I dislike weighing myself. But the recent Fancy Food Show left me with a fabulous collection of beautiful rare chocolates and I have gained weight. This essay by Bill McKibben about the value of knowing your gas mileage and this great piece by Atul Gawande on the value of a birth-outcome score (the Apgar score) have made me realize:
1. Weighing yourself is an act of courage.
2. Weighing yourself is always beneficial. No matter what the scale says.
I’m not sure I agree with you. Weighing yourself is always beneficial, if and only if you can see the measurement as just a simple data point. But there are a lot of people who can’t do this. I can’t tell you how many weight-loss bloggers I read who are obsessed with the scale, weighing themselves multiple times a day, getting really depressed if their weight fluctuates by just 2-3 lbs from one day to the next. The number defines their whole day. I tend to think that these people should only weigh themselves once a week, if not once a month, particularly if they’re actively losing weight. They are not helping themselves with the mental trauma of daily weigh-ins
True. I’ve often seen it recommended that you only weigh yourself once a week while on a diet. This is presumably so you don’t get discouraged by daily fluctuations. However, if you weigh yourself every day a bad weigh in will naturally be followed up quickly by a good weigh in, and you will not only see the overall trend shaping up, but you may learn something from the fluctuations.
More than once/day seems pointless, I agree with you. But as the articles I linked to show, knowing the weight does exert a downward pressure. Some people might not need that downward pressure. Or it might come at too high a price.
Although I don’t follow any of the actual diet advise contained within (especially after SLD), The Hacker’s Diet contains a bevy of useful information about how the human body actually works and what weight your significance has to it.
Since I read HD two years ago, I have weighed myself once a day, in the morning after I urinate, stark naked. I use a spreadsheet similar to the one John describes within to calculate a “moving average” based on the past two weeks or so of weights, that helps smooth out the day-to-day fluctuations you will often see. This helps me notice trends (good or bad) before I notice them otherwise.
However, I don’t think that weighing yourself more than once per day is really beneficial, and if you weigh yourself once a day like I do, it has to be under the same circumstances every day. Doing it first thing helps eliminate a lot of variables: I’ve tried weighing myself at various points throughout the day and have noticed HUGE fluctuations (up to six pounds) based on what I’ve eaten, if I’ve recently had a bowel movement, etc, etc, and trying to keep track of all those variables and the effect they have is just too much.
Concerning weighing-in during weight reduction; personal experience:
All of the above are valid, even if differing perspectives
I’ve done it both ways. Not judging by the scale means rather, judging by either the tape measure or by size and fit of clothes and changes in physique. For me as a woman, the tape measure presents a more accurate picture than scale of what is going on. Who knows why, but it seems inches may be shed when the scale numbers appear to be at a standstill or bouncing upward and downward a few pounds for weeks. Truthfully, even when greatly encouraged by tape-measure results, I still long to see downward scale movement. At one time of weightloss efforts, I refused to view the scale except once monthly, along with my scheduled tape measurement. I was avoiding emotional discouragement — all the while rationally understanding that a body’s mass is continually affected by host of variable influences. I psychologically wanted to get an invigorating boost and increased motivation from seeing a larger drop “all at once” than is experienced with sometimes-confusing up and down daily weights. Add to that, in places like internet fora, when Venus and Mars compare their progress, it can also be a source of disheartenment for women even though they full well know why men, on the whole, shed fat and weight more quickly and consistently, then tone more easily :^D
With SLD, I am weighing in every day, even if timidly after a larger than normal meal, or when I have an overnight-5 pounds+ episode of edema. Or when the weight doesn’t seem to be changing. Medically, I am supposed to weigh in every morning, although I don’t really want to, and don’t consistently do so, other than during this weightloss effort.
It can be scarey to look into the dark light of the scale. For many, daily weigh-ins CAN be an act of courage. They might more gently be done for oneself in a mildly self-disassociative state, while chanting a sweet, lullabye-rhythm’ed and new-agey mnemonic mantra to the effect that: “While I am beautifying my body, mind and soul with loving care and health, I kindly remind my heart and mind that the scale cannot be entirely accurate concerning the body’s actual weight” — or better — “While I am renewing my body, mind and soul through good nutrition and health, I lovingly remind my heart and mind that, while excess fat is quietly and consistently being shed, the body’s daily mass increases and decreases, due to a variety of inconsistent circumstances.” :^D Hmm. Maybe I could put those affirmations into poetry and tunes and chant them on binaural soundwave CDs.
Ah, although we may know and beleive facts in our heads, it doesn’t necessarily make them feel good or even believable in our hearts. Most of us are topsy-turvy: more creatures of heart over brain, me’feels. …I am.
But, daily weighing-in can be beneficial, nontheless: On the positive side, for me, it does track the long, almost horizontally-angled downward trend and sheds more light for trying to realistically determine what makes my weight fluctuate or stall. It’s helpful, especially comparing measures with caloric and macronutrient consumption records- both of which measuring and recording can be of value, too, particularly when beginning a nutritional plan — even SLD. The tracking of any and all of these, though somewhat a disciplinary nuisance imho, can make one diligent to examine what else might be considered and implemented — or not — or what to discontinue — in order to continue shedding unwanted fat and working toward improved health. This is, after all, the West where I’ve been born and living. When it comes to nutrition and eating, would that I might have been born in a culture with a long-traditional, healthy diet consumed and unquestioned by the aged elders and shamans and where there is no messing around with it by the political elite’s regulatory commissions.
Or, to be one of those people who are lucky with SLD and don’t seem to need any of the above. I need this oil…This cup and this oil. That’s all I need…and this tablesppon. I need this tablespoon…
(please overlook any myopic typos)