I’ve been afraid to get on the scale and weigh myself for the last few weeks. This ties in with the whole feeling like a failure episode that I experienced. It also is part and parcel of my ongoing conflicts and how much power I give to that three digit number.
Because I went through the rough period, I magnified in my mind all of the possible negative results. They ballooned in my head until I was absolutely positive that I must have gained 10 or 20 pounds. I didn’t want to face the evidence of my own fall from grace. This all caused extra stress and upset, of course.
Even when things turned around and I began to eat and behave more sanely and rationally, I still feared stepping up onto the scale for the physical reality check. At that stage, I was afraid that seeing a big gain would send me off the wagon again into the muck of diseased thinking which would lead to me compulsively eating yet again. This is such horrendous cycle.
Instead of just sucking it up and stepping up, I avoided. I focused on my eating and exercise, my readings and emotional work. I took heart in how I feel, how my clothes weren’t oppressively tight, that the shirt I put on fit better than it did the last time I wanted to wear it.
This was all pretty positive, sane behavior, so why wasn’t it enough? Well, there’s the whole “denial” thing to address. Sometimes it is a very strong asset to recovery to not be so locked into measuring my success and recovery based on my actual weight. It really is a good thing to build recovery based on my behavior, my healthy choices, not compulsing or binging, and so on. Unfortunately, sometimes not weighing can also be a form of denial, as in denying that there’s a problem unfolding.
It’s so difficult to balance these things sometimes. I finally decided that I needed to face facts and hope for the best. So, I finally stepped up on the scale. That’s when I discovered that I was still the same weight as I was a couple of months ago. In that moment of discovery, I had a choice to make. I could dive right into the negative and berate myself for not losing, or I could take a deep breath and be happy that, despite the food issues, I had maintained and not gained. I could also, as I shared yesterday, recognize that while the number might be the same, my body has changed and a number of those pounds have switched from fat to muscle. A plus!
Today I am glad that I faced the fear and weighed myself. Today I am also seeking a good and healthy balance. I don’t want to be obsessed with the scale number. I want to keep my focus on choosing to eat healthy food in a healthy, recovery-oriented manner.
Weighty Matters 
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