I wondered what would happen when the scale arrived. After probably 10 years without one, during my recovery from my ED, I was concerned that I would obsess. But since I am moving from recovery to weight reduction, it was time. I had replaced obsession over the weight with obsession over detecting if I had lost. Much harder to find, and I was constantly looking at my wrists, which seem to be smaller, or photographs from a year ago, or clothing size.
Wel, the fates surprised me. I thought I would have time to adjust to the idea of having a scale. Coming home late last night after a business dinner, I checked my email. “Your scale will be shipped tomorrow,” the message said. As I shut down, I commented on this to my husband, and he looked at me with surprise. “It’s already here – came today,” he said. “Does it work?” i asked. Yes, was the answer.
Well, after a huge day at work, and evening work event, I was exhausted. Too exhausted to determine a rational response, so I followed my usual “silent” response, and sat without saying a word. Inside my head raged the hope that he would go upstairs and be away for a few minutes, so I could try out the scale in secret.
Nobody said I was rational on this topic, ok? I told him I was going to buy one, looked for a week, bid on it on ebay, DH made the e-transfer, and it came. Not exactly a reason for secrecy, huh. But still, I wanted my first weigh-in to be private. DH didn’t even tell me his weight, which he checked. But he did say it did not satisfy him, and he was a little shocked.
I went upstairs to take a bath not long afterwards, and openly carried the scale with me. I measured before the bath, after the bath, after a pee, and again this morning. I do intend to collect a lot of data for a little while, to get a sense of how my weight varies over a day, given normal living circumstances. I’m tracking weight, day, time of day, time since BM, eating since last weigh-in. The repeatability of this electronic scale surprised me. I tested it by getting on and off several times in a row. Even recalibrating wach time didn’t make a difference. This is very different from a mechanical scale, but I’m still assessing if it seems to really be consistent, or is simply not reporting the kind of variation a mechanical scale has.
I promise myself that I will assess obsession over the scale, along with binging. If the BED returns, or the obsession is destructive, the scale goes away again. Sometimes being true to yourself means working through contradictions. The contradiction between tracking weight loss and potential for scale obsession is one of mine. Love and acceptance of myself will get me through.
