Does anyone else besides me find themselves obsessed with weighing themselves? I am trying to lose bodyfat right now and I find myself checking my bodyweight all the time. I think I do it 5 times a day. I know this is rediculous because you should only check it once a week, and bodyweight isn’t as good as bodyfat for guaging progress anyway. But I can’t seem to help but always want to know what my weight is. If I weigh less, I automatically feel much better… if I weigh more, it makes me upset and feel frustrated…
I’m trying to learn how to use skinfold measurements but I am rather bad at it… getting very inprecise measurements.
This past weekend I had a cheat meal which gave me lots of water weight… I lost a good deal of it in 1 night, but all I can think about now is losing the rest of it so I can continue down the road to losing weight… sigh.
I weigh every morning (but only in the a.m.), and plot the datapoint on a graph. While it goes against the conventional wisdom to weigh once a week, I find it helpful because I’m looking for a trend–fluctuations become less important, as long as things are overall moving in the direction I want.
This is probably less relevant for men than for women, as you don’t have the same level of hormonal fluctuations, but I became a lot less obsessive once I started the graph.
I find weighing during the day counterproductive…if your weight is low, all you do is reward yourself for dehydration, as you’ll weigh substantially more later in the day if you’re drinking enough water.
Steihl, stop weighing yourself so often! There are so many things that can make your weight fluctuate - how many times you’ve eaten, whether or not you’ve gone to the bathroom, your hydration level, how much caffeine you’ve had, your ratio of sodium to potassium, how many carbs you’ve been having, etc.
Pick one day a week to weight yourself and do your body comp measurements. Do it the same time of the day, after having the same amount of food, water, and trips to the bathroom, if possible. Some people get the best readings first thing in the morning, for me the middle of the day gave the most consistant readings.
Steihl …dont be so hung up,i hate to say it but you are starting to sound like a person who is going to give up…dont look for the instant gratification,and insted set some real goals and make whatever your goals are a lifstyle change…
Wake up, step on scale.
Pee, step on scale to see how much lost.
Workout, drink lots of water, step on scale to see how much weight gained through water.
Eat breakfast, shower, SOS
Get dressed, SOS
Get to work, immediately jump on scale
And I’ve been on the scale a couple times since. I’m on a mass building cycle right now so it’s fun to watch.
Yeah I know weighing myself during the day is pointless. But I am extremely consistent with my diet and I know “generally” how much I am supposed to weigh during certain times of the day. The main measure I care about is the one I get first thing in the morning right after I pee. That one bothers me the most if it increases. Increases during the day I know can be attributed to a variety of factors and I usually ignore those readings but just step on the scale anyway (out of fun, obsession, insanity, whatever).
But yeah, I mean, early morning, not much can change. I haven’t eaten anything yet, conditions are always the same… as long as I don’t have strength decreases in the gym I know I’m not losing LBM if my weight goes down. I haven’t lost strength at all since I started dieting so all I hope for every morning is a drop in weight. It’s crazy. If I’m not at a new “all time low” I get upset and feel as though I should change my diet. If I make a new “all time low” I feel great about my progress… the funny thing is that for the past 4-5 months I’ve lost over 20 pounds of fat, consistently losing about a pound a week while making LBM gains (measured by strength gain in the gym). I know I should be happy with this progress, but if just 1 day I gain weight in the mornings… I feel as though my progress has died. It’s irrational… I don’t know what my problem is.
Yeah I know this is neurotic behavior and I need to change. I think buying that scale was the worst thing I’ve ever done hahaha. I think if I just learned how to use a caliper properly I’d be less obsessive about my weight. What makes it worse is that I have one of those Tanita scales that measure bodyfat and sometimes that shit fluctuates so much I get so angry when my bodyfat is so high… even though I know the measurement is probably bogus. Sheesh…
I understand. Not about weighing 5 times a day (that’s just crazy! :), but about being discouraged by a bad reading. I’ve been cutting for about two months (the cutting’s about to stop, though) and I’ve tried to weigh every day. Like Lisa Simpson, I think it’s interesting to see trends.
A “light” day encouraged me, where a “heavy” day discouraged me. But I soon realized several patterns and could typically guess what I’d be weighing the next day. It really put cheating into perspective.
But yes, weighing that often and obsessing over it is neurotic. I would just tell myself that I couldn’t weigh myself until a certain day, and then do that, whether you like it or not.
Why don’t you just use a spreadsheet to calculate the trend? That way, you can put in your weight and bodyfat every day, but only pay attention to the trend analysis (which won’t be effected much by weird spikes up or down).
If I looked like you Patricia…well, I’d be a woman I guess…but I’d be a woman who never gets on a scale.
Personally, I broke the obsession a few years ago. I only do it a couple times a week. At the moment, it makes more sense to pay attention to the mirror.
