The common advice with most fitness gurus these days is to not pay any attention to the scale. That if you absolutely must know what you weigh, only step on a scale once a week at the very most. The idea is that weight loss and muscle gain is a bit more complicated than what can be shown on a typical bathroom scale. You can show a loss of several pounds that could be merely the result of water loss or a really big shit. Similarly, it is absolutely probable to lose quite a bit of fat but gain enough muscle to tip the scale to a higher number. Because of this, the common wisdom is that using the scale as a measurement of weight loss and fitness is pretty much useless.
But I never did follow common wisdom. I advocate using the scale every single day...and recording it every single day. Here;s why...
Measurement is important. Without measuring stuff you really don't know squat, you're just guessing. In trying to lose weight it is very tempting to guess and go with approximations...especially concerning our weight. For years, I renewed my driver's license with the same statistics; height 5'9", hair color brown, weight 200lbs, etc. Except my hair turned totally gray about the time I passed 200 by more than sixty pounds. My height stayed the same, I guess, I dunno, I probably stoop more these days. Anyway, what I'm trying to get at is that we usually tend to lie to ourselves about ourselves; especially about how much we weigh, how much we lose, and especially how much we gain. To combat that tendency there is only one thing to do to keep yourself honest....step on the scale every day.
The same time every day is preferable. I like to do mine in my underwear right after my morning dump and before I eat breakfast (hey, every bit helps). The point is to get some kind of consistent snapshot of your body since weight tends to fluctuate during the day. I enter the number into an app called MyFitnessPal. It's a really handy thing to load on your phone and I'll talk a lot more about it in the future. One of the great features is that it will track your weight on a graph. This will let you see the fluctuations of pounds over the days and weeks....and it will fluctuate....but, if you are doing everything right there will be a steady overall decline.
This is what can prove that you are making progress in the long run. Studies have shown that recording weight frequently enables more long term success than just measuring once in a great while all willy nilly. It makes sense if you think about it. A great many people get discouraged when they work their asses off and either only see a pound or two go away or the weight stays the same or it freaking goes up. Having the numbers, having the graph shows you with direct proof and feedback that you are making progress as well as giving you accountability if what you're doing is not working in the long run. It also allows you to keep your head when you see a weight gain for a day or two, because you know it is only a blip...not a setback. A word of warning though....you need to do this for a good length of time. As I said, there will be fluctuations and it will take a few weeks for a downward trend to become noticeable.
Don't fear the scale. It's just a tool and you can't build anything without tools.
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