E218: Ditch the Scale, Focus on This Instead!

What if I told you that the number on your bathroom scale is the least important metric in your health journey? On today's episode of the Healthy Hot Mess Mom podcast, we're tearing down the misconceptions surrounding weight and daily fluctuations. Join me, Rebecca, as I share my personal experience of ditching the traditional scale and embracing a more holistic approach to health, focusing on building strength and improving body composition. Say goodbye to the endless cycle of frustration and self-doubt that comes with weight fluctuations, and discover the freedom that comes with understanding your body better.

Get ready to redefine what progress looks like! I’ll talk about how investing in a body fat scale has transformed my mindset and approach to fitness, allowing me to track more meaningful metrics like muscle mass, BMI, and waist-to-hip ratio. Whether you’re in your 40s, premenopausal, or menopausal, this episode offers practical tips on how to prioritize strength training and consistency in the gym to achieve lasting health benefits and greater confidence. So grab your iced coffee, and let’s embark on this empowering journey to becoming the healthiest version of yourself!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey there, and welcome to the Healthy Hot Mess
Mom podcast.
Are you a frustrated mom tryingto navigate the maze of diet
and fitness trends, only to giveup before you even start?
Do you wish you could stick tohealthy habits, have more energy
and finally feel confident inyour own skin?
Are you tired of tellingyourself this is the year I'll
get healthier, only to findyourself back at square one?

(00:23):
Well, you're in the right place.
I'm Rebecca, a health-obsessedworking mom of two littles and a
self-proclaimed hot mess mom.
In this podcast, I'm here tohelp you cut through the
confusion and discover practicalways to become the healthiest
version of yourself, no matterhow chaotic life gets.
We'll dive into stayingconsistent with healthy habits,

(00:43):
fueling your body withoutfeeling overwhelmed, and making
mindset shifts to keep youmotivated.
You'll learn to enjoy movingyour body, lose weight and feel
more energized and confidentthan ever before.
Remember, it's all aboutprogress, not perfection.
So grab your iced coffee andlet's get started on this
journey together.
Welcome to the healthy, hotmess mom community.

(01:03):
Hey there, happy monday, andWelcome to the Healthy, Hot Mess
Mom community.
Hey there, happy Monday, andwelcome back to the Healthy Hot
Mess Mom podcast.
Thank you for tuning in with meanother day.
I hope your beginning of yourweek is going off to a great
start and today, because we arelike officially into summer, I
want to do an episode calledDitch your Scale.
And I don't mean that in thesense of like never weigh

(01:25):
yourself, never monitor things,Because if you've listened to
this podcast before, I'm allabout goals and you know small
progress leads to big results.
So I think we get caught up onthis weight number and I've done
like chats about this before.
But recently I've put on like afull on like mission to stop

(01:46):
stressing my weight on the scaleand really focusing on building
strength and just that littlemindset shift instead of like
looking at a number on a dialevery day, looking for it to go
down and then not seeing theresult, or seeing major
fluctuations every day andgetting super upset, super
depressed, getting in your ownhead.

(02:07):
It derails your progress.
All those things.
I decided to invest in a bodyfat scale.
Now, yes, it does give me myweight, but it's giving me a
much deeper picture of what'sgoing on in my body, and this is
why I think it's so important.
So you can basically weigh thesame thing but your body

(02:28):
composition can be completelydifferent.
So what that's going to mean isgetting in smaller clothing,
having a healthier body, smallerBMI, smaller waist to hip ratio
, which is good in regards tolong-term health and focusing on
how much muscle mass I'mputting on.
So, even if the scale goes up,I'm able to see a direct

(02:52):
correlation to the work I'mdoing in the gym and the number
on the body fat scale going down.
So for me, I've gotten rid ofthe regular scale, Even when I
get on my body fat scale, whichI'll go through, which one I
purchased in a little bit theonly thing I'm focused on is
what I'm gaining, what musclemass I'm putting on.

(03:15):
If you're listening to this, I'massuming you know you're done
having kids, maybe you're inyour 40s, maybe you're
premenopausal, maybe you'remenopausal and if you are over
that, like 35 year old, likehump, we start losing muscle
mass year after year at a prettylike quick decline If we are
not working on keeping it, atkeeping in the gym, putting

(03:37):
lifting the weights, putting inthe time to build your strength.
So I'm just like so dedicatedto that right now.
And if you're listening to thisand you're super frustrated
that the scale is just notmoving, the mental shift of
getting rid of a basic dialscale where you know we're women
, we have menstru cycles, ourwater fluctuates pretty much on
the daily.
You can eat a piece of breadone day and gain five pounds and

(03:59):
then it just completely putsyou in a pissy mood for a week
and then you just go down thatnegative spiral of negative
self-talk, binge eating,emotional eating, feeling bad
about yourself, all the thingswe do as women, and I know for
me I've like put that to bed,Like I don't want to feel like
that anymore.
So if you are dedicated to yourhealth, if you're dedicated to

