Weight loss progress can be a b*tch.
Talk to anyone who’s tried to lose weight and they’ll tell you it’s a struggle.
This is likely because the first thing that comes to your mind is, “what’s the number on the scale right now and what number do I want to get to?”
Too much emphasis is placed on whether the number on the scale went up or down.
If it went up, you mine as well say f*ck it and give up.
Oppositely, if it went down it’s time to start popping the champagne bottles and celebrate.
This is an all too common problem.
If there is anything you remember from this article, it’s this:
The scale doesn’t define you as a person. It’s a fucking number on a piece of equipment that’s made in a factory that you buy at a store.
It doesn’t know you. It doesn’t know how amazing of a person you are, how hard you work in the gym, how strong you’ve gotten, how much fat you’ve lost, and how much muscle you’ve built.
In this article, I am going to show you the right way to use the weight scale so that you can build a healthy relationship with it.
And I’ll show you other ways to measure your weight loss progress no matter if number on the scale went up, down, or stayed the same.
Before that, I’ll go over a few points on weight loss. Feel free to skip down to the 7 ways to measure your weight loss progress if you’d like. I think you’ll get a ton out of the first few paragraphs though.
My Personal Experience With Weight Loss Progress
At one point, I was in your shoes – completely new with no idea where to start or what to look at.
Before I knew anything about fat loss, I would weigh myself once a week – every Monday morning to be exact.
I vividly remember waking up excited to see if all the past weeks hard work paid off.
All my success was based on the number going down.
During the first month, the weight quickly went down every week. This meant I was losing fat and on the road to get shredded.
“Hell yeah” I thought. “This is easyyyyyyyy”.
Unfortunately, that mindset didn’t last very long because my weight eventually stalled and went up a few pounds.
For the life of me I couldn’t figure out why this would happen. In my mind, I was doing everything perfect. I hit my calorie and protein goals every day and crushed all my workouts.
How could the scale go up???
“F*ck this whole fitness thing” I thought.
This was the first lesson I learned – it’s all a part of the process.
Unfortunately Your Weight Loss Progress is Not Linear
The lesson was that your weight loss progress fluctuates day to day. This will be the hardest part for you to get over as there’s no way around it.
There will be days your weight goes down, stays the same, and even goes up
These fluctuations happen mainly because your body is constantly flushing water in and out of our body.
It’s not because you’ve lost muscle or gained fat (which is what I used to think).
Here’s a few reasons your weight may have spiked overnight:
- You have to go #2. Have you ever weighed yourself before and after? If not, give a try because you may be surprised.
- You ate more salt the previous night when you ate Chipotle for dinner. Salt causes your body to hold onto more water.
- You ate more carbs than usual. Each gram of carb your body stores results in 3 grams of that in water. Obviously, if you hold onto more water your weight will go up.
- You’re stressed from life (hey, I feel ya) and cortisol (your stress hormone) is spiked all day everyday.
- Cortisol causes your body to hold onto water. If you’re mentally stressed, doing intense exercise, and eating very low calories than your cortisol is going to skyrocket. Your best bet is to cut back.
- Cortisol can lead to more hunger (increases ghrelin = stress eating ) which may lead to eating more.
- Maybe you had a kick ass workout the previous day in which case your damaged muscles cause more water to be retained while they recover.
- You either weighed in earlier than usual or ate later than usual. Basically this means you have more food in your stomach.
Think of it like this…
If you drank a 16 ounce or 1 pound glass of water, what do you think will happen? You’d gain a pound because you drank a pound of water. Make sense?
This means it can go up, down, sideways, and back again.
But, that doesn’t mean you’ve gained fat. It only means you gained weight.
The Difference Between Fat Loss Vs Weight Loss Progress
I’m sure you’ve heard that a “Calorie Deficit is the only way you will lose fat”
If you haven’t, now you know.
In order to lose body fat, your body has to burn more calories than you are eating so that it’s forced to start burning its excess body fat as energy.
This is what a calorie deficit is – burning more calories than you eat.
It’s not because of a liquid diet, detox diarrhea tea, cutting out carbs, wearing electrodes that blast off belly fat, or any weird thing you see on the internet.
All those things work because they put you into a calorie deficit. As tempting as they might seem, don’t fall for them.
Weight Loss Progress
Weight loss does not tell the whole story because it accounts for your total body mass. Basically everything your body is made of, including:
- Body fat
- Muscle
- Water
- Glycogen
- Organs
- Bones
Believe it or not, losing weight is very easy.
All you need to do is cut calories super low and perform a shit ton of cardio.
However, that’s a great way to lose muscle, decrease your metabolism, and eventually gain all the weight back.
Fat Loss Progress
Fat loss on the other hand is just losing fat. Yes, that’s it.
It accounts for your improved body composition.
This means you still keep the muscle on your body and the only thing you lose is fat. (You can actually gain muscle too but thats for a later article)
I don’t know about you, but this sounds like a win/win to me.
Without muscle, you burn less calories, don’t look as good, and it becomes harder to stay lean as time goes on.
