So yesterday, by a fraction, I got to 200, en route for my mini target of 199.

I've started walking again, and did the longest one this week yesterday. Not far but My longest.

I felt like things were so moving. I ate sensibly. I kept active. I had a weight-loss inspiring bathroom visit last night and twice this morning. I KNEW that this morning I would have just SS-LL-II-DD on down to the 199 today.

I'm exactly the same as yesterday.

Now, I'm not complaining. Really. I'm doing the daily weighing at the minute to try and train myself to be objective, and not ground down by a set of numbers.
And hey, the fat is at the kicking and screamin stage as I break through the 200 barrier, I get that too.

Question: do we ever get to the place where we understand our bodies enough to know how our weight's doing? Or is it always going to be a matter of hoping?

I can never figure mine out. I thought I might be up a pound today because I had meetings the last 2 nights, and while I was careful, I just had a little worry because I had 2 beers last night and a couple of cookies the night before.

Nope I am down 2.

Go figure....

I think you're asking to be psychic. Body weight isn't alot different than other body processes - it's not under our conscious control and "feelings" are misleading as a result. My husband (I would have kicked him in the pants if I knew) decided a few months ago to stop his insulin and cholesterol med because he "could feel" that he didn't need them anymore because of the weight loss and how great he felt everyday. When he got his bloodwork back at his next physical (I was sitting in there, when he told the doctor and it was the first time I'd heard about it), the results were terrible.

Yes, feelings about body workings are very often misleading. If it's possible to know your body that well as to feel a loss, it's as rare as being able to know your exact blood pressure without having it measured, or knowing you're going to have a pimple when you wake up tomorrow.

I don't think it has to be a matter of "hoping" either for weight or blood pressure or pimples. It is what it is, and all you can do, is observe it, measure it (ok the pimple doesn't fit that analogy very well), and deal with it. You do the best you can, and the results are what they are.

Maybe some people can know, but I don't think it's guaranteed to anyone. I've known people who swear that they don't need an alarm clock to get to work on time - they just "decide" the night before when to wake up and they wake up in plenty of time. I'm not that person, I need an alarm clock if I have to be up at a certain time, and there's nothing wrong with needing an alarm clock or a scale.

Wishful thinking can inspire "hunches" that have no basis in fact. One of the reasons gambling is so addictive, is that people have "hunches" and feelings that they KNOW they're about to win - if only they play just a little bit longer. They run out of money before their hunch pays off and they think "if only I'd been able to play a little longer, I would have hit it big," or worse they win something and confirm in their mind that the hunch was accurate. Even if they win only once out of ever 50 "hunches," it reinforces the idea that hunches pay off.

Well, weight loss isn't magic--it's more like science. Hoping that an object will weigh a certain amount is... well... unrealistic. You just have to measure it and accept the value. So when you are the "object," it helps to keep in mind that the weight is what it is, and not let feelings slop over into making judgments about it.

Put it on your tracking chart and keep going!

Jay

It might be beneficial for you to try just having some faith in the way your body works. Scientifically speaking, we know that a calorie deficit will produce weight loss. Your body is not mutated or messed up in any way that would make this basic fact un-true. Nor is mine...nor is anyone's here. We are all pretty normal; when we create a calorie deficit through food control and exercise, we WILL lose weight. It's inevitable.

So hope has nothing to do with it. I trust my body and have faith that what I am doing will work. And it does work.

But putting timelines on your body for when weight loss "should" happen is kind of like being impatient with God because prayers aren't answered in as timely a fashion as we'd like, or in exactly the way we'd like Let your body just do its job, and be happy with it.

Thankyou for the replies.

I don't quite understand what's wrong with hoping. I appreciate it may be illogical but I can't be the only one who, close to a goal, says 'Please let it be today, please please' as I stand on the scales?

I understand the science-ness of weightloss, in fact I've just reminded another poster of the fact that, however nervous/despondent we might sometimes get, if we carry on eating and exercising appropriately then the weightloss will happen, not magically, not linearly but certainly.

I entitled the post 'feelings are misleading' to show that I do understand I can't believe myself slim but I did wonder if, after sufficient time has passed, one might be able to look back on the past few days' exercise and eating and have the kind of 'likely certainty' that a weight loss would be shown. We look at the rain and we look at the sun and we Know there's going to be a rainbow somewhere, it's not something that we have to believe in, we just know from experience that there will be. I wondered if one could base a similar expectation on weightloss experience.

On a related but other tack:
I Felt certain, when I set off this morning for coffee with a friend, that she'd notice and comment on the weight I've lost. I haven't seen her for 25lbs. Nope, nothing, nada, zip.
Felt a bit crabby.
Had wanted to do a bit of browsing shopping, new wok etc, but I couldn't shake her, just had to say I had to come back for the dogs.
Felt crabbier still, that I hadn't been able to work that better.
Did the food shopping, got the crusty bread that I'd been craving all week.
Came home.
Had lunch - ham and prawn sandwich. Very delicious, totally calorie counted.
Got hungrier and hungrier and Felt that I deserved to eat more. It was just to bury my crabbiness.
However, I sat and sat and imagined having to explain to someone why I'd had a binge: I was in a bad mood because someone didn't notice I'd lost weight. So I ate and spoiled my weightloss programme.
Well that Felt embarrassing, so I've settled for a cup of black coffee instead. And any moment now I'm going to waste an hour in a long bubble bath. That'll finally fix it.
Beaten down a set of very dubious Feelings there.

