Ditching the Scale

Like a lot of women, I’ve been dealing with the insecurities of my body since my last son was born. The crazy thing about my body is normally after I have a baby, my body is snatched. My stomach is flat, my butt is lifted, and my face is slim. Pregnancy always causes me to eat a lot healthier because I could never tolerate too much junk on my stomach. However, after my last pregnancy, my body did not do the same thing. After I gave birth to my youngest son, the weight just seemed to stick with me. When I tell you I tried everything to get the weight off, I mean it. Green smoothie cleanses, Keto, vegetarian and vegan diets, juicing, everything. I’ve found a few things from doing this. First, most of these diets and cleanses do work. You will lose the weight if you actually stick with the diet properly. On the other hand, as soon as you get off course those very same pounds will come back to haunt you. Not to mention I also found myself spending tons of money on these diets, and becoming more irritable and stressed.

The biggest thing I battled was I found myself counting pounds and weighing myself often. Because of that I noticed my weight wasn’t going down, but rather remaining the same or going up. As you can imagine, my confidence kept sinking because I felt like I was making no progress.

It wasn’t until one day while I was walking in the park and I was listening to a Youtuber I follow. She is a fitness expert and looks amazing. However, it was what she said in this video that gave me an “ah-ha” moment and made me change my outlook on the definition of healthy. She said although she has a very healthy and balanced diet and she exercises regularly, she is also human as well. She said she likes pizza, beer, chocolate, and a bunch of other things. She does not count calories nor pay attention to the scale because sometimes paying attention to those things while trying to achieve a goal will drive you insane. Especially when you fall short, it can be discouraging and cause you to give up altogether. At that moment I said to myself, “She is absolutely right!” From that moment on, I decided to stop obsessing with the numbers on the scale, and focus on remaining healthy. I figure if I continue to focus more on healthy habits and less on the actual weight loss, the results I’m longing for will follow.

In no way, shape or form am I telling anyone to stop counting calories or to stop watching what they eat because I’m no fitness guru, dietitian, or medical doctor. I know there are times when it is necessary to do these things. However, I have found in the last month eating healthy without any fad diets or cleanses and exercising a few times a week has done more good for me than anything I’ve tried in the past few years. I’ve also decided NOT to weigh myself on the scale, but rather photograph myself so I can actually see my progress. I’ve found the scale can be so deceiving at times, and I found myself getting down on myself because of it.  Not anymore!  Since ditching the scale, I’m less stressed, more confident, and I’m actually seeing and feeling the results. I feel amazing.  

If you can relate and have felt some or all of the ways I have felt, I encourage you to ditch the scale and just simply maintain a healthy lifestyle.  Focus on your health rather than the number attached to your body.  It will definitely take discipline not to weigh yourself every day if you are anything like I used to be.  In the end, I guarantee you will feel so much better because you’re not stressing so much, and before you know it you would’ve reached your goal because you have placed your focus elsewhere.  I’m just an ordinary mom who just wants to feel good and looks fabulous and just wanted to encourage anyone that can relate to this to just keep on being healthy.  The rest will follow.