Therefore, eat in a slight calorie deficit, adequate protein, and strength train to make sure you keep the muscle on your body when you lose fat.
7 Ways to Measure Your Weight Loss Progress
These are the ways that I have my 1:1 Online Coaching Clients keep track of their weight loss progress. It’s important to keep in mind that wins come in all different forms. If one thing on this list isn’t changing, look for other things that may be changing.
1.The Scale
The scale terrible in the short term but great in the long term. It’s by far the most commonly used device to measure weight loss progress.
That said, research has shown that people who weigh themselves everyday tend to lose weight and keep it off.
Oh, and I don’t want to hear about the scales that measure body fat percentage. Those are inaccurate and misleading.
Ultimately, the scale should be used as data. That’s it.
Weight Fluctuations
Its not a plateau if your weight stalls for a few days or even a week. You have to give it time and be patient.
The same thing can be said if your weight spikes up.
Have you ever had a night out with friends, had a few drinks, and a few unexpected slices of pizza, and all of a sudden gained a few pounds?
You probably thought, “What in the heck happened? I gained 5 pounds! All my progress is lost.”
Don’t panic because its not fat. You literally just ate more food and salt so your body is going to hold onto water from that.
The best thing your can do in this situation is not weigh yourself for a day or two afterwards when your weight goes back to normal.
See the trend here? I’m trying to drill this point into your mind.
Quick weight spikes result in your body holding onto water, therefore increasing your weight.
Remember, to gain a pound of fat you would have to eat 3,500 calories over your maintenance.
Therefore, logically you know your weight is going to go up and down over time so take it with a grain of salt (no pun intended) and keep moving forward.
Don’t take your daily weights too seriously. So when that number spikes up, which you know it will, please stay calm.
Weekly Averages
Instead, what if you took your weekly averages and compared those month to month?
This means weighing yourself everyday. Yes, its better to weigh yourself everyday than once a week so you can be more accurate and see for yourself that your weight will fluctuate.
Your average weekly weight takes out the daily fluctuations by averaging out the high and low days. It’s not perfect but it’s a lot more accurate.
With that in mind, this does not mean you’ll lose weight every week though. If that were the case, you’d lose 52 pounds in a year.
Now, if your average weight goes down month over month, that is how you know you’re getting leaner.
A good rate of weight loss is 2-4 pounds a month on average. On average is the key word there.
I do not want to hear the word “only” come out of your mouth.
Would you tell a friend that they only lost 2 pounds?
No you wouldn’t. So don’t tell yourself that either.
So, promise you won’t freak out then?
Do we hae a deal?
So, at the first of the month, or whatever week you started keeping track, compare that week to the previous month. Not the previous week or day. This is a much better way to measure your weight.
Moral of the story is this: DO NOT LET THE SCALE CONTROL YOU.
Side note: If you still struggle with using the scale, even after reading this, than take a break from it. However, that does not mean you’re done using it forever. The goal is to eventually build a good relationship with the scale.
Recommendation: Weigh yourself every morning after you go to the bathroom, before you put on clothes, and before you eat. Make sure you use the same scale as different scales can produce different readings. Keep track of your average weekly weight to account of the day to day fluctuations. Look at the average trendline going down rather than the day to day fluctuations. If you’re still struggling with the number on the scale, it may be time to take a break from it. But, that doesn’t mean it’s a forever thing.
2.Body Measurements
In my opinion, body measurements are the best numerical data to look at.
When compared to the scale, taking body measurements shows where you’re losing body fat and building muscle or at the very least retaining muscle.
We all have different genetics which means we will lose fat in different spots at different rates and times. Which is unfortunate because the mid section is always the last to come off. (I know, it sucks)
That said, you can actually lose or (*gasp) even gain weight but still lose inches if you build muscle and lose fat.
This is because muscle is more dense than fat – meaning it takes up less room for the same weight. When you build muscle and lose fat, you’ll look more defined and more toned.
Therefore, if you start to notice your inches going down, you know you’re doing something right. This is the gold standard of body recomposition because you are building muscle and burning fat relatively at the same time which is hard to do.
If this is you, congratulations you just put yourself in rare company and are going to have a lot of jealous people (including myself) looking at you.
Recommendation: Take measurements of your arms, waist, glutes, and thighs every two weeks. Use the same measuring tape and try to go directly against your skin as going over your clothes could add extra inches. The point is to try and have the same environment each time and limit the number of variables that could influence the measurements.
3.Progress Photos
While I think measurements are great, progress pictures are likely the best indicator of your progress.
Even if they make you feel uncomfortable, I’d highly recommend you take them to keep for yourself so that you can look at them in the future.
Look at it this way – I’ve never had someone take pictures and regret taking them after a few months if they consistently followed a plan.
Remember, you see yourself everyday so it can be hard for your brain to interpret the changes that are actually happening. You are your own worst critic which is why pictures are so important.
Have you ever been out and seen someone who’s lost weight and gave them a compliment and they brush it off like nothing?
Well, this is probably because they don’t realize exactly how much progress they’ve made and how good they look.