(04:21):
weight loss, to just feelingbetter, having more energy, do
not weigh yourself on yourregular scale.
And one thing that I am reallysticking to is not putting
myself even on the body fatscale, but more than once a week
, Because the problem is itbecomes like such a mental game
and you're not going to put onmuscle that quick, Like that's

(04:43):
just the reality, but week afterweek, maybe every two weeks,
you can start to see some gainsand it's super motivating.
So the scale that I invested inis an InBody and I believe the
model is the Dial H30, which istheir newer one.
It's an in-home model.
It's not the ones you see inthe gyms.
Inbody does make ones that arein the gyms, so I felt pretty

(05:05):
good investing into this one,because I know they have quality
products.
Now you put your body on thereI do it fully naked, and you
hold these hand things.
You stick them out straight,you keep your arms away from
your body.
You're, you know, barefoot.
All those things Takes about aminute, minute and a half and
you get a full reading.
You get so much information.
So, yes, you do get a weight.

(05:25):
However, that's like the lastthing I'm even looking at.
So it's super motivating to seeyou know what kind of percent
body fat, how much skeletalmuscle you have.
It puts you in a chart whetheryou're average.
It puts your body type in achart and kind of lets you know
like what's above average,what's normal.
You can set goals for yourself.
It tells you what your basalmetabolic rate is, your water

(05:46):
balance, all of these things andit's it graphs the points over
time so you can say like, hey,last month I had X amount of
body fat.
This month I'm going down mybody fat, up with my muscle.
Even if your weight stays thesame, you are a healthier you.
You are maybe more energized,Maybe your clothes are fitting

(06:07):
better.
But before that information youwould have beat yourself up.
I know because I've done itright Like the scale doesn't
budge.
You're doing all the rightthings, you're feeling your body
right, you're in the gym,you're doing your cardio, you're
doing your weights, you'redoing all the things.
You're so focused and theweight doesn't move.
That number doesn't budge.
But if you can see thefluctuation and the shift that

(06:28):
your body is making from burningthe body fat and putting on
muscle, who cares what you weigh?
Like really, who cares?
We all need to throw away thismentality that the scale number
matters, because there's been somany studies of pictures of
women where they weigh the samething and you would think that
the person that has more musclemass actually weighs less.

(06:49):
But indeed they weigh more.
But visually speaking, you maythink they weigh less, but
that's not true.
We just don't.
We don't ever set ourselves upfor, you know, really having
that as a true metric.
We're always looking at thenumber on the scale as a weight
and saying whether it's good orbad, and that's just the wrong
way to look at it.
So I've really been dedicatedto that in the last couple

(07:10):
months.
I know that if you get rid ofyour regular dial scale and you
either find a clinic or a gymthat has one of these and you
can weigh yourself on it once amonth, do the body fat scan, you
know, find out where you are,you are going to be so much more
motivated in the gym when yousee what's happening to your
body.
I would even argue that gettingrid of your regular scale if

(07:32):
that's all you have and using apair of pants as a metric is a
better way to measure than justa simple one metric number of
weight, Because I just thinkthat it sets us up for failure
and it doesn't motivate us ifthe number doesn't go down and
really you could just be losingwater rate and the number goes
down, but that doesn'tnecessarily mean good or bad,
right.
So again, just a simple thingthat we can do, something that I

(07:55):
know I've struggled with withyour, you know, through the
years of just having the scale,that number kind of driving you
like baddie, what you know, sucha tone for the day, and it's
not a good way, you know, tokeep yourself motivated, knowing
that the number didn't move ina week.
But I truly believe thatknowledge is power and having
these metrics helps fuel thepositivity, helps fuel you know.

(08:16):
Just one step after the other,the small goals lead to bigger
gains and you will keep yourselfon that trajectory of better
health, feeling better energizedand get to where you really
want to be, and that'sultimately the goal right, Like
getting healthy, getting whereyou want to be, feeling good.
So I think all these littlegadgets, all these things that

(08:37):
you can use are great, but ditchthe regular scale completely.
Ditch it, throw it out thewindow, burn it, run it over the
car, whatever you got to do,Don't just rely on that number
and see what happens.
Right?
I hope this episode find youwell and I'll chat with you next
week.
Thank you for tuning in to theHealthy Hot Mess Mom podcast.

(08:58):
I hope you found someinspiration and practical tips
to help you on your journey to ahealthier, more confident you.
Remember it's all aboutprogress, not perfection.
If you enjoyed today's episode,don't forget to subscribe, rate
and leave a review.
Your feedback means the worldto me and helps other hot mess
moms find our community.
Join me next time as wecontinue to navigate the ups and

(09:19):
downs of health and wellnesstogether.
Until then, keep striving forprogress, stay consistent and
embrace the beautiful chaos ofmotherhood.
Take care, stay healthy andkeep being the amazing hot mess,
mom, that you are.
See you next time.