And this is why I don’t weigh myself often

In mid-April, two weeks into my current sober-eating streak, I weighed myself. Woo hoo — 5 pounds down! A week later, I weighed again. Holy moly, down 2 more pounds!

It was like the weigh was just flowing off of me.

Then last week I weighed myself again. Up three pounds. Whaaaa? I was devastated. I waited two days, eating perfectly clean. Weighed myself again. Up another pound.

Waaaaahhhhhh.

Now, I know better than this.

I know that if I focus on eating well, with no sugar and flour, no snacks, three meals a day, the weight will take care of itself.

If I focus on sober eating, I’ll lose the weight. If I focus on the weight, I’ll lose my sober eating.

And yet, I still can’t get over the urge to weigh myself.

We all do this, right? Losing weight is such great motivation to keep with a plan. It feels so good.

The problem is that when you rely on the scale for your motivation, you’re going to have to deal with the fact that our bodies don’t behave simply. They're wildly complex. Bodies hang onto weight sometimes. Bodies retain salt sometimes. Bodies have hormone fluctuations. Bodies are not machines. They go up, they go down. Daily fluctuations are part of the process.

Sure, the scale can tell if you’re on the right track, especially in the big-picture sense:

-- You might need to reassess your food volume if you stop losing altogether, start gaining steadily, or hit a plateau.

-- You might need to be reminded to stop adding a little bite here or an extra 1/2 ounce there.

-- You might need to cut out nuts or other shady foods.

There’s a value to the scale.

But if you’re using the scale as your primary motivation to keep on with your food plan, it’s going to mess with your brain. It just will.

There are plenty of other ways to get motivation. Keep a calendar and put a gold star on each day when you eat sober. Notice how your clothes fit. Pay attention to your energy.

I’m off to hide my scale on the top shelf of my garage shelves where it’s hard to reach.

Weighing myself once a week — or even once a month — is fine by me.