Greedy Girls Guide

I know we’ve read all of the articles, blogs, and post that say “don’t weigh yourself every day”, “step away  from the scale”,“ don’t focus on the pounds”, etc. Well I learned from recent experience that they may be wrong (or at least not completely right).

For years I’ve been one of those people who throw caution to the wind and step on the scale everyday. A quick 5-10 seconds it’s become part of my daily routine, in between brush my teeth and shower is a scale.

Recently, for no particular reason, I took a break. Either I was traveling, woke up late, busy, or just reluctant get on and get the bad news; for most of last month I neglected my scale.  Many researchers (a.k.a. THEY) would say this is great, I broke the routine and now I can get on with a healthy regimen. Well, I completely disagree. During my scale hiatus I went on a cruise, barely made it to the gym, and had a 6 day birthday celebration that included 3 birthday dinners, a wedding, touring NY (and NY food), a BBQ, and a local festival (with festival food ) You can just imagine how bad all of this was. So yesterday when I hopped back on my scale I was hit by a shocking, disturbing, upsetting extra 3 pounds. During the 6 day celebration alone I gained 3 pounds and a total of 5 for the month of August. I know 5 pounds isn’t the end of the world, but it’s definitely a trend in the WRONG direction, at a rate of 5 pounds a month I would have gained 25 pounds by Christmas (see that’s the scary part).

Well I am now kicking my self for not seeing this little slide earlier. And here is where I come up with my theory of why you SHOULD weigh yourself everyday. Weighing yourself every day helps you recognize trends. While THEY are right that you don’t see real progress with a daily weigh in, and your body fluctuates from day to day. You do see a move in the wrong direction, and over time you will see movement in the right or wrong direction. Even if you only see a .4 change, .4 over several days adds up to full pounds. Personally I use the scale as a tool if I see it creeping up and I can’t explain it with any other body changes (yes those still count too) I adjust my diet or up my exercise. Knowing my weight or better yet weight trend, even serves as a little guilt reminder when I’m making meal decisions like “we’re up a pound, maybe I’ll skip the dessert” or “I’m down a pound maybe I can have the afternoon latte”.  Weight change doesn’t happen over night a few drop or gain all five pounds in one day, the truth is with careful monitoring you can see if what you are doing is helping o hurting one day and one pound at a time.

Now, I  must caution daily weigh ins are not for the faint at heart is you get easily discouraged or neurotic about your current weight then I suggest listening to the THEY. But if you can reasonably use the scale as guide and tool by all means hop on. I’ve learned my lesson. I will be on that scale yesterday, today, and tomorrow. LOL

Technorati Tags: body fat, daily weigh in, how oten should you weigh yourself, regimen, routine, scale, weight gain, weight gain trend, weight loss, weight loss trend

Bookmark It

Hide Sites