Confessions of a scale-aholic

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This is my confession. When I first started living in a healthier lifestyle, I found myself stepping on the scale. A LOT. The thrill of seeing the scale number going down was a bit of an adrenaline rush! Every morning, I would weigh myself as soon as I woke up to see my progress. There were some mornings, when the scale wasn’t cooperating in the way that I thought it should be, and I would hit a mound of frustration. I would spend the entire morning analyzing my previous day. Did I really burn enough calories? Did I eat too many calories? Did I eat too little calories? Am I experiencing water retention? The questions were endless and they would fill my mornings (and sometimes the entire day).

I was so desperate to see the scale drop, that I started almost obsessing with the scale. Daily morning weigh-ins added to the occasional nightly weigh-ins (because I had calculated that on average, I weighed 2 pounds less in the morning than I did at night). Weighing in at night gave me a glimpse of what to expect in the morning, so either I’d go to bed either happy, grumpy, or confused.

When I started making specific weight goals and deadlines to reach those goals, I became even MORE obsessed. We are talking major stress to hit the goals I had in my mind. Add the stress to the fact that I am a recovering emotional eater, and it was too much for me to take. If the scale had a drop that morning, I’d slip in a tiny bite of something as a “reward” (I know the logic seems funny but it really came down to getting too relaxed with my mini-celebration). If the scale had a significant increase, I’d get moody and eat…well, more than a few bites. I was chained to the scale, and allowed it to determine my mood for the day.

After joining Beachbody and the 21 Day Fix, I was on FIRE. The scale was dropping by leaps and bounds, the inches were coming off, and I was in the fast lane to success. I knew that the initial drop would slow down, and it did. I slowly slipped back into my scale-obsession, desperate to continue making progress. Finally, after a week of the scale going UP every day (despite that I was keeping everything in check), I hit the proverbial wall, knowing that something needed to change.

And so I decided to do something completely different than I had been doing – I stepped AWAY from the scale. I knew what I needed to do to be healthy, so I made a little challenge to myself to NOT look at the scale. Admittedly, it was pretty hard the first few days. I was working my tail off, and I wanted to SEE some kind of results. But as each day passed, the anxiety decreased. I even started to feel a little glimpse of freedom! Stepping away from the scale also challenged me. I knew that if I was cheating, then when I came back to the scale I’d see a less-than-desirable number. I love a good challenge, and this really helped me to focus more on my nutrition and less on my progress.

While I do have a specific goal weight in mind, my ULTIMATE goal is to be healthy. To eat healthy, to be fit and strong, and live healthy. I have the right tools within me to make it happen, and I KNOW that when I focus on the healthy, my weight/body is going to follow. Focusing on the health as opposed to the number on the scale has been a definite game-changing experience.

Are you a scale obsessor? I’d love to hear your story, and hear how you triumphed over it. Send me an email at fitfuntina@gmail.com