When you start seeing the numbers on the scale drop, does it make you addicted to keep on going to lose more and more weight?

It probably does affect a few people that way. Are you worried about it?

Jay

i kinda wish it was so i would keep going. i usually stop a diet or my attempt at a diet before i see 10 lbs come off
good luck to you

Oh no, I am just wanting to keep going and feel motivated. I want to keep seeing the number go down and eventually be addicted to this new healthy lifestyle. I was just wondering if anyone else feels this way

Keep going please...we can all do this. How bad do you want it? I want it really bad!

If it's the lifestyle you're "addicted" to, that's good! Maintaining isn't much different than losing, so you'll get to live this way for the rest of your life. It's not an addiction, so much, just healthy habits.

However, I am somewhat addicted to seeing pounds come off. My original goal was 145lbs, then I dropped it down to 140lbs. I'm secretly thinking I want to get to 135lbs. But I don't think I'd go any lower than that. I really don't feel like I'll develop a complex about getting the scale as low as I can (as in, develop an eating disorder), but seeing the pounds come off is very rewarding.

I know what you mean. Once that scale gets headed down - well, it feels marvelous and you want to keep seeing it head down. Success definitely begets more success. It does make it easier to keep on making the right choices because you see the results and you want to see MORE results. I really loved manipulating that scale. I knew that every time I said no to one of "those foods" that I was being proactive in making that scale head down.

I'm definitely addicted to feeling the way I do now: happier, healthier and a noticable decrease in anxiety. Maybe I am feeling somewhat like that with the numbers on the scale. Days like today, when the number stays the same and I get frustrated because I'm doing everything I'm supposed to do. But I think i'll be so tickled to be under 200 again, the numbers won't matter as much.

Yes. The first time I did it, years ago, during an unhealthy period in my life, I became half-crazy over it & I kept trying to make it go lower & lower & lower. Just because I could. Because I'd learned the "trick." And because I'd lost any sense of what I looked like & didn't realize I was getting downright gaunt.

Not this time around. I'm older. It's a real slog now. And I have sustainability in mind. Something I can keep doing long term. And I want to live a balanced life at the same time, too. It's about quality of life, in a way it wasn't the first, bad time.

It is motivating and encouraging to me. I am not all that into exercise, but since I started this journey in Februaru, I have only had 2 days that I didn't do some kind of extra activity...and that is most definitely unlike me. I guess for me, it's a reward for hard work.

I'm prolly too old to get an eating disorder out of the blue. I may need to lose more weight than my current goal, but I'm not really sure. When I get closer to goal weight I will go see my dr. and get his input on the final weight I should be.

Barb

I really don't like the word "addictive" in this sense, because it echos eating disorders and obsessive behavior.
That being said, I find it motivating, encouraging and almost like my own personal Jimmey Cricket watching those numbers drop. I've turned down free food, forced myself to go to the gym and passed over many a drink to keep those numbers going down. Getting healthy, and getting under 200 is more important to me than anything else. So am I "addicted" to watching those numbers drop? Maybe, but I'm ok with it, assuming it never blooms into anything more

Yes. Agreed.

But I don't look at this as a bad thing. I think it's responsible to turn down free food, to "force" oneself to exercise and to pass over drinks. These are very good decisions to make. It's responsible, mindful, mature, reasonable and rational. It IS about making ones health a priority. If one wants to be a healthy weight and be a health minded person than one has to BE it and make the right choices.

Although I'm not concerned with it blooming into anything more, I sure hope to keep to this level of strong desire for optimal health.

And I too think addictive isn't the right word. I most certainly don't find it to be obsessive as in "detrimental" and taking away from other aspects of my life (which is the definition of obsessive) as it enhances each and every area of my life.

I call it/like to think of it as dedicated. I am dedicated (and devoted) to taking care of my body.

That would be anorexia.

I think people see the word obsessed and get a little weirded out by it.

But to answer the OP question. Yes seeing the scale go down is motivating. Knowing you worked hard and the scaled reflected that hard work is awesome. Seeing the results always made me think "great all I have to do is stay on plan and the scale will move again" I don't think that line of thought is obsessive at all.