this a lot today and I decided to keep at it and crank the pressure up a notch, nothing crazy though. So when my husband came home tonight we went down to the local middle school and played tennis for 45 minutes. I was TIRED, but it was good cardio and a lot of fun!
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Old 07-30-2008, 08:40 AM   #14  
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I go to Physician's Weight Loss and get weighed three times a week. I only pay attention to the week-to-week weight loss though, so when I'm done with the program, I'll probably just do once a week.
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Old 07-30-2008, 10:36 AM   #15  
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I weigh daily. For me, that took the power and emotion out of the scale. It is just a part of my morning routine now, like taking a shower and brushing my teeth.

No time spent on your health is wasted. Even if the scale does not drop *now*, your body is getting healthier in other ways. Maybe it needs some time to repair itself. Keep it up!
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