You know what? I totally get you. I TOTALLY get what you are saying and I do the same thing myself.

I am GLAD that you didn't binge and if she didn't mention your weight loss it was probably because she's jealous (and obviously I was joking around about this HENCE the winky smile... I didn't mean to offend or put anyone off.) I'm proud of you and I'm cheering you on!

Mama, you is a !!!!!

hm, that's meant to be a star, not a nuclear explosion!!

Every once in a blue moon, when the planets align just so etc. etc., I can feel the loss. Mine has been such an extruciatingly slow loss that it's very, very, *very* rare, though. Most of the time I feel exactly the same, then get on the scale and surprise! I've lost some more weight. So it's possible to be that in tune with your body, but I never count on it.

As for 200, I had a heck of a time getting to 199 and *staying* there, so I feel your pain. You'll get there! Soon!!

There's nothing wrong with hoping or any other emotion, as long as it doesn't create an opportunity for defeat. What matters is how you deal with the situation when your hopes aren't realized. If the result is frustration - especially severe frustration - the kind that makes you think "why do I even bother," then "hope" can become disfunctional.

Weight loss used to be an emotional roller coaster. I had to take most of the "feelings" out of the equation because they literally were misleading me, leading me in an unhealthy direction. I was interpreting success as failure because of my feelings. My hopes led to expectations which were always larger than the reality. I'd start thinking about how hard I was working, for what seemed like such little success.

When hope makes your life better, it's a wonderful thing; but when it leads you down a path that makes your life more stressful, there's nothing wrong with taking that kind of hoping out of the equation.

I don't expect to "know" when I've lost weight - I don't expect that even perfect behavior, necessarily ends in perfect results. I don't always do the best that I can, and I don't beat myself up for that either, sometimes life intervenes and makes "perfect" impossible, and that's ok. And when I do the best that I can, I can be happy with that, regardless of whether the scales move in the direction I want.

Sometimes it's easy to forget what an acheivement weight maintenance is. It's so easy to get frustrated when the scale doesn't register a loss, we can forget what an acheivement not gaining is. Instead of celebrating the maintenance we mourn that there wasn't a loss.

It's all "big-picture" stuff. If hoping, makes your life better - you go right ahead and hope. But if hoping makes you feel frustrated when your hopes and "hunches" are wrong, you've got to re-evaluate whether the nature of your hoping is self-destructive.

For me, I'm a lot more hopeful overall, now that I don't set my hopes on the scale. I'm confident and optimistic that I will get to where I need to be, and the scale is only the smallest measure of my success. Feeling more energetic, being able to accomplish more and even do things I couldn't only a few moths ago - those are my hopes, not the numbers on the scale.

I'd be lying if I said that when I step on the scale each morning, that I don't hope for a loss - I just keep that hope very small and don't pin too much else on that hope. And I also force myself not to let my excitement get too large when I do see a loss. That may seem silly, but I have to remind myself that it isn't only about the numbers, because when I pin too much hope on the numbers, I start getting tempted (even after more than 3 decades of dieting and knowing it's destructive) to use more drastic, and even unhealthy methods of weight loss to try to see greater losses.

I don't think everyone has this problem, just like not everyone has a gambling addiction, but I have to keep myself grounded in the science and reality of weight loss or I start thinking crazy. If you don't, then it's not something you have to worry about.

Gosh, I feel your pain. But you handled your almost bad day very well!!!

I always get a little nervous before I get on the scale at home. I wish I knew what to expect! I was really hopeful when I had to get weighed in and measured at my gym. It was not what I thought it would be because I really thought it was better. HOWEVER, now that I know the numbers, I think I understand what else I need to do. So, the initial disappointment almost set me back, but I can't afford to give up.

That seems like a rather uncharitable assumption. There are potentially dozens of reasons why someone might not notice and/or mention a weight loss. Why choose to assign them a negative motivation?

I think part of the "diet culture" is to assume very uncharitable things about others, and I'm not sure why. If someone offers us food - they're immediately a saboteur (and if they offer it to everyone else, and not us, they're rude, controlling, and a saboteur). If someone pays too much attention, or too little they're rude, jealous or controlling. If when we talk about our weight loss success, and a person talks about their own success in response, or if someone goes on a diet after we have, they're "competitive."

Assuming anyone is or should be concerned with our weight is a sort of reverse arrogance. I'm not sure why we're taught to be so paranoid about the issue, but we are.

If we were talking about our kids and someone pulled out pictures of their kids, we wouldn't assume they were competing (at least not in a bad way), but if we tell someone what we've lost - and they tell us what they've lost - they're a jerk.

Weight loss can be one of those "can't win" topics.

I was trying to cheer her up and was joking around. I did not mean to offend or bother you with my comment. I'm sorry that you took my reply as me being uncharitable. I can assure you I meant nothing of the sort.