In any given one-week period, your weight will either go down, head up or stay exactly the same. The range of weight changes usually will not exceed this: -5 to +5. However, mostly the range will be from -2 to + 2, as the more extreme weekly changes may occur due to starting the first week of a weight loss program (can be lots of weight loss the first week) to gaining more than 2 pounds in a week due to a vacation excursion with lots of alcohol and carb/sugar ingestion.
What will NOT happen in any given one-week period: Gaining 20, 30, 40 or more pounds. So, for those people that find themselves gaining 20 or more pounds (not in 1 week, but rather, over a period of months), how does this happen?
The answer: Those large weight gains are due to the failure to “read and react”. Human nature is such that when weight is going up, many/most people stop getting on the scale. The reason? People do not like to be confronted with “bad” news. By avoiding the scale, we are not forced to face the reality of the ever-growing weight problem. However, there becomes some sort of “final straw”, whether this be the failure to fit into a clothes item, a recent picture we see of ourselves, a new medication being prescribed or other and then we get on the scale. And “Uh-Oh”…the number we see is shocking.
And here is how we can avoid the above scenario: Obligate yourself to hop on that scale once a week (at least), read the weight, and if this increased from the last measure, react to this higher number. The reaction? Obligate yourself to Phase 1 of the SP Dietary Plan for one week, cut out any alcohol usage, try to increase your exercise and then weigh yourself again in 1 week. The chances are great you just reversed the weight gain week and perhaps are even weighing less than 2 weeks before the gain week.
Please do not forget to come into our office for your FREE monthly body scan. This will enforce yet another “read” (and hopefully “react”) scenario. Not monitoring your own weight at home (especially after your visits here) is a recipe for having weight go up much higher, requiring much more work and time to shed that weight. If you ”read and react” weekly, controlling weight will be much easier without the “yo-yoing” of 20 or more pounds.
And if you read my mind, you would understand just how much we will miss you when Nataliya and I leave soon. Enjoy Gordon Lightfoot’s classic.
