If I had a friend who was dating a guy who rarely complimented her, who always managed to make her feel bad no matter how great she had been feeling before he came over. If she always felt like she wasn't good enough and compared herself to other women after spending time with him and if she often felt like giving up on those activities she had undertaken in order to better herself after he diminished her self esteem time after time I'd tell her that he was a big a** loser and that she should dump him.
So I decided that I'm getting rid of my scale! This is how my scale makes me feel almost everytime I get on it! Why am I doing this to myself?
I did weigh this morning and plan to weigh myself about once every 30 days but my 3x a week weigh ins are over!
I recently increased my cardio from 30 mins 3x a week to 6x a week and 1 hr every other day. I feel so much better, my clothes fit better but when I get on the scale it's up 2 pounds! Well I'm not going to let my scale make me feel bad about myself or question the things that I am doing anymore!
I'm officially not weighing and i already feel better.
Smart thinking! I was just thinking about doing this for myself. Once a month. Thats it. I, like you let my scale get me down daily. The emotional roller coaster is not worth it, as long as you are doing the things that you need to do to be healthy it doesnt matter what the scale says with its tiny fluctuations and daily trauma
Get to goal & stay there!
Join Date: Sep 2010
Posts: 849
S/C/G: 235/154.8/150
Height: 5'5"
Good for you! As a fellow scaleaholic, I'm with you. I used to weigh myself so many times during the day that I started to look at it as a step workout.
Serioulsy, though, I'm down to once a week and that's fine with me. My sister is baffled that after decades of weighing myself daily or several times daily, I suddenly can go a whole week without weighing in.
Meanwhile, she lets the scale set her mood for the day no matter how well she's been doing with her diet and exercise. That's not the kind of life I want to live.
So I applaud you for making this decision. I know you're not going to regret it.
Last edited by sandcar150; 08-29-2011 at 01:12 PM.
Good plan! I don't know if you're one of us unfortunate souls who suffers from TOM bloat, water weight, and false gain, but if so, I'd make your monthly weigh in as far away from that as possible. I weigh weekly, and without fail for two weigh ins I feel like bashing my head against a wall, even though I've been perfectly OP! Anyway, way to take charge of your weight loss and your feelings about it!
Since I started eating healthier in June I haven't weighed myself. I knew that doing so would only hurt my efforts: If I see a loss, I use that as an excuse for celebratory eating. If I see a gain, I get discouraged & eat with abandon. By not weighing myself, I'm forcing myself to focus on behaviors. I know if I just keep doing what I'm doing, I'll get to where I want to be.
Good job ladies! In the beginning the scale kept me accountable and it was nice in those early days to see a loss each time. But it's just different now and not something I even look forward to anymore.
If it works for you, then you've made the right decision.
However, it's important to remember that the scale is an inanimate tool, it can't abuse us. If we feel abused by the scale, it's because we're using it as a tool to abuse ourselves.
If you had an abusive boyfriend, you probably couldn't stop the abuse by taking the stick out of his hand. He'd probalby find a new tool.
If we're abusing ourselves with the scale, then taking the scale away doesn't necessarily fix the problem. It's likely that we'll just find a new tool to hurt ourselves with. I sure did.
Throwing the scale away didn't help me. As it turns out I could punish and torment myself just fine without a scale. So I had to learn to stop hurting myself.
What saved me, was actually the opposite of throwing away the scale, I started weighing myself dozens of times daily, reminding myself each time of what the number could and couldn't tell me. I had to change the messages I told myself when I stepped on the scale.
If I continued to define success as only seeing a lower number every time I stepped on the scale, I was going to keep feeling like a failure. I had to redefine success. I decided to celebrate whenever the scale was within 5 lbs of the lowest number I'd acheived so far on this journey. Turns out I could celebrate nearly every time I stepped on the scale. Feeling successful helped me build on that success.
When I expected to always see a lower number, I drove myself crazy - but when I celebrated staying within 5 lbs of my lowest number, I was able to slowly but surely lower that lowest number. It wasn't the scale that was my enemy - I was, because I expected the scale (and more importantly my body) to do what either couldn't. Having realistic expectations, and celebrating the "range" rather than a specific number, made me see the scale for what it really is, a tool that can't tell me much (but I can use it to tell me what it can).
I'm not criticisng your choice, or anyone who chooses not to use any tool, including the scale, for any reason. And it can help to take away the weapons you've been using to hurt yourself - as long as you realize that you were the one weilding the weapon.
Many people here have found discarding the scale helpful, others of us have found weighing daily or even more often helped us more, because it helped us better understand the fluctations on the scale (and therefore our bodies as well).
If we're using a weapon against ourselves (whether it's the scale or the mirror, or just nasty words to ourselves inside our head), deciding to put down the weapon is a good choice, but learning not to need weapons against ourselves should be the ultimate goal, otherwise we'll just use whatever weapon is handy.
If doing that helps you, I say "good for you!!!" This whole journey is about finding things that work for us and things that don't. Some people eliminate higher carbs, some eliminate calories, some eliminate soda...and some eliminate the scale If it keeps you on track, and works for you...then it's right! Personally, I officially weigh in once a week, however always sneak a peek once during the week before weigh in... trying to break that habit. Even at once a week it can be a let down if you allow it to be. But being realistic, knowing TOM, certain foods, illness hitting, etc can effect the "number" but not your health you have gained, is half the battle I think. I wish you luck and you are doing great finding what works for you!!!!
