People who want to lose weight increase their activity levels, cut off all junk food, and opt for healthier food options. Yet, they may still be having trouble shedding off the extra pounds. This can be demotivating and frustrating at times. However, there is hope. The scale is just a basic tool for assessing your weight loss journey. There are various other tracking methods for your weight loss attempts.
Are you aware of what exactly you are going to do and how long it will take to accomplish your weight loss goals? Some people only wander around the gym and do not track weight loss like they should to review whether their exercise routine is working out for them or not. Here are some of the ways you can track weight loss to evaluate your performance:
Trust the Good Old Scale
Using the scale is a simple method of tracking your weight loss, but it fails to reveal the entire story. Your weight may vary five to six pounds every day due to various factors. Eating salty or starchy foods, water retention, the weather and hormonal changes, may affect your weight daily. When you weigh yourself using a scale, make sure you do it first thing in the morning and after using the bathroom. You can do it twice a week and morning weigh-ins help you record any spikes in weight owing to water or food intake. Although convenient, daily weighing can be emotionally frustrating and inaccurate results may take their toll on your motivation to lose weight.
Other Friendlier Tracking Methods
Tracking weight loss progress according to measurements is a positive way to evaluate your results. Certain people have their own unique methods of tracking weight loss. One such way is ‘the jeans method.’ Try to fit into ‘non stretchy’ jeans once you feel you have cut down some weight. When you measure your body fat percentage, you will know if you are losing muscle or fat. The precise way of measuring this involves a lab. Therefore, you can rely on other easier ways to track weight loss, such as calculating your waist or abdominal circumference or getting a BMI to see progress.
You can also take measurements with a tape and keep a record of these figures every month. Compiling data to review and assess progress is crucial for a couple of reasons. For one thing, you will learn if the efforts you are putting into your weight loss journey are worth your while. Secondly, it will do wonders for your motivation. Any decrease in size or measurement will compel you to work harder to yield better results.
There are also a number of mobile apps and fitness trackers that work digitally to help you track weight loss. Thanks to wearable technology, keeping track of your gym workouts and calorie intake is not difficult. Just choose the tracking method that suits you best.