Your alarm goes off. Time to get up. You’re a little sore from yesterday’s workout but you manage to pull yourself out bed and walk to the bathroom. There, sitting on the floor is your best friend and worst enemy: the scale. You gingerly step on, closing your eyes as your weight is calculated. You feel confident. You worked out hard these last few days. You hit your macros spot on. You’re sure you’ve lost at least a couple pounds! You slowly open your eyes. Much to your horror and shock, the number is the exact same as last time; even a few ounces heavier. What gives? All that hard work with nothing to show for it. You’re in disbelief, frustrated, angry… If the above situation sounds familiar, it’s because it happens all too often. Anyone who’s ever tried to lose weight knows of the never-ending battle with the scale. Some days you love it, others you hate it. It’s a vicious cycle. But it doesn’t have to be. Why the scale is not the best way to measure progress Before we talk about why the scale isn’t a great way to measure overall progress, we must first define what progress actually is. In the context of a fat loss program, progress is somewhere in the neighborhood of a loss of 1-2% of your bodyweight per week. By using percentages, your progress is much more customized to the individual. A heavier person is going to have a much easier time losing more weight each week than someone with only a few pounds to lose. The problem with the scale, is it’s not a measure of body fat, or muscle…it’s a measure of total body mass. This means that the scale number is going to fluctuate based on a number […]