Therefore, progress pictures allow you to objectively see the visual changes of your body month to month and year to year.
You can visualize your own body recomposition slowly starting to take place month to month.
This is the perfect way to see how you look naked and in a bathing suit on the beach or at a pool.
Now you can build the confidence to show off that new and improved rockin body you’ve been working so hard to build.
Recommendation: Take a front, back, and side view in a bathing suit every 4 weeks. Make sure to leave enough room in between pictures or else the visual changes may not be as visible.
4.Gym Gains
Measuring your progress in the gym is highly underrated and something that comes on quick in the beginning. When you’re new to strength training, the gains come on quick. If you want a confidence booster, focus on getting stronger every week in the gym.
By getting stronger, you know you’re making progress. This is something where most people mess up though.
They go into the gym without a plan, do a few random exercises, and don’t keep track of how much weight they lifted or the repetitions they completed.
In order to make progress and get stronger, you have to follow a plan. This way you can continue to practice and get better at certain movements every week.
This is known as progressive overload – something that is vital to making gains. The goal is to either add weight or reps each week so that your muscles have to build and get stronger the next week.
To clarify, here’s your strength training check list:
- Have a rep range.
- Pick a weight for that rep range.
- If you can reach the high end of that rep range, than you add weight.
- If not, you use the same weight from the previous week and try doing 1 more rep until you’re able to do the max amount of reps in that range.
Furthermore, here’s an example of what progressive overload looks like for bench press with a rep range of 6-8:
- Week 1: 4×6-8 (100 pounds for 8 reps)
- Week 2: 4×6-8 (105 pounds for 8 reps)
- Week 3: 4×6-8 (110 pounds for 6 reps)
- Week 4: 4×6-8 (115pounds for 7 reps)
Generally speaking, if you’re new to lifting, you can expect to gain .5 of a pound of muscle per week if you’re a male and .25 per week if you’re a female.
However, that number tends to decrease by half each year of working out over time as your body adapts and get more familiar with strength training.
That said, go into the gym with a plan, set goals for yourself, and have fun.
Recommendation: Aim to lift 3-4 days a week and focus on the main movements. (Squat, hinge, overhead press, horizontal press, pull, carry, lunge) And make sure you are lifting heavy!
5.How Your Clothes Fit:
This one is obvious but often gets overlooked.
If you start to fit into that dress or jeans that you haven’t been able to fit in for years or your close are starting to get too big on you, what do you think happened?
You’ve obviously gotten leaner!
So, make sure to keep an eye out on how your clothes are fitting and what clothes you are fitting into.
And put that into the bag of wins!
6.Feeling More Like a Badass:
How you feel determines how you live.
Looking good is great, but how you feel matters too. What’s the point if you look good but feel like shit most of the time.
The goals is for you to look good and feel good because these factors have a big influence on long term health and adherence.
Do you have more energy?
Have you gotten stronger in the gym?
Are you sleeping longer?
Do you have lower levels of stress and anxiety?
Has your libido improved?
If you said yes to any of these, you’ve made progress.
Everyone is different and progress comes in different forms.
Sometimes your weight or measurements may stay the same for a while but you’ve noticed that your strength in the gym has skyrocketed and your spouse can’t stay off you in the bedroom.
Also, going off how you feel is important for knowing when to take diet breaks, or go easy in the gym.
If you’re hungry, sleeping like shit, moody, and fatigued you may need a diet break.
Or, maybe you’re not feeling it that day to workout. In this case, decreasing your intensity for that day and doing a less intense exercise like mobility or even walking may be a better option.
Recommendation: Keep track of these bio feedbacks each day. At the end of each week, look at your scores. Are they all good? Then you’re on the right track. Are they down? Then you know you may need to change something up.
7. Compliments From Friends, Family, Coworkers:
Even if you’re making tremendous progress, your brain can trick you into thinking you aren’t.
So next time someone gives you a compliment, take it and hang on to it.
Of course they’re saying it to be nice. But there’s also a reason they’re saying something because they see something different. And that something different is a positive change. Especially if they didn’t know you’ve been working out and cleaning up your diet.
They don’t see you every day like you do which means they can actually see the changes going on.
So be kind to yourself and use that as a way to know you are getting results.
Wrapping Up:
Just like everything else in life, building these new habits takes time. The cool thing is that they’ll get easier the more you do them and become a part of your everyday life.
If you’re not seeing results right away, that’s ok. Be patient and stay consistent. If you truly are being consistent, I promise you will see results eventually.
After all, you can’t control it so focus on what you can control through your exercise, sleep, and nutrition.
So when you do start to see changes, the more motivated you’ll be to continue crushing it.
If one measurement is not changing, you can look at any of these other ones to see changes. Because progress comes in many different forms.
Some might reveal more than others but they eventually all add up over time and work together like a team.
Everything matters, not just one. So live life and be happy.
Thanks for reading. Any questions, email me I’d be more than happy to help.
Ps. If you want more updates from me and a free manual that includes 30 workouts you can do from anywhere, subscribe here.