One Weigh or Another
Claire-ly Addicted

I have an addiction. No, it's not cheeseburgers, potato chips, and cake - well, maybe it is, but that's not what I'm talking about today.

I'm addicted to weighing myself. I do it every day. I know the optimal time to weigh myself and the ideal clothing (or lack thereof) that will make the number more palatable. I have my lowest weights saved on my scale.

I sometimes step off and then back on the scales to make sure I got the lowest number. Some days I go for best 2 out of 3. I have also been know to zero out the scales and start over because I'm convinced one of my kittens must have put a paw on the platform when I wasn't looking.

This daily obsession has its good points. I can clearly see when my weight it going up and not coming back down, so I have the opportunity to make adjustments in my diet to counteract the trend. I'm not saying that I actually do that. It's usually more of a "Huh, would you look at that?" disbelief kind of thing.

One thing that I've realized through this weighing habit is that, while I have a definite weight that I want to get down to, I don't have an upper limit that I won't go above. I never said to myself, if I gain 4 pounds, I must be cheating too much and it's time to stick a little closer to the diet. Why this never occurred to me, I don't know.

The bad thing about weighing myself every day is that weight naturally fluctuates up and down a pound or two. If I'm in a good mood, I can blame it on water weight gain and ignore it.

If I'm not in a good mood, then I blow it out of proportion and I'm fat the rest of the day…so why not just eat the cake? Either way, I'm not being realistic about my weight and I'm more likely to sabotage myself.

Good or bad, I spend way too much time on those step aerobics I perform every morning climbing back and forth onto the scales and then obsessing on the numbers that blink up at me.

So, I concocted a plan. It seemed like a good idea at the time. I packed up my scale and brought it in to work. We are planning to do a group diet and needed a way to weigh in so I was helping others while helping myself. Good for me!

The first day it was great. After all, I had weighed myself that morning anyway (ha, ha!). Then the next day dawned.

You never realize how much you rely on something until it's taken away. That empty spot on the bedroom floor kept drawing my attention. Oh, bathroom scales! I wish you were here! By the time I was getting out of the shower (my optimal weigh-in time) I was jonesing for a weighing fix.

I had to wait until I got to work to weigh in. That presented a whole new set of issues.

How was I going to know what I should wear if I didn't know what I weigh?

Is my weight up so the waistband will pinch if I wear that gray wool skirt?

Is my weight down and I can safely wear those clingy slacks?

What is my mood today? Can that be determined by something other than my weight?

How will I know what to pack for lunch? Is this a starve or cheat day?

And then the most worrisome question of all: If I can only weigh myself at work, is there a way to do that naked?

So far I've made it through the week without disrobing at work. I'm sure my coworkers are all relieved about that. And I've made it through the mornings without stepping on the scales. But now the weekend is here. How will I cope? Can I face the world without this daily information?

I may have to lurk around the gigantic scales at Marc's until there's no one around to see my weight and then quickly hop on and off. Or maybe drop a couple of quarters into one of those machines at the mall to get my weight and fortune.

If I'm really desperate, I can invent plumbing problems and then ask to use my neighbor's bathroom, hoping to get a chance to use her bathroom scales.

I'm sure that my cravings for weighings will decrease over the course of my recovery. Until then, if you happen to see a looney blonde in the bath department at Target, slipping out of her clogs and outerwear, and surreptitiously stepping onto the display bath scales, please don't alert security - it's just me, and I just had to know.

Claire