I'm all about what works so if this works for you, good!
But I will just say that personally, not weighing in regularly (and for me, that's at least once a week), means that I slip into cheating and all of a sudden, it's months since I've weighed in and - not coincidentally - months since I've truly been 100% on plan. And also not coincidentally, the number on the scale is higher, much higher, usually.
I agree with weighing yourself less; I'm having trouble with it now myself. Since joining WW, with the weekly weigh in, I'm on my home scale 2x a day....once naked, once dressed with shoes, each morning. I hate that I'm doing it = it is obsessive and I never used to be like this. I'm hoping I can stop.
It's so funny how different things work for different people! It reminds me that we are all so unique and human and pretty damn special...
For me, the scale is the equivalent of my most honest friend. And she only tells me something when I ask (stepping on the scale). I may not always like what she tells me, but I know she only tells me the truth, and she forces me to always be honest too. I love her.
Question for everyone (mzKiki, sorry to threadjack, but I think this is relevant here): Let's say you weigh in officially once weekly, but you weigh a couple of times before that "official" weigh in. There's a significant difference in your earlier weigh in--let's say a pound and half or two pounds lower than your regular weigh in day. Which weight would you count?
Question for everyone (mzKiki, sorry to threadjack, but I think this is relevant here): Let's say you weigh in officially once weekly, but you weigh a couple of times before that "official" weigh in. There's a significant difference in your earlier weigh in--let's say a pound and half or two pounds lower than your regular weigh in day. Which weight would you count?
Count for what? Who's counting and what does it count for?
Weighing yourself is like taking a photograph. Imagine that you're looking thorugh a photo album of yourself from the age of infancy to now.
Which of those photos count? Which ones are of the real you?
I think a serious problem with the way we've been taught to do weight loss is that we want to "claim" a number, we want to say we "are" a certain weight, and want to believe that we have a "true" weight, and that it can be determined. We want to believe that the scale tells us something objective and concrete - and the only thing the scale tells you is how much water, blood and other body fluids, bone, muscle, fat,undigested and digested food and solid waste we're carrying at any given point in time.
Any time you step on the scale, that is what the scale can tell you, and that's all it can tell you. And you can't by the scale tell how much of each - you just get the total picture, and you have to guess at the rest. And the specific count counts for nothing. It's the trend that counts, not any specific snapshot.
The number on the scale only counts as much as you decide it does, and for me that's not much.
I want to decrease my fat, and increase my muscle. The scale doesn't really tell me how much of each I'm doing. The scale is one of the best tools I've got, but it's far from perfect. I can hope that as I'm losing weight, I'm not losing muscle (and I try to make sure my protein intake and exercise are sufficient to minimize the muscle loss - so that most of what I lose is fat and water), but I never can know for certain (by the scale alone) how I'm doing at my goal.
I do get hints though. My weight fluctuates because of a lot of factors. Sodium is going to increase my weight by water retention. My TOM is going to do the same. Digesting and processing food and water and eliminating wastes are also going to affect my weight.
I can choose to never eat salt and I suppose I could get a hysterectomy to prevent TOM influences. I could try to eat exactly the same food and quantity every day and try to have the exact amount of exercise, and sleep each day to try to eliminate those variations as well, but that's all impossible, and unnecessary, besides because the scale measure only "counts" as a clue to what I really want to know.
If I drink a glass of water and step on the scale and see a half pound gain - I know that I haven't "gained" anything. As soon as I pee, usually in about 20 minutes, those 8 ounces will be gone.
If I weigh myself before and after I poo - which weight counts? (and again, counts for what?)
Personally, I think we're taught to spend way too much worrying about what "counts" and what our "true weight" is, when the fact is that there is no true weight. Weight is just a measure that can give us hints and clues as to what's going on with our body.
What's important (for most of us here) is reducing fat, increasing muscle, and keeping the rest in relative balance (which doesn't mean at a constant unchanging rate. We just want our bodies to be holding no more water, urine, and waste than it needs to).
In some ways, I think it's even kind of ridiculous that we talk about losing and gaining in terms of specific numbers. What does "I've gained a pound," really mean? Absolutely nothing if it's a pound of water we just drank ten minutes ago.
When I started experimenting with the scale to see just how much my weight changes during a single day, week, and month, I was astonished to see how much fluctuation there is. In a single day, my weight can vary by up to 6 pounds. In a given month (when entirely on-plan, eating on budget, not overeating) my weight can fluctate by 10 lbs or more?
Which of those weights "count?"
I used to only count the highest weight, because I used that as a measure of my success (or failure). So if I gained 8 lbs even if it was from TOM water retention, I "counted" it as failure. When I discovered that I gain those 8 lbs even if I do everything right all month, I realized that those 8 lbs don't count. I don't count them, because they don't count to me. I know that if I stay on plan, those 8 lbs will disappear on their own, so why count them for anything. They don't matter, they don't count, so I don't dispair or even feel sad or disapointed when they appear (unless hormonal mood swings are clouding my judgement and influencing what I decide to count).
Your scale's message only counts for what you decide it counts for. You and only you get to decide what counts, and what exactly it counts for.
The Advice I'd give a friend
Anyway, way to take charge of your weight loss and your feelings about it! 
