My scale is moving.....

Over the past couple days my scale seems to be doing something that it has not done over the past couple months. It is starting to move. I have been holding steading but have not really been dropping like I want to to take off those last 15 pesky pounds.

I hear many people tell me I don't need to lose anymore, but I still have a little bit of a pudgy belly that I am determined to take into my past and not in my present or future. I am feeling really good and I know I am healthy and fit, but just not quite where I want to be yet.

I started to count calories again, but have quit once again. I had forgotten how much of a pain it was. I did benefit from it again though, and I think through the counting I once again got an understanding to what I am doing wrong. I believe that it is completely eating too much when I sit down and not stopping when I am full and have had enough. I have started to make this change.... and as anyone would know, it is not an easy change. I have to get back in control or this will not be a long term change. I am not gaining, so that is good, but this is a good wake up call to make sure I keep my health and weight in check and not relapse.

Wow - nice drop!

Last week was a slow week for me as I didn't see my average go down by even one pound. However, this week mid week I saw I nice drop in scale weight of 5 lbs in one day, which the next day and every day since has settled with a 3 lb loss.

I am down 3 lbs from just a few days ago and it is holding steady. If this continues to hold I will be posting at least a 2 lb loss this week.

Some Recent Encouragement

I have been encouraged recently by my weight. Just like mentioned before I do have the daily fluctuations but I also have been able to start to notice trends, and the recent trend is that I am still moving downward at a better rate than I was over the past couple months. You could say it is because of the holidays, but it started before the holidays. Now when I say better rate, I am not talking much over a 1 lb a week rate, but that is better than what was happening over the past two months.

You can see here on the left what it looked like for the month of November - only a .36 lb average weekly loss all month. Plus you can see the jumping all over the place.

Now on the right you can see in the past 30 days a .81 lb average weekly loss, which is up to 1.1 if I only consider this last week alone.

I am moving in the right direction! I have also seen some new low end spikes which are always nice. My latest lowest spike was this morning at 175.8. You can see my progress live by clicking here.

The woes of weighing daily

There are many opposing ideas on how often you should weigh yourself when trying to lose weight. I for one find myself needing to weigh myself everyday, mainly because if I do not it is on my mind all day, wondering how I am doing and if I am really messing up. The downside to this is how much body weight can fluctuate from day to day due to water intake, sodium intake, and a plethora of other variables.

These fluctuations can really cause havoc on ones emotional state if they pay too close attention to what the daily weight actually is. This can give you emotional highs and lows and if not careful can actually derail an otherwise very healthy change in lifestyle. I found myself at times falling into this trap and getting really depressed when I found myself down to a new low only to find myself up a couple pounds the very next day.

I am sure these fluctuations can be explained to a certain degree, but to the non scientific like me they are unexplainable. Take for instance this past weekend. I woke up Saturday morning to a weight of 177.0 on the scale. The previous days before I was hovering in the 177.x range so this wasn't too surprising, in fact I was pleasantly surprised because I had not seen that low before. I then proceeded to get myself ready and went out for my long run of 14 miles as I am preparing for a February Half Marathon (follow my progress here). I then spent the rest of the day being quite active including playing some baseball as well as eating very well. The shocker came when I got up This morning, just two days later and the scale said 179.0. How could this be? I just ran 14 miles, and then ate very well for two days.... and then an increase of 2 lbs?!?

I used to let these fluctuations bother me, but as time has progressed I realize that these are normal and in my opinion very hard to explain many times. I have found that it is much easier for me to stay focused and not get the emotional highs and lows if I look at the trend that these daily weights give me. Many months ago, during one of the times I was having trouble with the emotional bouncing I came across a site that will do the trending for you. I have been using Physics Diet ever since, and have been very happy with the results. It lets me know if I am still on the downward trend, and how fast this is occurring. You can take a look at my chart by following this link > My Public Profile.

I highly recommend that if you do decide to weigh yourself daily that you take the daily weights with a grain of salt and you focus more on the trend, as that is where the real truth can be found.