I did an experiment over the weekend to see how
eating out, along with alcohol, would affect the scale. I can’t say this is any exact science per se,
but in my experience, you never get
on the scale after a meal out to a Chinese restaurant. Sodium is not a friend of the scale and you
will almost always show an increase in your weight. Sodium increases water retention and I
always feel puffy after eating an excess of sodium and/or not drinking as much
water. I would often hear from my
personal trainer Tyson say that it can take two to three days for your body to
level out after a large meal out or a day of being lax with your
calories/points. While I am in no way
saying you should avoid eating out and alcohol (the shock and horror!!!) just
be mindful that it could affect the scale.
And, remember that it is never a time to panic! You can't tell anything but just one week. Instead, go back to your normal eating/exercise
routine and maybe drink a little extra water the next few days. You should see that excess water weight drop
off.
This leads me to recent weekend experiment.
I usually have the best weight loss success when my
official WW weigh-in is the day after my last workday. For example, if I work Friday - Monday and have my WI on Tuesday, I will almost always have pretty consistent losses. If my weekend is Saturday - Monday and my WI is on Tuesday, I tend to lose weight at a slower pace. The reason behind this is because I eat differently during my work week than I
do on my weekend and when my weekend is closer to my WI, I have less time to get rid of the excess water weight/calorie consumption.
Weekends and days off are
when Kenyon and I go out to eat the most. We
enjoy eating out and after being on track and preparing my meals all week at work, I
look forward to relaxing on the weekend.
Eating out doesn’t have to mean relaxing all together with your WW
program, but it tends to happen if I have social events also scheduled on my
days off.
On Friday afternoon when I woke up,
dressed in my home-weigh-in-attire (night gown and panties) and after emptied my
bladder, I stepped on the scale. The scale at home read
222.3. I was down 1.8 pounds from when I
stepped on the scale at home last Monday. I did
not track either Saturday or Sunday but I ate out twice and had several
alcoholic beverages. On Monday afternoon
when I woke up for my day, I stepped on the scale at home in the same weigh-in
attire and after emptying my bladder.
The home scale read 223.9 pounds, which was up 1.6 pounds from Friday weigh-in. The interesting part of these
two numbers is that last Monday my scale at home read 224.0 and this Monday it
read 223.9, a different of 0.1 pounds and if I had gone to my WW meeting last
night (I had to work so I did my WI tonight), I would have expected a maintain
or a very small gain since not all scales are the same.
Interesting but not surprising.
When I woke up this afternoon, ready to go in my
home weigh-in attire with an empty bladder, I got on the scale and the number read 222.4. My official WW weigh-in weight was 222.6. I am officially down 1.6 pounds, which I am
very happy about. I gained 2.0 pounds last week so it is nice to have most of that drop off.
Since I didn’t track what I ate Saturday or
Sunday, I don’t know how many points I used and how many points I went over. I have had weeks in January and February that
were 100 point days and they affected the scale. I have been a bit too lax on my weekends,
which I plan to buckle down and get a handle on those. The biggest positive is that I’ve been back on
track since my work week started again.
I don’t like taking two steps forward and then take four steps
back when the scale number in concerned. So, managing my weekends is
the key to consistent losses.
My main takeaway from this experiment is to try
and encourage you to not freak out when the scale jumps up after a weekend of
eating off track. The scale isn’t
telling the whole story and as long as you get back on track ASAP, the weight
gain is just temporary.
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